In a perfect storm of events, it’s Passover (first Seder tomorrow night), the plan to make cuts at my university has been released (women’s studies, music, theatre, dance, and modern languages axed, among others), and the PCA/ACA conference begins Wednesday, which means finishing my paper and getting everything set prior to departure.
We’re so rushed for time this year that I might have to follow Slate’s suggestions for How To Get Through the Haggadah in Two Minutes Flat.
I won’t have a new post until my first conference report Thursday.
Happy Pesach!!
Ah, I remember it so well — Hannukah, when all you had to worry about was keeping your latkes from going limp.
Say Hi to Elijah!
“women’s studies, music, theatre, dance, and modern languages axed, among others”
As someone who studied Spanish, I shrieked “MODERN LANGUAGES!!!!!”
Sorry, am too cross to leave a coherent comment.
Hey, all my best for Passover, Jessica! And good luck with that paper.
What? Modern Languages? That was a *huge* program at my public university, even though the school was/is known more for hard sciences. Cannot imagine it being axed! How? Why?
ETA: should mention that my degree was in ML&Linguistics, w/ concentration in Spanish and Russian.
Have a wonderful holiday!
Altho every axed department is terribly dismaying, the closed border to the rest of the world approach to shutting down modern languages, it’s just appalling. What would the taxpayers say I wonder? It’s the future of their children at stake, after all!
Thanks everyone!
I should clarify that while the modern languages majors will be no more, there will still be instruction. It’s not the same thing, and not good enough, but at least there will be some courses. Oh, and classics is going, too. Granted, “classics” was just one person, but…
*Sigh* at what got the axe.
I have to add my sigh to everyone else’s. It sounds like they cut just about everything I love. Bah. Granted, I am (singlehandedly) “theatre” at my university, and that doesn’t really depress me that much. It does, however, strike me as ominous when Modern Languages majors are phased out: these are some of the most professionally useful programs for undergraduates, and I can’t help but see this as part of national decline in emphasis on the vitality of foreign language education. What is going to happen when our work force no longer has the ability to communicate beyond our borders? (Not to mention within them.)
Sigh. I hope that I am just extrapolating melodramatically here.
Well, the Provost’s report comes out 4/8, then it is on to a few other folks, before it becomes official. So the dorr is still open a crack to keeping some of these programs.