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The seven deadly sins of the academy
17 September 2009
Matthew Reisz and our seven guest contributors lift the lid on the rampant wickedness troubling the sanctity of our hallowed universities
When the historian David Starkey left the University of Cambridge in 1972, he told an interviewer that he "knew exactly how an ingrowing toenail felt". There was something deeply dispiriting, he said, about "the sense of introversion, of knowing everyone".
The inward-looking, incestuous atmosphere of university life has long made it a breeding ground for some of the canonical deadly sins. Take the description that the historian Edward Gibbon gave of the University of Oxford in the 1750s. He was taught - or, rather, not taught - by "decent easy men who supinely enjoyed the gifts of the founder. Their days were filled by a series of uniform employments: the chapel and the hall, the coffee house and the common room, till they retired, weary and well-satisfied, to a long slumber."
"A silent blush or a scornful frown" would greet questions on whether their research was ever going to lead to any publications. A tutor called Dr Winchester "well remembered he had a salary to receive, and only forgot he had a duty to perform".
So sloth was almost universal, and avarice pretty common. With them went some milder vices: a fondness for booze, complacency and small-mindedness. The conversations of the dons "stagnated in a round of college business, Tory politics, personal stories and private scandal". Nor would they have scored any higher for student satisfaction than for research output. Gibbon described the 14 months he spent at Oxford as "the most idle and unprofitable of my whole life".
Other common features of closed, hothouse communities are the spite and murderous rivalry that long made Oxbridge colleges popular settings for detective fiction. Starkey conducted a famously vicious feud with his former mentor, Sir Geoffrey Elton, about the interpretation of Tudor history. This may only prove that when an intellectual love affair breaks up, the results can be just as toxic as the messiest divorce. But it's not hard to find academics responding to the work of complete strangers with a depth of malice that would put gossip columnists to shame. And the dispute often turns out to be about a subject so obscure that it would take a month to explain to an ordinary intelligent person what is at stake (and a lifetime to explain why it matters).
The classical scholar and poet A.E. Housman (1859-1936), for example, peppered his books and reviews with carefully distilled venom. A rival editor was "a born blunderer, marked cross from the womb and perverse". Another's error revealed "the felicity of the house of bondage, and of the soul which is so fast in prison that it cannot go forth, (believing that) its own flimsy tabernacle of second-hand opinions is a habitation for everlasting". And what was the terrible crime for which this scholar deserved such a roasting, if not eternal damnation? He had omitted a single citation in an entry to a dictionary.
It would not be hard to draw up a list of traditional academic deadly sins on the basis of such examples. But how many have survived in today's academy, we wondered? Which have disappeared? And, assuming goodwill hasn't broken out on all sides, what have they been replaced by?
Modernisation and a huge expansion of the sector have brought fresh air into even the stuffiest quadrangles. So, if people in general are subject to avarice, envy, gluttony, pride, lust, sloth and wrath, what are the vices particularly prominent on campuses and in common rooms now? Here we present our own personal selection, but we'd love to hear about any sins we've omitted. Lifelong laziness or sloth has surely been booted out of the academy. Laurie Taylor has described in Times Higher Education his memories of a time when universities were "managed - despite the declared aims and objectives - to ensure that the staff (had) an easy life". For better and for worse, those days are gone beyond recall. One of Poppleton's treasures, Dr Piercemuller - "an academic who spends his time wandering round the world and doing no work" - is now an anachronism.
Unlike laziness, lust got off to a slow start in our universities. Gonville and Caius had already been around for more than 500 years when, in 1860, it became the first Cambridge college to abolish compulsory celibacy among its fellows. As late as the 1920s, the critic William Empson had a Cambridge fellowship withdrawn when condoms were found in his rooms. Yet today the most virginal cloisters throb with sexual tensions and lust has a secure place among the academic deadly sins just as surely as it does in the canonical ones. But what else should appear on the list? Looking at the standard seven, academics are probably no more gluttonous, wrathful or envious than any other group of people. A career in higher education is an unpromising choice for the avaricious. Pedantry and procrastination, on the other hand, are surely native to the academy. And, although managerialism and changing social status may have cut back on their wilder excesses, we'd like to suggest that arrogance, complacency, snobbery and sartorial inelegance are still pretty common in some seats of higher learning. But write in and tell us if we've got that drastically wrong - or if managerialism itself should count as a deadly sin.
Once we'd drawn up our list, we needed a team of writers who could analyse it with insight and panache. Although we carefully matched sinner with sin, we knew we were taking a risk. Would the reflections on procrastination be endlessly delayed or never arrive? (Academic and journalistic timescales, after all, are never quite the same.) Would those on pedantry be spiky with learned footnotes in several languages? Would an expert on arrogance even deign to respond to our emails?
We needn't have worried. Most of our writers recognised the sin in themselves as well as those around them. All entered into the spirit and offered amusing examples of their sins in action, why they are a bane of university life or what is to be said in their favour. Although they may never become definitive, we are delighted to present our unofficial catalogue of today's seven academic deadly sins.
SARTORIAL INELEGANCE
At Caltech in the late 1970s, I met a postdoc whose morning change of clothes involved turning his Pink Floyd T-shirt inside out. His only footwear was a pair of pink sandals, "a perfectly adequate interface between my feet and the ground".
He was a rather extreme case, admittedly, of the caricature of the badly dressed academic. Since Socrates, there has been an uninterrupted trend for thinkers to dress badly, or at least carelessly. And even today, the unwritten list of acceptable vanities among academics does not include the wish to dress well - that would be just too trivial.
No institution has done more recently than The Open University to consolidate the reputation of academics as the worst-dressed people in the country. The BBC ably assisted, repeating OU programmes annually, with the embarrassment at the clothing choices on display sometimes rising above the human pain threshold. I myself spent a good decade participating enthusiastically in this organised crime against sartorial taste, as many video nasties attest.
Even if the OU had recruited only sharply dressed presenters, most people would still believe that dons have the dress sense of Mr Bean. Any notion that academics had the faintest concern for how they dressed was destroyed by the world's most famous professor, Albert Einstein - "the worst-dressed man in the world", according to Mrs Paul Dirac. She judged her husband runner-up.
Einstein's contemporary classicist, A.E. Housman, dressed neatly without wasting a second thinking about it, simply by wearing a three-piece woollen suit even in high summer (that was the norm, I gather). Among leading women academics, Marie Curie and Rosalind Franklin had what might best be called a utilitarian attitude to clothing, drawing sotto voce sneers from some male colleagues, none of whom was exactly Beau Brummell.
Today, many academics dress down so far that they are indistinguishable from undergraduates. That excludes, of course, The Management, who are usually expected to dress with at least some semblance of formality. For even the dowdiest academics, the day after they take up their first high-ranking management job, it's a safe bet that they will turn up to work in the approved livery, each lining up to their vice-chancellor's values like an iron filing in a magnetic field.
I sometimes worry that the bean-counters may one day try to enforce dress codes in universities and colleges, as part of some misbegotten quality assurance fad. A few years ago, Trine University in Indiana proposed an "appearance policy", seeking to ban cross-gender garb and Mohawk haircuts and also forbidding any "observable lack of undergarments". The university soon climbed down, however, perhaps realising that the notion of forced conformity is alien to any respectable higher education institution: the essential freedoms of their academics must include dress as well as speech.
When academics leave higher education to work elsewhere, their sartorial freedom usually goes out the window. This happened to my pink-sandalled Caltech acquaintance. After joining a bank, he was permanently spruced and primped to within an inch of his life. But a piece of his heart remains in academia: somewhere at the back of his wardrobe, I hear, he still has that T-shirt.
- Graham Farmelo, a Twitterer, is senior research fellow at the Science Museum, London, and author of The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Quantum Genius (2009).
PROCRASTINATION
There is no sin more dangerous in academia than procrastination. If the world of the academy is about publishing or perishing, then perish the thought that one might delay writing so much as to fail to publish. One can put off writing, reading or preparation for lectures - all of which lead to various forms of humiliation. The wonder is that the fear of public humiliation doesn't spur one into activity, but the paradox is that procrastination is the dysfunctional way to avoid being humiliated. If you do nothing, you can't be accused of having done anything wrong. Procrastination is a sin of omission rather than of commission.
One always intends to write, but there are so many distractions and preparations that must precede the actual deed. To begin with, you must wait for a clear stretch of time set aside, hopefully the product of a grant, which, of course, one can put off applying for. Then again one must clear one's decks, which means of course clearing one's desk, inbox and the accumulated other things one has been postponing, such as writing letters of recommendation, reviewing manuscripts or doing book reviews. These are the smallish tasks of make-work that are the academic equivalents of civil world distractions like watering the plants or watching DVDs.
It is a general rule of procrastination that the body will take precedence over the mind. Hunger trumps inspiration; sleep wins out over determination; sex seems a lot more alluring than writing one more paragraph. To defeat procrastination, you must conquer the instincts and the drives. I am supposedly descended from the Gaon of Vilna, an 18th-century polymath who wrote copiously on a variety of subjects. His secret, apparently, was to soak his feet in ice water as he studied, an act of asceticism that combated the body's natural reticence to remain at the desk for long periods of time. You could say that procrastinators are hedonists in search of asceticism.
The fact that there is no antonym for "procrastination" lets you know that there is a shared cultural assumption that getting things done right now is the proper way to conduct one's scholarly life. But I would like to suggest the counterintuitive point that procrastination can be a devious royal road to the scholarly unconscious.
When I begin to write a scholarly book, I spend a nervously long period of time in utter fallowness. I put off writing for as long as possible. I wander around libraries pursuing a random investigation of the Dewey decimal system. I go in search of one book on a shelf and end up reading the one next to it. I feel I should write. I know I should write. But I do not write. My obsession at this point is to read everything.
Yes, the drive to read on, to plough through the internet and explore the archive, is a massive form of procrastination. Yet, at the same time, it provides me with a liminal space of organised disorganisation. Procrastination leads me to the horror chamber of uncertainty where I hesitate and pray that coherence and an argument will come. Sometimes procrastinating works and I emerge ready to write. Sometimes it doesn't and I abandon the project. But were it not for procrastination, I would never write.
Procrastination has another virtue. If you put off what you have to do until the last minute, you most likely are doing it to defeat another deadly sin of academia - perfectionism. But by putting off the task of writing until the penultimate moment, you will have to give it your best, but not your very best, shot. You can tell yourself afterwards that you could have done better - if only you had the time, which you will no doubt have at some future date.
- Lennard J. Davis is professor in the department of English, University of Illinois at Chicago. He is the author of books including Obsession: A History (2008).
SNOBBERY
The definitive treatment of snobbery is not to be found in Sociological Review nor even in The Poppletonian - although it is surely unsettling that "etonian" is printed in bright red, while the humble, populist prefix "Poppl" - is left in sombre black; at all events, Hilaire Belloc's Cautionary Verses gets to the heart of the whole sordid business.
It is not in those helpful verses that remind us of the dangers of keeping pythons, eating string, or changing light bulbs without waiting for the maintenance department to do a full health and safety assessment, but in The Garden Party, that the full pathos of English snobbery is captured. One might think that the Queen's garden party was a gallant attempt to offset the snootiness of English society by mingling the classes on her lawns for a cucumber sandwich and a cup of Earl Grey. No such luck.
"The rich arrived in pairs, and also in Rolls-Royces/they talked of their affairs/in loud and strident voices." No change there, then, save that it'd be the bankers boasting of their bonuses while sniffing coke in the Buck House tented loos. The poor don't care, since they think social hierarchy is a joke anyway and enjoy gawping at the celebs.
But the unhappiness of the middling sort is tragic: "The people in between/looked underdone and harassed/and out of place and mean/and horribly embarrassed." Is there a message for academic snobbery? Might the true elite neither feel anxiety nor go in for snobbery; that if they bother at all, they do hauteur? But does anyone admit to being "in between", let alone "out of place and harassed"? When the research assessment exercise emphasised the discovery of islands - or was it "pockets"? - of excellence in out-of-the-way places, the most astonishing number of institutions announced that they were world-class at something or other.
The University of Oxford is convicted of snobbery on the strength of its architecture; The Guardian, famously, always illustrates stories about Oxford undergraduate admissions with pictures of All Souls, the one institution that has on its books nothing but fellows of one or another variety. I doubt a photograph of the recently erected chemistry building would convey the not-very-subliminal message The Guardian intends.
Can buildings exude an air of "not for you"? London clubs do, and the hero of Jude the Obscure felt that Oxford colleges did; but they were initially built less to keep non-members out than to lock their members in between dusk and dawn and preserve them from the temptations of the carnal world outside. Perhaps they have changed from prisons to fortresses, strong points in a new class war between the qualified and the unqualified.
The worst sorts of academic snobbery, irresistible to the perpetrators just because they inflict such pain on the victims, are all too obvious. "Oh, do they give degrees in that?" and "Oh, is there really a university there?" "Bolton?" they might ask, "the University of Bolton?" Anyone who thinks they are immune can test themselves by listing from memory every institution that now calls itself "the University of ..." and seeing how many they leave out and how surprised they are to discover their existence. Courses provide a less reliable test. It may be snobbery to sneer at media studies, but asking for the abolition of degrees in complementary medicine and theology - though not comparative religion - wouldn't be snobbery but intellectual hygiene; er, wouldn't it?
- Alan Ryan is a visiting fellow in politics at Princeton University.
LUST
Clark Kerr, the president of the University of California from 1958 to 1967, used to describe his job as providing sex for the students, car parking for the faculty and football for the alumni. But what happens when the natural order is disrupted by faculty members who, on parking their cars, head for the students' bedrooms?
The great academic novel of the 19th century was George Eliot's Middlemarch. The great academic novel of the 20th century was Malcolm Bradbury's The History Man. Both books chronicle lust between male scholars and female acolytes, and I expect that the great academic novel of the 21st century will describe more of the same. So, why do universities pullulate with transgressive intercourse?
