Sounding on the Academy, February 24, 2010

Some interesting stories along the garden path of my day:

• Marc Bousquet, proprieter of the must-read-blog How the University Works, highlights some key points from the recent and sensible survey of the problems of the Academic Labor Market from Scientific American.  Basic lesson? “The real crisis in American science education,… is a distorted job market’s inability to provide [young scientists] careers worthy of their abilities.”
• A funny and insightful comparison of the conferences of International Studies and Anthropology leads ethnography.com to announce that they like Anthropologists more than International Studies folks.  Let the battles begin!
• In spite of all the stupid red-baiting, the red herrings (like his native identity), and the generally hateful attitude toward Churchill in the press, both the ACLU and the AAUP (that’s the professor’s union, folks) have issued formal statements in support of him, and his quest to be returned to his job and position.