When Willie Sutton was asked why he robbed banks, he is famously said to have replied, "because that's where the money is". Equally, the universities are where the male scholars and the female acolytes are. Separate the acolytes from the scholars by prohibiting intimacy between staff and students (thus confirming that sex between them is indeed transgressive - the best sex being transgressive, as any married person will soulfully confirm) and the consequences are inevitable.
The fault lies with the females. The myth is that an affair between a student and her academic lover represents an abuse of his power. What power? Thanks to the accountability imposed by the Quality Assurance Agency and other intrusive bodies, the days are gone when a scholar could trade sex for upgrades. I know of two girls who, in 1982, got firsts in biochemistry from a south-coast university in exchange for favours to a professor, but I know of no later scandals.
But girls fantasise. This was encapsulated by Beverly in Tom Wolfe's novel I Am Charlotte Simmons, who forces herself on to JoJo, the campus sports star, with the explanation that "all girls want sex with heroes". On an English campus, academics can be heroes.
Normal girls - more interested in abs than in labs, more interested in pecs than specs, more interested in triceps than tripos - will abjure their lecturers for the company of their peers, but nonetheless, most male lecturers know that, most years, there will be a girl in class who flashes her admiration and who asks for advice on her essays. What to do?
Enjoy her! She's a perk. She doesn't yet know that you are only Casaubon to her Dorothea, Howard Kirk to her Felicity Phee, and she will flaunt you her curves. Which you should admire daily to spice up your sex, nightly, with the wife.
Yup, I'm afraid so. As in Stringfellows, you should look but not touch. Be warned by the fates of too many of the protagonists in Middlemarch, The History Man and I Am Charlotte Simmons. And in any case, you should have learnt by now that all cats are grey in the dark.
So, sow your oats while you are young but enjoy the views - and only the views - when you are older.
- Terence Kealey is vice-chancellor, University of Buckingham, and the author of Sex, Science and Profits (2008).
ARROGANCE
All academics are equal, but some are more equal than others; and, while arrogance is a trait to be found wherever in the world that scholars congregate, it cannot be denied that some nations' academics are more generously endowed than most. Having taught for a year at the University of Massachusetts and having lectured across America - Arizona, Colorado, Michigan, Hawaii, South Carolina, Nebraska, Georgia, oh, and did I mention Harvard? Yes, Harvard! - as well as having been a regular delegate for more than a decade at the annual conference of the Shakespeare Association of America and the proud possessor of 38 fridge magnets from different states, I am in an unassailable position to pronounce on the arrogance of my trans-Atlantic peers.
American academics attend conferences in best bib and tucker, they are on time, they ask intelligent questions, they are polite, they have beautiful teeth and they are disappointingly sober. Now, all this could be construed as professionalism - particularly when compared with the drunken, late-night antics of the flip-flop-wearing, unshaven and almost always sunburnt Limeys whose most pressing questions are "where's the bar?" and "does anyone remember my room number?" - but, I assure you, it is arrogance. Make no mistake: their reverence for the subject, thoroughgoing knowledge of its intricacies, prolific capacities to produce research of the highest standard ... what unspeakable arrogance!
So shambolic and amateurish is the British version of academe in comparison with that of its colonial subjects that it appears as an object of affectionate contempt in several novels by David Lodge, not least the brilliant Changing Places, in which the charismatic and hubristic Professor Morris Zapp of Euphoria State University gets to swap jobs (and eventually a wife) with the pedestrian pedant Mr Philip Swallow of the University of Rummidge (Birmingham? How could you?): overpaid, oversexed and over here.
We have only ourselves to blame. In a culture as anti-intellectual as ours, a society in which being any kind of teacher (let alone a university teacher) generates derision and incredulity - "What do you actually do with that 12-week holiday?" - nobody in his right mind would choose the second-oldest profession. In the States, academics are properly remunerated, publicly respected and tenured for Chrissakes! Moreover, all US scholars are professors of one sort or another, since the coveted title that in Britain is reserved for those who are supposedly at the top of their game is immediately conferred on the most callow American junior faculty (a manoeuvre of such arrogance that only Warwick in the UK would dare follow suit).
American media dons are showbiz stars who dine at the White House and influence public opinion, instead of appearing on late-night chat shows in the company of an out-of-work comedian, with viewing figures in the low hundreds, to fulminate about the latest nonsense from Gilbert and George. Faced with such assured displays of scholarly arrogance, how should we begin to fight back? With our secret weapon, of course - Received Pronunciation. "Hey, Professor Smith," called one of my American male undergraduates the length of an enormous and bustling corridor (I didn't correct the promotion), "that accent must be a real bitch-magnet!" I then heard myself declaim, in a combination of Lord Laurence Olivier and Sir Leslie Phillips, "Would that it were, young man. Would that it were!"
- Peter J. Smith is reader in Renaissance literature, Nottingham Trent University.
COMPLACENCY
By academic complacency I mean the attitude that one's undoubted distinction in one's own subject entitles one to pontificate about any other; and conversely, that their ignorance of one's own subject disqualifies everyone else from having a worthwhile opinion on anything at all. Such complacency shades into arrogance, of course, but I think of arrogance as the child of vanity, whereas complacency is the child of laziness. The virtue opposed to arrogance is modesty; that opposed to complacency is curiosity. Were there any, quite modest academics could still be complacent. But the vices are closely allied. Lord Rutherford's notorious remark that "there is physics and there is stamp collecting" illustrates both.
I once thought that complacency was the particular sin of mathematicians and scientists. Petted and rewarded from an early age for going through their particular hoops, daily seeing themselves unquestionably better at jumping through those hoops than all their peers, no more faulted for knowing nothing else than a champion golfer is faulted for his football skills, can they be blamed for assuming the mantle of omniscience? I remember long ago an egregious young sprig of this kind declaiming at some length on the evils of opposition to the Vietnam War, and then concluding with a smirk, "Of course, some would say I have too little experience to hold these opinions". My own rejoinder of "Oh no, X, you have exactly the right amount of experience to hold those opinions" was one of my more satisfactory moments on the High Table, which I fear is why I remember it.
But, of course, any subject that has alpha-male status will breed complacency. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, it was Classics, with its certainty that without years of Latin and Greek nobody could govern the colonies, but that with those years, anybody could. Classics was aided by an unholy alliance with theology, as witnessed by the famous remark from Dean Gaisford of Christ Church to a lady asking the value of a classical education that it "elevates above the common herd, enables us to read the words of our Saviour in the original Greek, and not infrequently leads to positions of considerable emolument, both in this life and in that which is to come". Complacency, alas, still stalks Divinity, as listeners to Radio 4 know to their cost.
I fear that there are even complacent philosophers, in spite of the shining examples set by omnivores such as Leibniz and Kant, and sceptics from Socrates through Montaigne to Hume and beyond. But philosophers are not alpha males in the current world and are more likely to be the victims of the vice in others. There are complacent economists, informing us about the way in which all value reduces to cash value; biologists telling us about human nature and how we are born selfish and can be nice only by rebelling against our brains; and physicists finding magical designers wherever their own understandings of the cosmos give out. We poor philosophers often need all the resources of Stoicism to bear up.
- Simon Blackburn is professor of philosophy, University of Cambridge.
PEDANTRY
Does anyone really believe himself to be a pedant (and it is usually a male complaint)? You can probably feel your own lust if you are lucky, smile proudly at your own shabby-genteel clothes, and be complacent about your complacency, but when the wretched bore on the committee says, "I may be being pedantic here ...", he usually means "at least one of us has the seriousness to care about the regulations in the due manner". As with so many of our virtues and vices, there seems to be a conjugation rather than a definition: "I show proper concern for the niceties", "you are a bit of a stickler", "he is a pedant" - and "we are lawyers".
The kiss of death for the history of scholarship is the moment when we forget that, from its very beginnings, there is no scholarly activity without someone mocking its passions and protocols from the sidelines. The pedants are not just always with us, but actually are us in someone's flinty eyes.
The scholars in the library of Alexandria, our ancestors, were mercilessly teased for being "hummers in corners", who cared only whether Homer wrote min or nin (two slightly different versions of the same word, which means "him": a real pedant's worry). I remember a lecture in Cambridge when the professor was holding forth at length whether the right text of a scream in Sophocles was ototototoi or otototototoi, that is, "aargh", or "aaargh". An exasperated student fled muttering loudly, "what difference does it make? It's a scream." And there's the rub of pedantry - it's the scholarly moment when someone else wants to shout: "What's the difference?! - who cares?!"
The pedant is the one who does care and thinks the difference really counts. And tells you. Pedantry has to be performed. You can have secret lusts; you can even be a snob in private, I suppose, imagining in solitude the invitations you would turn down if invited; but it is only when a pedant comes out that pedantry takes place. It needs an audience, or it is just an obsessive-compulsive disorder. Pedantry is that moment when you feel your eyes glaze and your bile rise as your companion says: "Of course, the letter of 15 January 1853, rather than the letter of 19 January, which I think I can show is wrongly dated anyway, must refute the theory of Deathridge."
But the strange thing is that all scholars, hedgehogs and foxes both, love details - the telling fact, the extraordinary coincidence. And we are all capable of falling dangerously in love with pedantry. Think of the lasting success of Fowler's Modern English Usage, a paean to pedantry where irony cannot conceal its true commitment; or A.P. Herbert's legal tales, which revel in the pedant out-pedanting the law. Writing a cheque on a cow, because a cheque can be written on anything, is the pedant's joke par excellence. No one wants to be declared a pedant, but every scholar worth his salt is someone's pet pedant.
- Simon Goldhill is professor of Greek, University of Cambridge, and author of How to Stage Greek Tragedy Today (2007) and Jerusalem: City of Longing (2008).
Readers' comments
Would I be being pedantic to point out to Terence Kealey that were a 'girl in class' to flash her admiration and ask for advice on her essays' from me the favours he seems to have in mind will not be on either of our agendas. In the pursuit of humour he does a disservice not only to the many female scholars who have struggled to get a foothold in academia, but also the many bright female students who have got their good grades through nothing more exciting than hard work.
It is appalling that THE permitted the deeply offensive comments about female undergraduates--from a Vice Chancellor of a UK university no less-to appear in its pages. In places across the Pond he would be forced to resign on the spot for uttering a single one of these misogynous quips. One could hardly find a better example of how utterly 'shambolic and amateurish [ ] the British version of academe [is] 'in comparison with that of its colonial subjects', as Peter Brown so aptly puts it.
sorry, make that Peter J. Smith (not Peter Brown as written)
?? (and you mean UK private University, our only one)
It would have been more fun if Simon Blackburn had added some names to his last paragraph. So, can I start the ball rolling with Paul Davies as one of the physicists?
Carrie; its a light hearted piece. Take the article as it was written. I am sure that your procolmation and pontification of 'harm' to female students is doing more injustice than the article ever will
@Not Carrie Ah, yes, the usual litany of anti-feminist stereotypes ('humorless', 'strident', 'preachy') masquerading as reasoned impartiality.
Re: Lust. “The myth is that an affair between a student and her academic lover represents an abuse of his power. What power?” Was Terrence Kealey’s aim here an attempt to undo some of the traditional ‘feminist’ views on so-called ‘non-consensual’ sex? Carrie, in her comment, distinguishes between female scholars and the many bright female students, only a fraction of whom will proceed to the next level. So how is it to be explained who gets to move ahead and who doesn’t, unless one accepts the fact that women students do use their powers – sexual, social, and so on, to further their careers. How does struggling for some students bring the desired consequences, while for others, all other things being equal, it doesn’t. Surely the disservice being done, to women students, and to men students too, is to perpetuate the myth that anyone who is intelligent enough will get to be a university scholar.
I'm with Carrie - I'm amazed that Terence K has a position in any university, and I'll be damn sure never to apply for a job at Buckingham. Carrie doesn't suggest Terence will "harm" anyone, as not-Carrie mischeviously misquotes, but he most certainly does every academic and half the student body a monstrous disservice. And no, "light-hearted" is not an excuse. Why did THE print this awful, ugly nonsense??
Sorry, otototoi, I don't know your status, or identity, but whatever it is, your response isn't good enough. What you should do is try and fill in the blank: 'I believe Terence does every academic and half the student body a monstrous disservice because _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ '. Sometimes the truth is not pleasant to hear. But whether it is "awful" or "ugly" (in your view) cannot be commented on by others in any logical sense unless you say more about what you think the disservice is. I think that Anthony Giddens would consider it acceptable. And I know some female academics who wouldn't think it offensive, I'm sure.
Please, please stop doing 'humour'. If anyone at an editorial meeting refers to an idea or a piece as 'lighthearted', junk it. The results are always painful to read, and this time they're offensive too. 'What happens when academics go off-piste?' Well, we know what happens. Keep them on piste, for God's sake. If you can find anything for Laurie Taylor to do instead of his sub-Private Eye tosh, that'd be appreciated too.
Are all academics as miserable as the poster above? If so, god help us.
Any scholar who assumes that female students who show interest in the subject and ask for help because they have a crush on you or hope to manipulate you with their sexual charms is a reality-challenged idiot. And anyone who thinks that female students are there in the classroom expressly as objects of the instructor's viewing pleasure needs to retire. (Please.) The implication that "normal girls" aren't inclined toward intellectual pursuits is likewise offensive. I'm sorry that THE printed Kealey's essay. He'd do well to remember the tone-deaf sentiments about women in science that got Larry Summer's ousted from Harvard.
Whatever level you look at it, Kealey's essay is completely inappropriate. It is suprisng he wrote it and it is suprising it was published. What is most shocking is the disrespect to his wife.
With reference to this section: "I sometimes worry that the bean-counters may one day try to enforce dress codes in universities and colleges, as part of some misbegotten quality assurance fad." why do the support staff in universities have dress codes when their academic peers do not? I want to wear jeans!
Kealey wrote: "Normal girls - more interested in abs than in labs, more interested in pecs than specs, more interested in triceps than tripos - will abjure their lecturers for the company of their peers". He was saying that, in general, female students are sexually attracted to and want a social life with their peers, just as male students are. I wouldn't say he was correct in that, that young men and women are equally drawn to sexual pursuits, but that's not the same as suggesting that "'normal girls' aren't inclined toward intellectual pursuits", as SG thinks he is saying. As far as Colemar's comment is concerned, s/he forgot to add "In my opinion" or offer an explanation of what s'he thought was disrespectful to Kealey's wife. It surprises me that people offer up negative comments in this forum without an analysis of the piece or telling what exactly they found inappropriate or disrespectful. I would have to take a wild guess and say that it must be Kealey's remark "the best sex being transgressive, as any married person will soulfully confirm", as that is the one that comes the closes to admitting 'transgression', although since sexual desire takes place in the mind as well as the body, it's hard to tell. Or maybe Colemar feels uncomfortable talking about this subject in specific terms, as did ootototototoi, keeping to tradition and probably just wanting any campus sexual activity to remain something people do but do not talk about, much as homosexuality was before it came out of the closet.
How cliche to focus on this section. Still, "most male lecturers know that, most years, there will be a girl in class who flashes her admiration and who asks for advice on her essays", Yes, probably. And perhaps - just perhaps! - she wants advice on her essays. There is a double standard here. I think it is a shame that female students seemingly can't express admiration (because intelligence and wisdom are worth admiring regardless of gender) and ask for advice without sexual undertones being read into it. These sort of relationships can be intimate, but intellectual intimacy is not quite the same thing. If I were a male lecturer I'd be positively frightened of mentoring or working closely with female students for how it might come across, and attitudes like the above don't exactly help. Which doesn't help women to succeed in the academy, does it?
Ok, a few points on why I think that piece was duff: 1. Heteronormativity and the privileging of the male gaze; 2. "The fault lies with the females." "But girls fantasise." "Enjoy her! She's a perk." Jackassery of the highest order, IMHO; 3. The general impression the piece gave of being written by someone who wishes he could but feels obliged, in this day and age, to point out that you can't, and to imply thereby that that's a shame; 4. Smelling of old person like a pee-soaked slipper. [sorry, I know, that's so ageist. So blow me.] That enough to be going on with?
In respect to Sue McPherson's point, I think it was the line:'Which you should admire daily to spice up your sex, nightly, with the wife' that indicated disrespect. I think there may be issues about relationships between female students and staff but rarely do I think the issue is that young women have any desire for middle aged men (except that men will interpret any smile or interest as a sexual interest). If you dissect this piece at all, the assumption are terrible. It assumes that academics are men who have wives at home with whom they have no sexual interest and clearly no respect. That is without going into the assumptions about female students. It can be dismissed as a joke but it is a very revealing joke. Or may be I am just too conventional!
Oh dear. Whenever Kealey pops up you just have to remember that he isn't representative. I'm more worried about the tosh that ITV2 is about to unlease on the unsuspecting public in their 'Trinity' show. It's probably as accurate as the depition of Footballers Wives lives, but aspiring WAGs are a small group - asppiring students will come away with a completely absurd view of University live. Kealey simply reguritates 1960s fictional views - mingled with Tom Sharp's view of US HE (where the academics play a remarkably small role in proceedings) and as such are only of historical value - 'look kids, that's what lecturers used to think of their students'...
Trade sexual favours for percentages? The author plainly hasn't visited my faculty recently. I'd rather spend extra time swotting in the library each week, thanks very much. I'm sure that my male lecturers have "interesting personalities", I'd just rather not spend enough one-to-one time with any of them to find out. (NB This post is humorous and not at all sexist).(Honest).
Arch Eyebrow, This must be one of the main challenges of being a prof, in this age of sexual harassment - to figure out which of the students are game, and which are not. As Kealey says, most years there will be at least one. Yes, male lecturers do have more to worry about if they could be subjected to punishment for doing what lecturers have always done, because of feminism. Does it help women succeed in the academy? Yes and no. It depends in part on the match between student and prof (lecturer). If they meet on mutual grounds (either sexual only or sexual plus intellectual, if that's what he wants, then it can be beneficial to the student also. What is tragic is if the relationship with the prof can't happen because of the personal aspects. In today's world, it seems the relationship is vital, and not just the intellectual one. Colemar, The thought behind the phrase "Which you should admire daily to spice up your sex, nightly, with the wife" doesn't necessarily mean there is disrespect towards one's wife. One can still remain faithful to one's spouse, some to a greater extent than others, as Bill Clinton's experience informs us. No, I don't think you're too conventional. Men from earlier generations, running around on their wives and thinking nothing of it, are probably the conventional ones. If you talk about it and don't just play sexual games, then you're not conventional.
I think THE has performed a valuable public service by exposing Keeleys views to scruinty.
Leave Keeley alone.
Sue, Sorry, I don't quite follow you. Are you saying that *feminism* has perpetuated a situation in which male lecturers are reluctant to really engage with their female students because of the fear of sexual harassment allegations? If that's what you're saying, I don't buy it. The point I was making is that we are clearly not in a situation of equality where female students are unable to express sincere interest in a topic without it being automatically misread as a sexual come-on, and as far as I am concerned feminism does have a role to play in remedying that. It has the unfortunate consequence that male lecturers become unwilling to assist in the development of young female scholars (studies on mentoring in the academy consistently show that male students receive more faculty support) because they are afraid of being seen to have done something wrong - when in fact the relationship may be intimate, but still innocent. I absolutely think ethical boundaries are crossed when faculty engage in sexual relationships with their students, btw.
Stop wasting time analyzing the nonsense that one of our esteemed VC's have written to be 'down with the kids' and get back to work. Its just not worth it. Would love to hear him explain his submission in any future job interview though, and if I were a female student with a grudge I would say that the door is open for some interesting complaints.
Arch Eyebrow, There are all sorts of lecturers, some of whom would be reluctant to really engage with (some) female students for that reason - fear of sexual harassment allegations. I'm sure there are many situations, too, where neither one - the male lecturer or the female student (for this discussion) can know for sure if there is a sexual aspect to an interaction. Even if there wasn't to begin with, the interaction could lead to increased intimacy over time, couldn't it, including sexual intimacy. You can't prevent the attraction from happening, although the freedom to act on it can be regulated by the university, and possibly by the people involved. Where feminism comes in is that it has not only made men and women on campuses aware of serious sexual harassment issues, but it has also led to a situation where women students might be more knowledgable about the affect of their sexual power on men *and,* because of the liberating influence of feminism, more likely to use it.
Of course it goes on, even with the younger crop of male academics, I suspect much more widely than one would think. I was an u/g fairly recently, and had a predictable crush on my lecturer ("because he's clever!"), but I knew it was ridiculous. Strangely enough I also wanted to work hard; my interest in the course preceded this girlish feeling of... eye-fluttering. So I just got over it. What puzzles me in the comments here is the line of "women in academia." Are we all saying this is a massive problem, what are the facts? I am now a postgrad and will be trying to get a job in a couple of years. Thanks THE and commentators for simultaneously making me feel like Kealey's idea of "Girly Swat in Sex Romp" nonsense (i.e. rubbish), even if only in the proverbial Stringfellows sense, *and* hide-bound for failure. And here I was thinking it doesn't make a toss of difference if you're a woman or not. Shalln't procrastinate anymore. Thesis writing awaits. *flaunts curves, all the way to the library*
Not Kealey's Wife - nice arse!
Get down, Howard Belsey!
I wrote about women in academia, as it happens, in an essay, in 1994 (http://samcpherson.homestead.com/files/EssaysandWriting/WmnInAcadmiaSMcPherson.doc). That was when I still thought everything was straightforward. There's always the informal, hidden side of it, isn't there. And to answer the pg student's question, the one writing her thesis, how can there get to be facts, if there are a lot of female students marrying or otherwise sleeping their way to success, when the ones doing the research would be the very ones who are successful at getting support (funding) for their research. People who do research on controversial topics such as sex and sexuality (whether academics or not) are probably all subjected to a great deal of criticism, and for women whose focus is the sex habits of female students in the academy there would probably be even more criticism (or punishment). How could such researchers ever expect to get truths about this topic (from surveys, etc) when it is so political and the subjects so wise, politically? The 'massive problem' as the pg called it, wouldn't just be limited to academia. It's a condition of the social world we currently live in (if it exists to such an extent that we consider it a problem). And what makes it a problem? Is it that it's not just women who are intelligent who are using their power, but also women who are not. And if the mediocre women get to be reluctant to have the intelligent ones around at all (or maybe they already are) what will happen to our world. That's assuming it takes people with intelligence to work at making our world a better place and do a reasonably good job at it.
Girls fantasize? It seems to me that the one fantasizing in Dr Kealey's account is none other than the male professor! He fantasizes about his his student when he is with his wife! He fantasizes (read imagines) the admiration of his students.
Creepy...
Unfortunatley Terence Kealey's article is depressingly true from my experience, how many times do I see sad, passed it, old male academics stand around in the pub, declaring with a grin that their wives are at home so they can happily chat up 19 year olds…similarly in a number of institutions I've worked in a number of males lecturers have spent their entire careers, using the position to get off with women. But having said that, it truly is disgusting that THES thinks this is ok to print 'joke' or not, because it ain't funny, and yes if he's a bloody Vice Chancellor, I think he needs to be disciplined and sacked for what are patently offensive, sexist attitudes.
I am quite frankly appalled that the THES published Kealey's piece. What a slap in the face to all women in academia.
I'm appaled that everyone's so appalled! - it's just not that important, or offensive
AND the editor's a woman...how wrong is that?!
Appalled wrote: "I am quite frankly appalled that the THES published Kealey's piece. What a slap in the face to all women in academia." And I am disappointed that, having taken the effort to respond to such comments as this one, that this reader, who is anonymous, obviously didn't bother taking the time to read and think about other comments on this piece. Lady, you may feel offended, but it isn't all women who engage in such practices. To try and pretend that it doesn't happen at all, that there isn't a sexual element in universities between students and professors, and that it doesn't affect women's careers in academia, is a rather naive view. Sometimes I think there is more hidden in the world today, despite the attempts to make it appear otherwise. As Noel Douglas says, men of previous generations could be more open about their lustful feelings whereas today, as I mentioned in another post, they have to keep them under wraps while they seek out like-minded people.
Jesus Sue, I think most readers have a hard time following the so-called logic of your arguments let alone accept your postings as conclusive. I mean, what the heck do you mean in responding to Appalled by saying "Lady, you may feel offended, but it isn't all women who engage in such practices." I think Appalled was appalled for the same reason i was while reading Kealey's comments--it's loaded with sexist, and frankly boring, crap. By this, since you seem to have difficulty following trains of thought, I mean that when Kealey says things like "Normal girls [are] more interested in abs than in labs, more interested in pecs than specs, more interested in triceps than tripos," or, "the fault lies with the females," or just the tone of the entire piece with its assumption that academics are by default straight males, Kealey is spewing very unfunny, uninteresting, and yes, appalling BS.
Sorry if it wasn't clear what I meant in my last post, DNS. Appalled said she thought it was a slap in the face to ALL women in academia. My response was that,if she wasn't one of those who screwed around with lecturers, for fun or profit, she doesn't have to feel offended. I guess I misunderstood what she was offended about. This situation is similar to another topic I commented on recently, actually about Serena Williams behaviour at the US Open being a slap in the face to women playing the sport, and I guess I was thinking of that, too. I don't see that ALL women should be offended by the behaviour of some. Personally, I don't care what other women do. I just wish not ALL women were expected to participate in the sexual activities on campus. Similarly, if I did get it wrong and we women are ALL supposed to get irate about the writings or thoughts of some academic or non-academic (in this case Kealey) then she really has given him some kind of legitimacy he hardly deserves - speaking for all men, telling THE truth. I think you and Appalled have a right to be appalled, but Appalled was suggesting ALL women should be appalled. Yes, I would say some of what Kealey said was incorrent. Women's sexuality is not the same as mens and yet he speaks as if women's desire is the same. I think girls of a certain age ARE more interested in abs than labs, otherwise campus publs on British campuses wouldn't be so popular. I believe the idea that "the fault lies with females" (taken out of context here) is probably related to Kealey's suggestion (in "What power') that men don't really have the power. Often, they don't even have the power to resist. Finally, people usually do speak from their own perspective, and Kealey is probably heterosexual. I hope you can follow this okay. Maybe you have a different kind of brain.
I have a chill: the Spanish Inquisition is knocking at the door. It's not that people are appalled - I'm regularly appalled - it's that they want to externalise this and swear that people have no right to the opinions that appall them. This is downright frightening - Thoughtcrime. I want people to be able to be honest, even if I disagree with them along every dimension. Just stop and think of the alternative...
I thank everybody for their comments. This is a moral piece that says that middle aged male academics and young female undergraduates should not sleep together. Rather, people should exercise self-restraint. Because transgressional sex is inappropriate, the piece uses inappropriate and transgressional language to underscore the point - a conventional literary device. At a couple of places, the piece confounds expectations, another conventional literary device, designed to maintain the reader's interest. Sex between academics and students is not funny, and should not be a source of humour. But employing humour to highlight the ways by which people try to resolve the dissonance between what is publicly expected of them and how they actually feel - not just in this context - reaches back to origins of humour itself. In his introduction, Matthew wondered how many of his contributors would enter into the spirit of levity that inspired the idea of the seven deadly academic sins (submitting a piece on prevarication late, etc) and I suspected that one could get to heart of all that is wrong with sex between scholars and students by employing the good ol' boy language of middle aged male collusion. I'm not sure I'm wrong.
Sue: The main thing you have made clear in your latest post is that we do indeed have very different brains. Thank Jesus for that. I perused some of your material on the Montreal Massacre and was very glad to have my well-oiled mind. Dr. Kealey: Thanks for the clarification. I feel bad for you. On Jezebel, and most likely many other feminist sites, they are ripping you apart based on not only your attempt at satire, but your picture taken from your university's website as well. I actually discussed the possibility that this was a failed piece of humour earlier today with a friend, but we thought that most people who had read Swift's ur-satire--a group I assume you belong to--would have gone even further with the details or sexist blather in order to clearly indicate the authorial intention.
This seems to be a blatant attempt to besmirch an impeccable professional woman academic - who made a point of NEVER sleeping with students or academics (outside those she was married to, speaking of the fellow academics that is) 0-={
Thanks for nothing, DNS - I'm always eager to respond to any critique of anything pertaining to the Montreal Massacre. It took me living in England, away from Canada, to be able to see clearly the other side of the more general interpretation of the tragedy originally named the Montreal Massacre, later referred to as the Ecole Polytechnique massacre - or just another school killing (except it was ALL women who were killed). Dr Kealey: the trouble with your explanation, above, of this "moral piece" about undergraduates is that undergraduates get to be postgrads, and then the situation changes - students and lecturers may not seem so far apart, in their intellectual ability, goal aspirations, and quest for marital partners. By the way, women in academia often do take sexism seriously (appalling) as demonstrated in some of the comments here, and I'm pretty sure that Marc Lepine must have experienced the antagonism of female students and staff, in all his real state of powerlessness, for him to have acted the way he did. Even in satire there is some truth, and I'm certain too that universities are great places for male academics to get laid, as you (didn't) suggest.
Terence Kealey may not believe he is wrong but the line 'The fault lies with the females' highlights his antiquated attitude. I appreciate that Terence Kealey wrote this as a tongue in cheek article but he makes light of a highly serious issue. The longer it remains a joke and the blame for such transgressions placed at the feet of women the longer women struggle to achieve respectability in the academic world. A recent University graduate myself I have experienced the rumour-mill which comes with the territory when you are an outgoing 'curvy' female. It is a treacherous landscape, when you receive a good grade because you are intelligent and you, unlike your peers did the research and debated fiercely in the open forums, the assumption is suddenly made that you must be dallying with your professor. As long as men like Mr. Kealey exist with such viewpoints as outlined in his article women like me will continue to be accused of being more boobs than brains. We are not at University to be oogled, we are there to learn and enjoy ourselves just as our fellow students do and yet due to our physical make up we are subjected to cruel rumours, bullying and general harrassment. This is not an overstatement of the facts, when one of my professors got wind of the latest gossip doing the rounds about the professionalism of our acquaintance he made a concentrated effort to distance himself, to prove to both faculty and student body that there was nothing going on. What was going on was a coming together of two very different attitudes and viewpoints, an imperialist historian waging war with a woman who was a product of the old British empire. It made for lively group tutorials and hotly contested term papers. However, even this pure academic venture had to be tarred with the brush of perversion. So the professor began to treat me in an appauling manner, which rendered him unavailable to me for academic help. When your professor makes himself unavailable for guidance during an entire academic year there is only one possible result. My work suffered a great deal as my confidence in my academic ability diminished. The fault does not lie with the females in question in this equation but with the jealousy of her peers who cannot match her standards and with the perversions of the middle aged married man who wants what he can no longer have. When I graduated I did so with my head held high, the grades had been earned in a thoroughly noble manner - by battling adversity, more to the point my professor left a lecture he was conducting to watch us begin our graduation procession and publically applauded me for my efforts. I was left with the thought that perhaps we had both been victims of the ol' boy network and female tittle-tattle which Kealey seems so very fond of, and that the situation had been caused less by our lack of professionalism and more by the tainted thinking of others. Perhaps they, like Kealey should check themselves first before they point fingers and damage the reputations of others.
Dr Kealey: "Sex between academics and students is not funny, and should not be a source of humour. But employing humour to highlight the ways by which people try to resolve the dissonance between what is publicly expected of them and how they actually feel - not just in this context - reaches back to origins of humour itself. " Yes, quite. Unfortunately you have mixed your messages in the pursuit of levity. If the piece is intended to be satire, you should have gone the whole way with the language of 'middle-aged collusion' rather than attempting to keep one foot in the 'don't transgress' camp and another in the 'merrily transgressing' camp. Anyway, you have been dragged thoroughly over the coals in relation to this so I don't intend to continue. Not Kealey's Wife: I am a female postgrad too. I don't think anyone is suggesting you will face dire hardship as a result of your gender. But it would be a mistake to regard it as an irrelevance. Even if it's coming from the occasional rotten apple, comments like 'you'd just be there as eye candy' (as I have been told myself!) do hurt and knock confidence, and there is the above mentioned problem with faculty reluctant to assist with the development of female scholars if there is a risk it could appear transgressive. I don't think attitudes like Sue's, which appear to paint women as devious vixens using their sexuality to further their careers (sorry if this is a misrepresentation, Sue, but I am struggling to understand you) particularly help either.
"This is a moral piece that says that middle aged male academics and young female undergraduates should not sleep together" this statement is obviously the ramblings of a middle aged man with delusional fantasies that his young female students would actually engaged in sexual relations with him. Get over yourself, please. Women students do not want to feel like sexual objects placed in lectures for the sexual gratification of a dirty old professor. Get some respect for women academics, and please get some respect for your long suffering wife.
*eyeroll* What is becoming abundantly clear is that both the original piece and some of the comments it has spawned demonstrate a complete failure to understand subtlety.
I'm sorry but the truth of the matter is that when old men perve over their female students they certainly don't do it subtlety.
Slap the sexist professor down:. (a) You don't have to be an old man to ogle female students, and not all academics are old men. (b) I'm sure some of them do in fact do it subtly, but you wouldn't notice it then, would you? Especially given that (c) You have completely missed my previous point.
Won't SOMEBODY think of the children!!!?
Having read through the expressions of outrage above, I can only conclude that some members of the academy do not believe that the Pope is a Catholic or that bears shit in the woods.
This article's now linked to by the Torygraph and the BBC. Obviously it is a slow news week...
In these days of excessive political correctness, it's refreshing to read Dr Kealey's article. We are human, men desire women. We wouldn't be here otherwise. Why not make a bit of a joke of it. I work in a German Investment bank in the IT department, no such perks around here....I'm considering become a University lecturer now thanks to Dr Kealey!
Im a female student at University and I still managed to find the article that everyone is so disgusted by quite funny. It was clearly not meant in seriousness no-one in there right mind would write that kind of article with todays need for Political Correctness in absolutely everything. Its ridiculous that everyone is ranting about it.
I predict that applications to Buckingham will now soar. Very crafty, Dr Kealy -- well done.
I'm a bit miffed that I never seem to get treated as eye candy...
After making a rather poor joke - he then attempts to pass it off as a commentary on the merits of humour in debate: "But employing humour to highlight the ways by which people try to resolve the dissonance between what is publicly expected of them and how they actually feel - not just in this context - reaches back to origins of humour itself." He obviously doesn't have the courage to stand by his original comments...
Oh, get a life! As a curvy female who survived years of university education without any unwanted advances, I clearly remember those who put on their low cut tops and fluttered their lash extensions in the hope of a better grade. Perhaps it worked - I never cared as I got good marks anyway. And as a teacher, could I say that I did not get a little hot under the collar when a gorgeous young man came up to me asking for advice on his research? Do I laugh at the Diet Coke break adverts? Do I enjoy the sight of handsome young men and joke about it to my female friends? Does that make me unsafe to teach young men? I think not! Can men not laugh a little at what is a perfectly understandable reaction to those women who come to lectures dressed for an Ibizza beach party? He's warning his male colleagues, which is a good thing, yet keeping a sense of humour, which is also a good thing, surely.
The article is quite clearly written in jest and I enjoyed it every bit as much as the regular Poppletonian feature on the back page. Thanks for the chuckles
My God, you're a s***y writer.
Grow up everyone - we're talking about adults at university, not children at school.
This would all make for a very good episode of South Park, I can see the line from Moira L. Panic shouted by Randy... is there nothing bigger and more important going on in the world, things that may need our attention more... Good article, clearly too many people with nothing else going on around them... Good Times...
It's dissappointing that everything has to be so over analysed. Political Correctness is just crap meant to destroy the left over sense of humour...
Brilliant! A boldy sarcastic article that seems to have drawn in all the PC Officers to bite. Now what else is happening in the world?
I do not see the problem. I think it works both ways for male and female teachers. They all know that a male or female student can sometimes flirt a little too much. From being on the side/perspective of the student I know that some girls would tease the teachers on purpose and wear clothes which they hoped would have the required effect. It is part of growing up and I am glad to read the teachers point of view in a humourus manner. Lets not try to be too PC and understand that he has written about this to open the subject for discussion. Are we all so old that we have forgotten what it is to be a student?
<i>I thank everybody for their comments. This is a moral piece that says that middle aged male academics and young female undergraduates should not sleep together. </i> But instead, the middle aged male academics should lust from afar and fantasise over the young female undergraduates while sleeping with their wives?! That may be your idea of morality but it is not mine. Are you seriously suggesting that the only immoral act here is that of actual penetrative sex? You don't think it's immoral to encourage male academics to objectify their female students? You disgust me.
I'm currently studying at a top university in this country (hence I'm staying anonymous), and I know of female students who have used their womanly charms to increase their percentages and have admitted it. It disgusts me, but I'm not pretending that it doesn't happen. However, the article itself is humorous and I don't think that Kealey is endorsing any misbehaviour at all.
There's only one response to Terry please sack him - if I were at this backward looking University I'd be organising a rally. At least potential students know where not to go.
I'm a member of staff at a Russell Group university. On the whole, I enjoy working with female students and female members of staff. I enjoy their intellectual curiosity, sense of humour, mental acuity and dedication to their work. I don't pay much attention to their physical attractiveness, or lack of it; it doesn't seem appropriate to do so in an academic environment. Terence Kealey's piece reduces such relationships to a low common denominator. Rather like a 'Carry On' film or one of those 'saucy' seaside postcards, it's indicative of a point of view that I don't share.
Just goes to show you can't be too careful. <p> Kealey may well have tried to be funny, but the only intonation of humour in the whole thing is its context amongst the other 'sins' (that and the fact that there's now a lot of people in a lot of universities having a good laugh at his expense). The piece really does just make him sound like an old perv.<p> We shouldn't mock him if he can't write for toffee - he's just a VC, after all. ;-)
Dr. Gyro - Secretly you are the double-dipped, exquisitely flavoured chocolate tidbit of fantasy. How was that?
Lighten up everybody. We're all falling for a whole bunch of cliches. If you've seen Kealey's picture, you'll see it's just a lustful old man we're talking about, who is sharing his own ground rules with the world in an attempt to be humorous. His wife should string him up for this account of being aroused by a flash of 'admiration' by day and channelling that into nighttime encounters with her. While there may be people who attempt to gain better grades though sexual favours, and those who attempt to gain sexual favours against a promise of better grades, this is surely a thing of the past. I've had relationships with former students who had nothing to gain from dating their lecturer. Maybe when I am no longer single and my students are more than 20 years my junior, I'll still have a grown-up enough attitude to sex to avoid such lecherous looks at students and to enjoy marriage without fantasizing in the dark.
I'm female and I thought the article was very funny. *shrugs* If only maths profesors were hot :(
mmm... thanks!
Well I'm female too and my maths professors *are* hot! :)
Gawd people get over it, it's written in jest end of. No need to be so in depth about all of it. Leave the poor old bugger alone
After having read the said offending article from a female perspective I really do not see the issue. So someone looks at you because you happen to be attractive erm doesn't everyone do that both male and female!! Not one soul can tell me that they are not more inclined to help the gorgeous looking guy or gal so essentially that makes us all hypocrites.
Vice Chancellor Kealey was obviously fishing for a reaction with that piece. Low and behold, he got more bites than a tourist in Scotland lacking midge repellant. An effective wind-up from an obviously experienced wind up merchant.
what uni please? :D
Kealey's view is not wrong. It used to happen and it still does happen, look at the music teacher with her student earlier this week. It may be in low occurance, but he is still stating a fact. Also look at the pay gap between male and female, again is it not a fact? He simiply took facts and wrote it up in very very good literature. In england there is still a very very sexist social community. Female will not make it big, nor will they have the same amount of bonus or salary again a fact. This occurs only because the male dominate the place and make sure females fail or be hindered. Not saying there aren't women up at the top, just not that many. May I also add rich successful women, are females that males dont want. There is still a lot of testosterone flying about. Blame it on the equal rights, equal sex department for not doing a good job. And my god where have all your banta humour gone, this is just like a blonde or brunette jokes, don't see you all complaining about those.
I don't think anyone has pointed out yet that the whole article is in fact very masculinist, and written almost completely from a male point of view. All the authors are male and although no one else is as explicit as Keeley in his misogyny, the whole article seems to just be the ramblings of a bunch of boring old guys, and reflects their total lack of self-consciousness in regard to this fact. So, the real question is: why has the THE provided a venue for this kind of crap? They should be just as answerable as Keeley for giving page space to what is ultimately potentially damaging for women in universities, since it feeds into the kinds of vague assumptions that women in academia *still* have to deal with everyday.
Why do people still think sexism is funny or acceptable? This man is disgracful. It is not acceptable to objectify women. He should be ashamed of himself.
Its insulting and offensive to women to assume that they're such bland, sexless, powerless creatures as to be incapable of occasionally flirting with their lecturers.
I am frnakly appalled by how out of touch Terence Kealey is with issues of sexual harassment in educational institutions. The idea that its OK for male lecturers to 'look but not touch' attractive female students as a way to 'spice up their sex life', and to consider this a 'perk of the job', simply reinforces a culture of objectifying and denigrating women. Whether through physical actions or fantasy, the effect on women is the same, legitimising a culture of sexual manipulation. I'm surprised that a reputable university such as Buckingham would have leadership so out of touch with current understandings of such basic social issues. Perhaps its time for Kealey to step down, as Larry Summers, president of Harvard University did, shortly after his mysogenistic comments about women's capacities for science? And be succeeded as he was, by a female president more in touch with the times?
I found the Lust section very amusing - but I was one of the girls with a huuuuuge crush on one particular lecturer (I'm not sure whether he ever realised), and plenty of attraction to several others. Maybe it's even funnier because I want a career in academe.
A quick look at the comments on www.ratemyprofessors.com makes clear that the perception of looks is not entirely one-way. The professor rated as "hottest" in the "Top 10 hot professors" (Hugo Schwyzer) attracted comments such as "not a dull moment!! and hes not too hard on the eyes! :)" and "as the other rater said, quite easy on the eyes, but even easier on the ears" And then, for second-placed Math professor Andrew Beran: "More importantly, yes, he is a hottie...in disguise. I would do anything to give him a makeover--so much potential. HOLY...", and "The Beranster is the man.... the cal class is too long but he makes it fun... HOLY CANCELLATION he is a cute one.. maybe I should get an A now lol... " I think you get the picture.
From what I can see from the website, THE has a female editor, female books editor, female deputy news editor, female chief reporter and a female chief sub. Not really a bunch of "boring old guys" really.
To be fair to Terence Kealey, it's not exactly mens' fault that young women often dress up in ridiculously revealing clothes. Although I would never condone 'enjoying' the sight, I do think the responsibility in many cases lies not with the men but with the women. It's hardly surprising if a man shows a keen sexual interest in a woman, if she's flaunting her wares at him. Typical clothes might include low-cut tops and mini-skirts: it's just stupid to wear such clothes and NOT expect huge amounts of attention from men (sometimes even leading to sexual harassment). If women want to be respected for who they are, and not viewed as a piece of meat to have sex with, then they should dress in less revealing clothes! Surely that's just common sense? On the other hand, if a woman does nothing (and I emphasise the word 'nothing'... wearing a slightly less low-cut top that's still revealing, and a skirt that goes half way down the thighs rather than actually showing the underwear does not count as 'nothing') to merit such attention, other than the fact that she is extremely attractive by nature, then the fault lies entirely with the man. Men should learn to control themselves in such matters, and women should do nothing to exacerbate what, for men, is a huge issue (i.e. lust).
Those who huff and puff over Mr K and his comments, get a grip! Why vent about how un pc he is when u r only trying to show how pc u r - sensible females don't get hot and bothered over things like this. And anyway, any female student who would be willing to offer sexual favours in return for higher grades from such a person would actually deserve them - after all, how many women would climb over a pig to get to him?
I think the man is right. Affairs occur, and good looking students ARE a perk of this job. ANYONE who has EVER gone to school knows that good looking students (women,mostly) sometimes flaunt their stuff. If you don't agree, you're lying to yourself or have never been to school. I don't see anything disrespectful towards women. Unless you're a hard-core feminist, at which point is is obvious that anything that is ever said about women you'l ltake offense to, even if most "normal" women will not. I look forward to your deranged rebuttals: thesamba@aol.com
So the girls who do come into class wearing just a belt and a see through top now want the lecturers to just look at their shoes or the ceiling for two hours? Maybe they should worry about their own dress sense and the 10 - 200 male students in their class, rather than what its going through the mind of the lecturer? In the article he warns against doing anything other than looking, and in a lecturers role, what can they do other than look into the audience?
I love how everybody comes out and claims to love this as a humourous piece of satire AFTER Dr. Kealey has announced his intentions. Haha, right...
If anyone wants to email Kealey himself here's his email: terence.kealey@buckingham.ac.uk. Let him have it!
I am a woman (as helpfully pointed out by a poster above), a feminist and I have a sense of humour. Most importantly, however, I believe in academic freedom and the right to free speech. Terence Kealey was asked to write on the theme of “the seven deadly sins of academe”. He was explicitly asked for a “lighthearted” or “wry” piece, and we suggested the topic of “lust”, which was a “sin” identified by a straw poll of academics; it was not Dr Kealey’s own suggested topic. Dr Kealey’s article was satire. I fully support his right to express himself in this way. If people are offended, that is their right and they also have the right to express that.
If we cannot have freedom of speech and robust debate in the academy where can we have it?
Ann Mroz
Editor
Poor Terry k. The Times Higher, aware that "the most virginal cloisters throb with sexual tensions and lust" (see Intro), ask him to write a short essay on lust in HE. He does so, pointing out what is surely obvious to everyone; i.e. that lust does not respect professional boundaries, that men like the sight of pretty girls, and some girls take advantage of this. Predictably, this is followed by accusations of condoning sexual inequality, disrespecting women, etc. Other suggest that the entire notion of a young woman having anything to do with a much older man is a male fantasy, which is obviously untrue (just take a look around). These people need to get a reality check. The whole point of lust is that it doesn't respect politically correct morality, and one shouldn't have to face calls to be sacked for merely pointing out what is, frankly, bleedin' obvious. But acting on one's lust is a different matter, and Professor K cautions us to "look, don't touch", which seems pretty sensible. It's just a shame that he felt he had to follow-up his amusing piece with a dull piece of self-justification in the face of the even duller ideologues.
Just a thought, what if the subject matter of the article would have been race, say jokes about Asian students, would they have gotten away with it? I did some research into male academics in social sciences and feminism while doing my undergrad degree in 2000. There is a distinct disjunction between the public façade and private thoughts.The public persona of the male academic, well-mannered and upholding pro-feminist views while holding very old-fashioned and sexist ideas in their private lives. What has changed since 2000 is that with this tongue in cheek irony male academics can assert their very sexist views and flaunt them publicly while claiming it's an intelligent joke, when it is what it is, sexist demeaning views. Why can they do this? Because we are sold the myth that women have achieved equality, and this is widely believed and even more so in academia, the safe haven of egalitarianism. If that's the case this would work as a joke. But is does not, judging by the views of many and my own gut feeling. Because we have not achieved equality, we are far from it, and getting further away by the looks of things. So men in academia do not even have to pretend any more that they care about feminist views or PC, in fact they can publicly assert masculine authority and make sexist assumptions about women. That is the cleverness of new sexism, it disguises itself as humour and if you do not laugh along you are deemed as a dry feminazi who just does not get the joke because we are equals, right? Those women who want to please these men laugh along, we are like the boys really, or are we not? But those of us who are left a bit uncomfortable reading his little ego trip, we are from the PC brigade. I can see the editor, why she would have wanted to publish this banter as a great piece of satire, but what Mr Kealey's wife is going to make of this? Is she "enlightened" enough to find the humour hidden in there somewhere or is he in the dog house from now on? Oh, dear!
I can't help but laugh at everyone pathetic enough to get offended by this article. Of course it's a bit of a perk of the job for any heterosexual male lecturer when his curvy students turn up to lectures dressed like they're off to sunbathe. It's a humorous article and very true. What's sad is that society has become so politically correct that a man can't even jokingly give reference to his sexuality without being slated by feminists and other 'PC warriors'. ....and to those screaming how sexist it is 'to objectify women': Welcome to reality. Purely physical sexual attraction is normal for men AND women. If you find that offensive then life is really going to shock you.
Read the whole article.... its not difficult to see this was simply a humourous piece... Please PC police give it a rest.....
Well, hooray for freedom of expression, Dr. Mroz. I am free to say that this "wry" and "lighthearted" piece was not funny. It ade my stomach turn, as did the author's pompous, pseudo-intellectualized attempt at justifying himself. What a wanker. I also agree that this could not have been defended as a "joke" or a subject to provoke "robust debate" if it was about any other traditionally marginalized group. Nauseating.
What I find disgusting is the complete lack of tolerance and generosity that comes from so many people commenting on this site. Upon readingthe article, it is clear from very early on that it is a satirical piece written in jest. As with all attempts at humour, some will find it funny, others won't. Equally, some will find the subject matter appropriate, others won't. I didn't find the article particularly funny or entertaining myself, but I certainly wouldn't say the attempt was offensive! What I find tiresome is the vitriolic attack upon this man for his efforts. I have aways believed the fundamental concept behind feminism to be respect. It offends me when people show such lack of respect to others, yet claim to be fighting for that very thing.
Half the problem that has been discussed on this thread would disappear, of course, if no grades that counted for anything could be given for work that could be identified at the time of grading it. So lecturer X could promise all he wanted and student Y could flutter till her lashes dropped off, but all to no academic purpose if X had no idea whether it was Y's work he was marking.
Sense of humour, people. SENSE. OF. HUMOUR. Get it, don't lose it, and you'll be much happier for it.
There's a lot of talk of manipulative female students, what about those of us who just adore our tutors? This isn't about grades or special treatment, it's a genuine attraction and affection, which, I imagine, is harder to resist than cynical seduction (having never tried either, I wouldn't know). There are loads of girls who have a soft spot for a tutor or lecturer. I also find it telling that we're talking about male academics and female students. I suggest this is due to the small number of female academics, and our society's focus on women's looks and youth (I hasten to add I know a few female students who fell for female tutors). And why do so many assume that students dress provocatively for the lecturers, and not for other students, or even themselves?
There really is nothing wrong with the position offered in Kealey's article. I am a professor and happily dole out first class grades to stunning looking birds who also take the time to read the materials for my courses and submit their essays in good time. Objectification with objectivity please people.
I'm a girl, I did the University of Buckinham, and I support the frankly speaking of the VC but I ban the common opinion and the hypocrisy of journalists. They finally find the argument to attack the private sector and have a pathetic revenge on a political past which disturbs more English than the rest of the world!! What a poor argument !! Yes, the Uni was created by Margaret and what was her weakness (to be a woman) became her assets in the right way !! BTW, I'm sorry but it's based on chemical research and even if you don't like the idea it's right and it's the game of the life !!! Sorry for the looser who wrote the rubbish published below against the VC who may be is the winner !!
Wow! Talk about, 'no sex please we're Br--," we'll whatever all these disembodied and scarsely identified beings*** are. Nope, no sense of the light or wry at all for ... ... Holy-commit-more-than-one-of-the-above-seven-deadly-sins-of-the-academy 'cause multiple knickers got in a twist over heteronormativity *cack* and whatnot in "Lust!" ***I presume - reluctantly - that these comments come from actual typing persons (some even with something like an education) and not from some kind of PC bot which trolls the interwebs looking for expression to geld.
Ian: "So the girls who do come into class wearing just a belt and a see through top now want the lecturers to just look at their shoes or the ceiling" Is this likewise supposed to be satire??
Of course men fantasize about women, we are straight MEN! It does matter if we are a professor, student or preacher, we all do it. If you are offend about it, that's ok. Be offended all you want but will not change who we are. Kodo's to the professor that tells it how it is.
When I read this article I had a bet with my wife. I said the word 'misogyny' would appear in the first 10 comments, she said it wouldn't. It appeared in the 2nd comment! Well done gobsmacked for your highly original response - if you want to discredit something or someone just give it the misogynistic tag and that's it, job done. I also find it quite worrying that "across the pond he would be forced to resign on the spot" - so much for the land of free speech! Would the same also be true for females who make misandric comments I wonder? Not only is Misogyny one of the most overused word in the English language today it is often the most misused as well - here's the Cambridge online dictonary definition for thiose of you in need of further education: <b>Definition misogyny noun the hatred of women</b> So Mr Kealey's clearly satirical piece about lusting over younger female students makes him a misogynist. Huh? Yeah, right! I could write volumes on why so many of the above "I am outraged" comments are wrong but experience tells me I'd be wasting my time. Just 2 things I'd like to say: 1) Get a sense of humour people, this pc cr*p is becoming boring (and hypocritical!) 2) I wonder if the above "I am outraged" comments would have been made if the article was written by a female lecturer lusting after younger male students? But silly me, we all know women don't do that, do they?...
OK, I was pretty irritated by Kealey. I’m a pick-and-choose feminist, and have decidedly non-pc opinions about a few things despite having gone to a women's college in the late 60’s-early 70’s. As an undergraduate, I saw a most touching love story between a professor and a student in my class--who, as far as I know, are still very happily married. I also saw some of the most grotesque male faculty I have ever seen in my life prey on one young undergraduate woman after another. There were very few "vamps" among the women, but a whole lot of vampires among the men. They viewed all young women as meat, not perks. Any woman who went to school in the 60's just before feminism knows exactly what I am referring to. Most of the faculty were male, and it was an era rife with abuse of power and privilege. It got worse in the 70’s, not better. I also worked for years at a major university in the “other” Cambridge. And there I fell in love with a student (though not one of mine, and we had zero professional connection via any department, program, or university-sponsored activity). With 20,000 people in a place the size of a small town (and in an even smaller geographical area), it was actually possible to meet someone, fall in love, have a relationship, marry. We were not unique. Our daughter is now a university student. If I thought some professional lech was after her, I'd have him by the short and curlies very fast. My kid=his perk??? …Tiger Mother roars; ex-university administrator who knows how to play deadly academic games would do her level best to ruin the bastard’s career. I’ve had to prepare to testify in sexual harassment litigation, and it’s not pretty. …And equally, if I thought my daughter was playing games for grades, I'd cut off her funding and let her get a job until she was hungry for a real education instead of flirting for playtime in an expensive sandbox. Predatory behavior goes in both directions—we all know that. But Kealey’s joke fell dreadfully flat. Instead, he touched a major nerve in his sexual stereotyping of young women. For those of you who are having a hard time seeing what the fuss is all about, what if he had written this? Or, worse yet, what if a woman wrote it? “Normal boys - more interested in boobs than tubes, more interested in ass than "pass," more interested in toys than tools - will abjure their lecturers for the company of their peers, but nonetheless, most female lecturers know that, most years, there will be a boy in class who flashes his admiration (!!!) and who asks for advice on his essays. What to do? ...Enjoy him! He's a perk.” Kealey can write what he wrote, but if a woman had written the paragraph above she would be fired. Immediately. No question. (And who out there would defend the young man used as a “joke”? …Anyone??? One of my more non-pc opinions is that in the great hunt for equality for women, boys and young men have been overlooked and trashed for nearly forty years—and unlike their fathers and grandfathers, did nothing to injure women.) Kealey has an unfortunate gift for being seriously unfunny when he attempts humor, and absolutely hilarious when he's dead serious. Did anyone else pick this up? The howlers in academic-speak? “The Times Higher readership is composed mainly of academics who would be expected to appreciate articles written at more than one level.” Academics “get it” at more than one level. Hmmm. And, “The crudeness of some of the examples was to underpin the inappropriateness of transgressional sex and that is a conventional literary device.” Puh-lease. Was he writing for a bunch of dumb-ass civilians who just happen to read the Times Higher Education mag? Only now that we don’t get the joke in his soi-disant “good ol' boy language of middle aged male collusion,” he’s got to use S-E-R-I-O-U-S academic language to explicate it? When the joke dies, it dies, pal. Finally, the killer: “to illuminate the ways that people finesse the dissonance between what is publicly acceptable and what is sometimes privately desired.” Yup. Bet his wife loved that one. Open mouth, insert foot, chew vigorously, change foot. Almost makes me feel sorry for him. But not quite. He should know better. Oh, and btw, it’s really illuminating to read the entire Times Higher Ed piece. Kealey’s article is by far the weakest. Some of the others actually get the light-hearted bit right.
I had been wondering where to send my daughter (a well-adjusted, curvy and sensible young lady) to university. No doubt now. It's off to Buckingham where I know now there is still humour in education and a healthy inverse relationship to the PC lobby who make me vow yet again never to return to the UK. I shall now order a copy of Terence Kealey's book.
I appreciate that the editor of the piece is both a woman and a feminist, but am nonetheless concerned that no women were asked to contribute. I think if anything that absence of voice even in 'lighthearted' and 'wry' piece is an important one to consider.
To the editor: Justifying a blatant piece of misogyny on the grounds that it was proffered in a "lighthearted" spirit is a shopworn shibboleth well past its sell-by date. If you had received a contribution employing some "lighthearted" racism, I very much doubt you would have published it, much less defended it. The problem, as others have pointed out, is not talking about sex in the academy. It's the tedious and telling positing of women's role in higher education as one of intellectual subordination and sexual objectification. "The universities are where the male scholars and the female acolytes are," writes Kealey. Really? That will come as considerable news to female lecturers, many of whom are under the impression that they've earned their rank on the academic food chain by getting a degree, and a job. "The fault lies with the females," continues Kealey, with dreary predictability. Of course it does. When a middle-aged bald man who bears more than a passing resemblance to Bozo the Clown lies in bed next to his long-suffering wife fantasizing about a nineteen year-old, the motor force clearly lies with the nineteen year-old, who should cover up properly lest she invoke the just desserts of the audacious crime of being female, from lechery in the classroom to rape in the street. As ever. "Normal girls [are] more interested in abs than in labs, more interested in pecs than specs, more interested in triceps than tripos." Conveniently, the normativity of women's overdetermining sexual appetite supports the contention that women ask for it. Perhaps that's why they wind up perpetual apprentices, and never scholars in their own right, as well - they're creatures of the flesh, not the mind, bless the dears. And so on. As for your claims to "feminism," Ms. Mroz, I'm dubious. Feminism isn't a flag in which to wrap yourself in discursive defense of indefensible deeds. The THES should be embarrassed to print this dreck and Kealey should be sacked. He, and you, are an embarrassment to British higher education.
Frequently, people say in jest that which they are afraid to state in seriousness. The cloak of humour is a convenient blind. VC Kealey's patronising comments have been excused on the basis of the editor's invitation to write, but he would not have written what he wrote unless those thoughts were in his own mind, would he? Unless, that is, the piece was ghost-written. I'm not suggesting that it was. While at university, I knew several gay guys who used sexual incentives to achieve their Degrees. I recently attended the wedding of a prof and her grad student. I also recently visited with prof and his grad student mistress. There is no way to refute that sexual attraction between profs and students is a fact of life that is acted upon, whatever the gender mix may be. 'Look but don't touch' is given the nod but is not observed. As for the wives, maybe they're relieved that their inadequate husbands are being entertained by other women.
Great comment by Anne Armitage, swapping the male/female contents of a statement is definitely an effective way to detect whether it is dubious or not. I'd like also to second another poster: 99% of undergrad girls (and boys) float their charms for other undergrads on campus to see obviously, not for the lecturers! It's really disgraceful to imply, as Kealy does, that since sex is not an option, at least taking advantage of the situation by looking lustfully is. Yes we all have biological instincts, but we also have ethical and moral abilities: the lecture hall is simply not the place for that kind of behaviour, it's a place for honnest teaching.
‘She doesn't yet know that you are only Casaubon to her Dorothea, Howard Kirk to her Felicity Phee, and she will flaunt you her curves. Which you should admire daily to spice up your sex, nightly, with the wife.’ Professor Kealey assumes that every male academic’s wife mustn’t be that attractive. How wrong! I, for example, I am far hotter than any of my husband’s young and inexperienced students could ever (unfortunately for them) hope to be.
While I've enjoyed reading through this thread, there's a far simpler problem with the VC's piece (and indeed the editor's input) than the overblown and repulsively, joyfully stupid views expressed therein. Taking a step back from the details, look at it from the point of view of audience reaction. There are two interpretations: 1) Kealey horrifically misjudged his audience, wrote a stinker and accidentally caused the excrement to hit the fan, or 2) Kealey did not misjudge his audience and was aware of the likely response. Reading the piece, imagine him giggling gently as he typed the words 'with the wife', stabbing at the full stop and triumphantly pressing the 'send' button on his email client. It's not difficult. In short, either Kealey has severe shortcomings as a writer and deeply misjudged the appropriateness of his satirical piece - which I do not believe - or Kealey is what is known on the internet as a troll. It remains only for him to announce ritually to the THE, editor, and audience: You Have Been Trolled. Yes, all of you. Including those who react angrily and predictably to his obvious flamebait, and most especially including those who jump in with the equally tired anti-PC-pro-flamebait reflex knee-jerk reactions. Seriously, people. Just because Kealey's sketched you out an unpleasant choice of bed doesn't mean you have to volunteer to lie in it. Everybody in this thread needs to step back, get a cup of your favourite beverage and take the time for a rueful little giggle at your own reactions. That way, Kealey will be laughing with you, since it's a dead cert that he is laughing at you already.
I think most of the offence comes from the fact that the author objectifies women as solely at university to vamp lectures and without holding any power in the organisational structure of the university. Which is simply untrue and indicative of a rather scary attitude towards women. Of course lecturers and students will fancy each other and sexual attraction to someone can mean they can influence your behaviour. Although I think it can work between all sorts of sexual orientations, not just the older man/younger woman category! But it was the massive generalisation and assumptions towards the "female state" that offended me.
I am reminded of poor Wilt. This is just the sort of mess he would get himself into. A "wry" piece on "lust" on campus should never to be attempted by a public university figure. Leave it to the authors and from a safe distance.
Editor and Sub-Editor: Please check the accuracy of your copy. -- "vice-chancellor" I'm pretty sure that this is correct. -- "University of Buckingham" But are you sure there is no typo there? I apologise if this should appear Pedantic -- that is not intended.
This is amazing!! I love studying at Buckingham University!
I've re-read the article in a whole again and I find it very funny in places, especially the sins of arrogance and snobbery, but I can not help but cringe at the one by Dr Kealey.The article in a whole is disappointing and I find it quite shameful that it seems the commissioner could not find one female academic with satirical vein running through their bodies. Thus the whole article gives the impression that academia is a heterosexual men only domain and women are only noticed when sexually provocative. I get it why people take this as a joke and I almost can see this. But within the context of its existence and its conception I do not see anything else but few home truths and more navel gazing in the Ivory Tower and business as usual 1900 style. Has feminism ever happened?
Mary Beard has a rather sensible take on the whole issue here: http://timesonline.typepad.com/dons_life/2009/09/sex-with-students-is-terence-kealey-as-misunderstood-as-juvenal.html
@Wissenschaftlerin. Just imagine the reaction had Kealey set up blacks, Jews, or Muslims as the target of his little 'joke'. Oh, yes, it would be so very 'funny' indeed. I can just hear him (and his audience) 'giggling'.
Wish I'd been to Buckingham Uni - he's my hero!
@gobsmacked: Trolls operate through enjoyment of other peoples' righteous outrage. And if you want them to stop it and go away, it is vitally important not to feed them. @Paul P: Yes, a perfectly sane rule of thumb for human activity. When I pick up the laptop in the morning, I know I always spend a moment asking myself WWJD, that is, 'What would Juvenal do?' Also, with the greatest of respect to Mary Beard, she is incorrect in supposing that caps lock is EMPHASIS and CRUISE CONTROL FOR COOL. Perhaps one of the nicest things about the internet is that it allows direct comparison between socially dissimilar things, highlighting vanity, pretentiousness and the fact that, brand name aside, a lot of the stuff people produce simply isn't very good. To the emperors of academia: restock your sock drawers. Most of you don't measure up to Wodehouse, and that schtick is getting old.
Poor old Dr Kealey probably hasn't had an erection in 20 years and is trying to impress the rest of the creepy old floppy set that he still, or ever did, "have it".
@Teresa So now it's OK to suggest that Terence Kealey is impotent, and that there are a subgroup of men who can be considered "the creepy old floppy set"? I'm sure that all over the country male academics with erectile dysfunction will be laughing themselves silly over your clever wit. Your comment is just as shameful as anything that appears anywhere else on this page. Perhaps you were moved to write that because you are all dried up. Funny isn't it?
@Eliza Darling congratulations on your misuse of the word misogynistic. Once again, here's the Cambridge online dictonary definition of it: <b>Definition misogyny noun the hatred of women</b>. Could you kindly show me exactly where in Mr Kealey's clearly satirical piece he shows a hatred of women? I'd say he seems quite fond of them but then again I haven't had a sense of humour bypass. Also, why exactly should " Kealey be sacked" - has he commited any crime apart from write something you personally found offensive? I think you need to get a bit of perspective here - he hasn't commited murder - he wrote what he thought was a humourous piece about lust in higher education. Get a grip!
I'm very glad I do not attend this school.. and unfortunatley I can see this university having a negitive reputation, based on one man's crudness, when freshmen are looking at which universities to attend if this is how professional thier profs are. Just goes to show how uneducated this man is, not to mention socially unequipted and shallow. -HP
@Teresa congratulations on making fun of erectile dysfunction. You've certainly put yourself on the moral highground with that comment. Care to make a witty comment about testicular cancer while you're at it??
@Chris @Astounded etc. Congratulations on making fun of a person *obviously* making fun of a person *obviously* making fun of an article theme. Sheesh, people, this is a classic approach - haven't you read Juvenal? Plus, I'd say Kealey seems like the kind of person who would appreciate Teresa's joke, but then again I haven't had a sense of humour bypass. You've certainly all put yourselves on the moral high ground with your comments... Sheesh, talk about trolls trolling trolls.
Alice writes, on 24 September, "I appreciate that the editor of the piece is both a woman and a feminist, but am nonetheless concerned that no women were asked to contribute. I think if anything that absence of voice even in 'lighthearted' and 'wry' piece is an important one to consider. " This small but important matter seems to have been forgotten in the emphasis on the 'sins' of Terence Kealey (and of the woman editor of THE), even though several women have written comments complaining about sexism in the article's contents. Matthew Reisz was the editor/author of the article, The seven deadly sins of the academy, and is also a feature editor of THE. The topics, and the writers for this article are: SARTORIAL INELEGANCE [Graham Farmelo, a Twitterer, is senior research fellow at the Science Museum, London, and author of The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Quantum Genius (2009)]; PROCRASTINATION [Lennard J. Davis is professor in the department of English, University of Illinois at Chicago. He is the author of books including Obsession: A History (2008)]; SNOBBERY [Alan Ryan is a visiting fellow in politics at Princeton University]. LUST [Terence Kealey is vice-chancellor, University of Buckingham, and the author of Sex, Science and Profits (2008)]; ARROGANCE [Peter J. Smith is reader in Renaissance literature, Nottingham Trent University]; COMPLACENCY [Simon Blackburn is professor of philosophy, University of Cambridge]; PEDANTRY [Simon Goldhill is professor of Greek, University of Cambridge, and author of How to Stage Greek Tragedy Today (2007) and Jerusalem: City of Longing (2008)]. The fairly serious nature of the discussion which started off the comments section for the article seem to have disintegrated over the last day or so. That's too bad, when there are still unanswered questions. How did 7 men get to be the contributors? In such situations, when no reasonable response is readily available, I believe responsibility is usually diffused over two or more sources, and sometimes attention is drawn away from the more interesting subject, often through the voices of whining, annoying commenters whose contributions are just as likely to cause readers to give up reading further or go back to the beginning for the first responses. I hope that's not what's happening here.
@Ben Button point taken, although I'm not convinced @Teresa was *clearly* making fun. I was trying to highlight that some of the "outraged" commenters are making posts that are no better than the original article (yeah, and I probably fall into that category too before you say it). Looks like I failed miserably. I haven't read Juvenal - is he the Brazillian footballer who writes a sports column in The Sun??
The most offensive point in Terence Kealey makes is that most "normal" girls are "more interested in abs than in labs, more interested in pecs than specs, more interested in triceps than tripos". I find it surprising that this has not been picked up on by previous commenters. But maybe that says most about the admissions to the University of Buckingham, and the New Labour drive to ensure the majority of youg people achieve degree-level education. This aside, it is a dire and provocative pronouncement on the ambitions of women at university - that they are Not Interested in Learning (which is the premise for them being there), and is not too large a shift from the outdated notion of a girl primarily seeking a husband at Uni. It is entirely reasonable and understandable that a lecturer - of either sex - responds positively to a student showing interest in their subject. Having just graduated from a university in the top 10 of the world, I am fortunate that I can say that I saw this attitude in the vast majority of my peers. I can also say - quite openly- that several of us girls immensely enjoyed a semi-flirtatious and certainly witty relationship with a few of our male tutors who we respected, admired, and admmittedly found sexy in a geeky middle aged way. This is a TWO-WAY relationship. The feeling a student can feel on receiving a high mark back from a tutor that is reknowned for being hard, who you value the personal opinions of, and who's work you admire, is pretty damn awesome. Just as it is for the intellectual who sees they have inspired a spark in a student - isn't that one of the joys of teaching? This is not to say that our female tutors did not miss out on admiration, student-tutor banter, post-seminar chat, and intellectual debate. The great thing about university is that it is not school, and we are (supposedly intelligent) adults. Sex is everywhere. Don't get so het up about it. Unfortunately liberties have been taken in the past, and in no way do I mean to advocate that lecherous smelly old men have a right to fantasize about their students and make them feel uncomfortable. But seriously, the lines are pretty clear. People in the academic world can work ridiculously hard with very little perks - being submerged in the library 10 hours a day can get a person down. Departmental giggling is just a bit of fun. Kealey should perhaps think over why he only gets the occassional girl asking questions after class. Only one student? He's not doing his job properly.
Freedom of speech it appears is only reserved to those who are in agreement with Dr Kealeys article one way or another (laughing along or condoning this as "nature's way") and the rest of those who feel less comfortable are told to "give it a rest". Some of us it seems are more equal than others. Some of us are more entitled to free speech than others. Some of us have the right to decide what counts as "relevant" and "true" statement at the expense of those who are deemed deviating from it. Some of us on the moral high ground think that others occupy a higher position than themselves therefore are a free game for anonymous and very personalised attacks. Sue, as much as I enjoyed your last comment, I do not quite understand who you are referring to as "whingers"? What type of comments, no names necessary. If you've read my earlier comment, I think we are thinking the same, that the fact that only men contribute gives the impression that academia in exclusively inhabited by men. Which is further reinforced by the fact that these men's references were exclusively to male intellectual greats, and women only figured in talked about, submissive positions. Knowledge production in academia, therefore, is going on along the same pre-feminism lines, serious intellectual though still handed down from men to men. How about the 8th Sin of academia, the ring fencing of critical thought and feminism? As long as women do science on men's terms they are fine, but when it comes to criticism and challenges to taken for granted thought, privileges, including the afore mentioned "perks", suddenly female or male academics find themselves isolated. Any Critical Psychologist can sympathise with this thought who is working in a cognitive or experimental psychology focused department. Snobbery, arrogance and sexism in one package.
It's obvious why no women were asked to write on the seven deadly sins. They are perfect while men are not.
Terence you have clearly never been an 18 year old girl, and clearly have no idea of the way they think and feel. So my advice is, don't write about them. Swift might be able to do satire - you can't. Your piece is not funny. It's actually a somewhat tedious out-of-date-jumble of badly written Carry On and most women, I am fairly sure, are simply bored an tired out from having things like this shoved down their their throats all the time. Oh and a short paragraph at end does not make it a 'moral tale' either, I'm afraid. And to the editor - being a woman does not mean that you can speak for all of womankind, or indeed, approve what you must obviously see is a bit of whiffle which just confirms the writer's age. And it is somewhat disingenuous of you to claim otherwise, as you very well know. And Terence - if you have daughters, and they leave home at 18 and are promply slavered over by a man as old as you, then I hope you will begin to understand how not just the girls in your care, but also the parents of those girls must feel reading this. And yes, that will even include middle aged men. Like you.
Terence you have clearly never been an 18 year old girl, and clearly have no idea of the way they think and feel. So my advice is, don't write about them. Swift might be able to do satire - you can't. Your piece is not funny. It's actually a somewhat tedious out-of-date-jumble of badly written Carry On and most women, I am fairly sure, are simply bored an tired out from having things like this shoved down their their throats all the time. Oh and a short paragraph at end does not make it a 'moral tale' either, I'm afraid. And to the editor - being a woman does not mean that you can speak for all of womankind, or indeed, approve what you must obviously see is a bit of whiffle which just confirms the writer's age. And it is somewhat disingenuous of you to claim otherwise, as you very well know. And Terence - if you have daughters, and they leave home at 18 and are promply slavered over by a man as old as you, then I hope you will begin to understand how not just the girls in your care, but also the parents of those girls must feel reading this. And yes, that will even include middle aged men. Like you.
well, sometimes it happens that people look at the things the way they are shown to them. I never knew unless I visited pyramids of egypt myself, that there is pizza hut and KFC just next to it. As the title itself suggests, seven deadly sins of academy; so considering it we need to get our perspective right that the author here is talkin about the sins which are supposedly not to be done. Infact if you just go through the last para of the article, look and not touch at all. On the second place, the dialogue of which the phobia is being created about, "Enjoy her! She is a perk." is entirely a sign of sense of humour, which might be over the top of some people's level of humour, also as a vice chancellor of the university, I believe you got to have that to achieve student satisfaction except academics. That is what he has been doing wonderfully from last 4 years. Last but not the least at all, as a student over here I can say that with full assurance that it is not like it at all. There is always a healthy relationship among the academias and the students. They discuss things sometimes with a bit of personal touch that is meant in all positive sense just to achieve and ensure maximum learning which is done too. As we are a small university, we can manage that personal attachment which most of the UK universities aspire for but can not manage. That is what a good reason too that we are on top in student satisfaction from last 4 years. So, get a humour guys or atleast do not just give your opinions about something you have not read carefully and in the perspective it is written.
Philippa - I have a relatively comely daughter who, in times gone by (well, from when she was 14) was of such a shape that I had to remind her that part of the responsibility for minor traffic accidents would surely be hers if she insisted on going around so inadequately clad. I never, ever had any fears for her as regards the unwelcome attentions of leery old lecturers. That would have been absolutely the least of my worries - and my wife's. I might have worried about her being out on the streets after a club, looking for a taxi in some dodgy part of town, things like that. But the idea that an otherwise civilised and intelligent academic should be sneaking a peak wouldn't have bothered her, or me. All this hysteria does seem to point to something darker, a sort of puritanical extremism. I'm not sure whether the original crime, in the back of people's minds, is that there's some frisson (if only one-way) between a lecturer and a student - that was the main thrust (oops) of the article, or whether it's the 'dirty old man' thing - so is it sex or is it age, or is it a balance of power thing, leading to abuse of power (even if only in someone's mind)? Either way, the vituperative, vindictive, even, reactions here are quite worrying.
This article should not at all be taken seriously. I am a law student from the University of Buckingham and I fully support the Vice Chancellor's article. This article was written by Dr Terence Kealey as he was asked to. This country is a democratic country and everyone has the right to express their views. People should relax and learn to read the article properly. The Chancellor is actually discouraging any type of sexual activity between lecturers and students, considering this is not a crime in England and Wales. The Unoversity is a perfect place to be and the media just twisted the whole article and made the University and the Chancellor look bad. Read the article properly and do not let yourself be influenced by the media.
Apples and Pears: comments made by people going by the usernames of Chris, Henry, Tereas and Ben Buttons, and Astounded come to mind, as examples of useless for the purpose of this forum. Yes, you noticed that too, didn't you, that the female voice was missing in this set of seven writers (plus Matthew Reisz, the piece's editor). You mentioned that in your view the article in its entirety gives the impression that academia consists only of men (heterosexual men). And you add to that here, saying the men reference only writing by other men. There is something very wrong about all that. It is only one article, and really does seem to have been one huge mistake, in more than one way. Several people commenting have placed blame on the female editor of THE, Ann Mroz, and it's true she is the Editor, but the feature editor responsible for editing the contributions of the 7 writers of the 7 segments was surely the writer/editor Matthew Reitz, who both works for THE and submitted this piece. Did nobody catch that, that it was all men writing about (and for?) men? Could it be backlash by men against the 'tyranny' of female rule, much as women would do that when they felt overwhelmed by the overbearing presence of men. One would have to read much further back in THE to figure this out. If one man took responsibility for developing it, approving it, editing it, could it simply be accepted as a 'men's piece', even though this was not stated in the introduction? When feminists do that they make a point of saying so. Yes, a female scholar addressing attitudes towards women would have been an improvement, instead of only having Terence Kealey's views, and his only on the topic of lust.
As a student currently studying at buckingham university, it is my opinion, that this article has been taken wholly out of context. Terrence Kealey merely meant to bring to our attention that young girls will develop crushes on teachers but academics must enjoy the flattery, rather than commiting the sin of sleeping with a student. It is correct to say he did believe it was not an abuse of power, but only because academics no longer have the power to boost grades in return for sexual favours. In this day and age it is ludricous that such a valued academic such be ostracised for being brave enough to talk about such a taboo subject, because most cannot understand the tongue-in-cheek impertenance of the article on a whole. He is not encouraging lecturers to ''view'' students, but is merely clarifying that if you do, do nothing more. If anything he is trying to discourage it.
Ermm, it was SATIRE. Perhaps not particularly brilliant satire, but satire nonetheless. Whatever happened to the British sense of irony...do most Brits think is it now like goldy or silvery?
I would submit that Disgrace by Coetzee is the great 21st century academic novel to which Prof. Kealey alludes.
Being a student at this university I could not be more appauled at your views Terrence. Not all female students flaunt their curves at male lecturers- as you seem to have stereotyped all female students as doing such. There are many female students , I being one of them, who have come to this institution to gain a degree, and a degree only. Having been referred to as a 'perk' and a way to spice up tutors sex lives with their wives, I have been left feeling unvalued as I am sure many if not all of the other female students a the university buckingham do also. If female students are to be 'perks' at this university for the male academics, and therefore an "asset" ( If i may be so bold) to the university, then why are we paying the same ridiculously expensive fees as male scholars. Reading between the lines of your article we are capable of no better than luring male lecturers so why has it been shown year after year that females are achieving better grades than males throughout GCSE's and A levels , surely you are not suggesting females are then luring teachers with their curves or embarking on sexual relationships in order to upgrade. To be honest I no longer wish to be polite on the matter, and think your ideas and views are ridiculous not to mention offensive and sexist - you have bought shame upon our university and you will see the reputation of the university dwindle away along with your students!
Your arrogance and sexism are appauling Kealey. "Enjoy her! She's a perk"? This is derogatory and insulting to half of the student population who pay your inflated salary. Shame.
The outrage of readers which has ensued appears to be from the discovery that most men, regardless of profession, will find 18-21 year old women attractive. Interesting observation this, I wonder if any other magazines have noticed this?
Danielle, with the greatest of respect, although everyone is entitled to their opinion , you are talking utter rubbish. This article is nothing more than an insult to all female students and any female standing for such an article is a disgrace!
What two consenting adults do in their PERSONAL lives is their business no matter who they are. Not all University students are 'young' (16-21) and not all University lecturers are 'middle-aged'. Nor do all relationships between students and tutors have a hiden agenda! There are exceptions. As long as a conflict of interest is declared and the lecturer is no longer officially involved in the assessment of the student, I do not see where the problem is. I think this is more about a personal belief. Well if VC Kealey is so against student-lecturer relationships, then why doesn't he have policies within his own esablishment to prohibit it!
I am thoroughly unimpressed with VC Kealey's statements. In fact as a female student at his University, I would go as far as to say that I wish I had never joined after his sexist comments - I deem them to be very foolish indeed. It has brought embarrassment upon the University and caused serious offence and ridicle.
Ah, if only Isaiah Berlin were here to see these wonderful examples of the liberal paradox...
and Socrates would choose the hemlock again
It's a long time since I was an 18 year old student, reasonably "comely" if you could ignore the punk gear, but I truly wish that academics of the time had followed Kealey's advice to "look but not touch". And they didn't seem to think that good marks should go along with their lechery, dammit. Looking is harmless enough when some scrutiny is extended to the bestowing of marks etc. What outrages me is that Kealey ignores the female academic who teaches luscious-looking young men who both charm and on occasion may act "inappropriately". Do the same rules apply, Prof K? What's a girl to do? Seriously, sex is around in the academy. Calm down and deal with it. Abuse of power is abuse of power whether sex is involved or not. Deal with it. The difference is that women in 2009 know how to name what's going on and stand up for ourselves if we need to. That's why it's different for my 18 year old daughter at university now. Times have changed, thank the Goddess.
Humour? I wonder if the two 'girls' whom in 1982 received a first in bio-chemistry in a south coast university because they slept with their professor (allegedly) find his article humorous? Thanks to the rather unusual detail Terry included in his article I am sure it would be easy to find them and ask and perhaps hint at libel. Maybe too, one should question the professionality of that professor? But of course as it's always the female's fault, he would be entirely blameless. The entire article seems to have been spawned by a resentment allowed to fester since 1982. May I suggest therapy at 'Relate'. As for the editor's freedom of speech. Yes of course, let's write satirical articles about the Nazis, the blacks, the poor....all in the name of satire and free speech. Free speech must not be encouraged at the expense of social responsibility. Interestingly, Terry's article was the first one to ridicule students as opposed to the others which ridiculed the academics. I say first as I was so sickened by his article I neglected to read the rest. Let's hope that he's relieved of his position as 'vice' chancellor.
Yes I agree with 'uni buckingham student'. Would any female student now be proud to say they were associated with Buckingham University? And should they have worked hard and received a first, would they now be loathe to advertise that fact in case it is inferred they too slept with their professor? The VC however is clearly (and almost proudly) unrepentant. In an email to alumni students he thinks that most of his students appreciated the joke. Ummm deluded? Just as well he was not the one responsible for judging Student Satisfaction. Apparently Buckingham is top of the league - I wonder if that still stands after this? He remarked that students are satisifed because they pay full fees and therefore receive a better education. All the other universities who strive to make university affordable and available to all - shame on you! Clearly a substandard service but maybe one where female students are not leered at?
I am totally outraged and think Kealey is misogynistic and should be sacked immediately, In fact I think every single male lecturer at his college should also be sacked as they are *clearly* in cahoots with him. In fact, they should sack all the male students and turn it into a women only college and only employ female lecturers. Also, how dare THE publish such a vicious attack on women and allow an article to be written only by men. Every THE member of staff should be sacked for this outrage, but obviously not the female ones cos they have *clearly* been oppressed by their male colleagues. Any male commenters who have made non-condemming comments should also be sacked for being mysogynisticalists. I haven't actually read the article, or understand the context in which it was written, but I heard about how outrageous it was on a message board and came straight over here to comment on it 9 days after it was published. SAM (Sack All Men)
I have seen a male lecturer of literature who seduced a 18 year old female student in every year. Is he our ideal?
I FAIL TO SEE HOW ANYBODY WITH AN OUNCE OF INTELLIGENCE COULD BE OFFENDED BY DR KEALEY'S ARTICLE.
Blind as well as stupid then, Patrick and possibly with enormous neanderthal swollen fingers glued to the caps lock.
So 'normal' girls are more interested 'in abs than in labs', are they? And female students 'fantasize' about, and 'flaunt' their 'curves' at, their male lecturers? The very fact that the Vice-Chancellor of any university in this country, even the most right-wing of universities, could think that comments such as this are humorous -- and not patronizing as well as deeply and offensively sexist (on male as well as female grounds) simply astonishes me. If Kealey's piece had been written at the beginning of the 1960s, I would not have been surprised; the fact that it is now nearly the beginning of the 2010s, makes it more shocking. It is useful, though, in reminding all of us who are concerned with the status of women and the workings of gender in society just how embedded sexist attitudes can still be, and why, when such attitudes are held by people in positions of power, the glass ceiling still operates.
fed up i am blind. sorry i didnt know my caps lock was on.
I am a French student at the University of Buckingham. Unfortunately, being now the 26th of September, I couldn’t write anything that isn’t already in one of the comments. Still, after reading some comments by obviously more intelligent and cultivated people I would pinpoint that individuals in the education sector (including students like myself) have way too much time on their hands. It is also really amazing that living in a time where most of us accept to be managed or should I say processed as data thanks Marketing, Sociology, Health and Safety and so on… We still foster individuality whenever things go wrong. Also, I remember when Le Pen from the French “Front National” (equivalent of the BNP) said: “the Shoah is a detail of history; it is two pages in a history book”. Before him Lord Yehudi Menuhin was expressing harsh comments on the behaviour of its own people in Israel. Seemingly, when general Massu spoke of the torture in Algeria the French public opinion was appalled. From those facts I would like to underline few interesting points. Firstly, the way that we let taboos determine our perception of reality and the hideous hypocrisy we demonstrate when spoken of; secondly, the fact that our understanding too often stops to the form and not the content; and when trying to focus on the later one, we generally either confuse both or express wobbly opinions; thirdly isn’t there better topics to exercise your brain cells on? From a personal point of view, and in accordance of my line of thoughts, I find this article utterly brilliant: the ones that defend it will be classified as Sexist and those who oppose it will be “Sexually Frustrated”. Because at the end of the day easiness is what we like. Little that I know, Dr Terence Kealey is a genuinely bright and highly cultivated man that most of us shouldn’t dare comparing to. To conclude, I personally saw this man acting as real professional and gentleman saving the life of a young female lecturer at a social event on campus.
Has everybody forgotten what satire is - even the illustrious readers of the THES? It is no surprise that the tabloids took up selected phrases and words from Terence Kealey's article and spun them to create a sensational, salacious story, but for intelligent academics and students to fall for such a stunt is sad. What would these critics have made of Jonathan Swift's 'A Modest Proposal'? Would they have alerted the authorities, taken to the streets and rioted, or simply have removed all Irish babies to avoid them being eaten? The 'PC brigade' have tried, relatively successfully, to censor humour, will satire now be a thing of the past? What happened to free speech?
Look where the deadly sins got this guy! http://istvanpogany.blogspot.com/
@Paul - you're just repeating the same old thing. Didn't you read the hundreds of posts above yours??
Enclosed is an email I sent to Ms. Olivia Bailey of the NUS, whose comments are fueling the flame of this "scandal". I submit it for your approval: "Dear Ms. Bailey, Having read your courageous and eloquent exposure of the VC of Buckingham University, as disgusting a man as ever ogled a lady, I have been closely reminded of a scandal which took place in the UK in 1729, when an Irish journalist of very good standing proposed the consumption of children in "A Modest Proposal: For Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland from Being a Burden to Their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Public". This shocking publication was seen as satire at the time, ignoring the obvious danger to the public that such a suggestion posed - why, Irish people might have taken the article seriously! We might now have "Infant and Guinness Pie" on the menu at the local Swan and Crown! Fortunately, we live in modern times, in which the general public is open to the suggestions of such enlightened persons as yourself and the agency you represent, and will not stand for even the slightest possibility that the unthinking masses might interpret such thoughtless public discourse as literal. We cannot let claims of humour give cause to speak freely! As a great man once said: "As blushing will sometimes make a whore pass for a virtuous woman, so modesty may make a fool seem a man of sense." Yours in sisterhood, K. Tracy"
Jennifer Juniper: Yes, did you? Hundreds?!!
I'm a little surprised by the number of spelling mistakes in the comments above. That seems like a bigger academic failing than one lecturer out of the thousands in this country making a bad joke about inappropriate interpersonal attraction, which is surely something that must happen to almost all human beings at some point in their lives.
fyi
If every organisation hired a caped crusader to thin out the overgrown tangled thickets of old, inappropriate and downright harmful admin., I would guess that some, if not all, of the education industry's financial woes would evaporate. But we'll always have the problem of it trying to grow back whilst ever we have the strongly centralised 'steep pyramid' approach to Universities. The more mature collegiate system, having fine-tuned itself over hundreds of years, and quite the opposite of the Stalinist approach to agricultural policy. seems to offer flexibility, human-scale organisations that people can identify strongly with (which in itself offers cost-savings that enforced "living the values"-type systems cannot approach) and are generally more pleasant to work in, according to anecdotal evidence. So, time for some gardening! - get the pruning shears out!
Thanks to Guillaume! Again, it seems, the French give a lesson on humour to the English. From my point of view, Kealey's article is a great piece of the British so-called black humor that we - on the continent - are sad to misunderstand so often. So, talking about "appalling" news, it is the harsh criticism that seems more appalling to me. The fact that people really consider to compare the article's contents to the abuse of children or sexual harassment of women provides an interesting insight in people's minds - and it is definitely more tabloid than academic, I fear. The article is a piece of literature, a piece of humouros satire refering to a chief title: Academic sins, which itself reflects no more but humour. Kealey obviously took on a role that does not fit or suit him, because it is just a role. He expresses thoughts, we very obviously all know, because they meet our prejudices: old and greasy professors hunt young students. Of course that happens in reality. And it happens vice versa too. But should we not rather forget about our prejudices and discuss the matter seriously instead of blaming the author whose mere goal it is to draw attention to the matter by using the very ancient rhetorical method of satire; satire, simply because academic life is about adults (at least it should be, as real academic education does not at all meet the abilities of an underaged person). Now, what is the article good for? You may read it and laugh about the exaggerated description of academic life - female and male academics do, obviously. You may discuss it, but please discuss its content: Any abuse of (male or female) power against women or men, be it at university or in business life, should be banned, prosecuted and punished. Terence Kealey gratias ago.
Interestingly, the stories that seem to generate the most comment and forthright discussion (in a short space of time) are about * sex- * sexuality * harassment * abuse * paedophilia * The other story is - "Paedophilia research riles and titillates the academy "- 10 September, 2009 There's a Thesis here!!!! So we *do know* where the brain - (intellect) is after all?
I'm really disappointed that THE printed this nonsense. Offensive in so many ways already discussed.
Comparing academic campuses to Springfellows?! As a female academic with research funding I find this very offensive, but it's hard not to be amused by his pitiful attempt at satire.
To: "from the continent" - thanks for your perspective! - it does seem as though we're happier to shoot the messenger rather than listen to an unpalatable message. This would be unhealthy for any slice of society - for the supposed intellectuals, it's verging on criminal. As you say, the issue, as originally pointed out by Kealy, is that of the abuse of power. If people can't see the wood for the trees, we'll never come close to addressing that.
I get it's *meant* to be funny: but it's just not very successful, at least partly because every contributor to this piece is male, and most write as if to be an academic is to be male, or to walk the halls of an academy that is the bastion of "real bitch-magnets" (Smith). That is kind of funny, accidentally - for, as even the writers seem to realize, they are satirizing something that exists only in the pathetically nostalgic imaginings of a generation on the way out. It is interesting, though, as inadvertent evidence of something "we" female academics surely all observed at graduate school: the beta to pseudo-"alpha-male" (Blackburn) transition. Man who never got over his adolescent-isolation/rejection-fueled misogyny discovers that, PhD behind him and lectern protectively in front, he can get real live women-children to "flaunt [their] curves" (Kealey), and maybe even touch his long publication list.
Whoever said that the "Lust" author Kealey was offensive to his wife is an idiot. Every man fantasizes about other women while having sex with their wife. The good, honorable men just never act out that fantasy. The "Lust" article argues for a strictly moral and ethical stance -- enjoy the view but don't get involved. Who can complain about such a stance? Only humorless feminists and self-righteous prigs. Lastly, some posters grossly misinterpret the Lust article (I really hope they don't have Ph.D.s. That would be sad). They think that because the author said that SOME women seek something more than help on their essays, that means he thinks ALL girls who ask for help seek something more than help. This is a ridiculous interpretation. As a professor who's taught in Uni for the last 7 years, I've had thousands of girls approach my desk and "flash [their] admiration and ask for advice on [their] essays." But only one was actually hitting on me. How do I know? Trust me, body language and timing and clothing and a gazillion other things made it perfectly clear. And I've never thought that any other girl had a crush on me. But she certainly did. Obviously Kealey has experienced the same thing. We should hope that all administrators would have such common sense as to know the sexual temptation in the classroom and then address it for the sake of other colleagues. No sense hiding the elephant in the room, people. Being forthright is a virtue, one that most of the condemning commentators have forgotten.
To Maria Smith -- shame on the THE for prompting an international debate on an important issue! Are uou serious?
@confused, so the article is not funny because it is entirely written by men and written from a male perspective. Men, like women, have a tendancy to write from their own perspective. I have a friend who is a male nurse and pretty much everything he reads about nursing is written by females from a female perspective. Does that mean all nurses are fundamentally misandric? I'm not saying its right, just that both sexes are guilty of this. "his adolescent-isolation/rejection-fueled misogyny" - wtf?? - I think this only exists in your own mind!
I repeat; it isn't satire. Satire is extremity - eating babies to cure the Irish problem is satire because it is so extreme and so awful that it makes us look at our own views again. It is savage, vicious and over the top. This is not over the top. It is a situation that could easily happen, although I am sure that if you look at the vast majority of girls in a lecture room, they tend not to be the fantasy curvaceous wenches that Terence has in mind. But it is still not far enough from the truth to be called satire, as any semi-decent English lecturer can explain. It's just a repetitive, unimaginative bit of bad writing, which is a shame, as that subject could have been hilarious. It does not have to be some turgid piece of badly placed sexism - and I am sorry to all you out there who get so offended and upset and over-react at at the word, as if we have cured the world of sexism and it is somehow bad form to mention it now - but it is. It simply tells girls once again that no matter how brilliant they are or how hard they work, their only value is as a bit of eye candy to the person who should be putting their brain through its paces. Sorry again if that upsets some of you, and I have no doubt that such a view will be scoffed angrily away by ...oh....at least several people. But we have all heard men like Terence far too often for them to be interesting anymore.
I repeat; it isn't satire. Satire is extremity - eating babies to cure the Irish problem is satire because it is so extreme and so awful that it makes us look at our own views again. It is savage, vicious and over the top. This is not over the top. It is a situation that could easily happen, although I am sure that if you look at the vast majority of girls in a lecture room, they tend not to be the fantasy curvaceous wenches that Terence has in mind. But it is still not far enough from the truth to be called satire, as any semi-decent English lecturer can explain. It's just a repetitive, unimaginative bit of bad writing, which is a shame, as that subject could have been hilarious. It does not have to be some turgid piece of badly placed sexism - and I am sorry to all you out there who get so offended and upset and over-react at at the word, as if we have cured the world of sexism and it is somehow bad form to mention it now - but it is. It simply tells girls once again that no matter how brilliant they are or how hard they work, their only value is as a bit of eye candy to the person who should be putting their brain through its paces. Sorry again if that upsets some of you, and I have no doubt that such a view will be scoffed angrily away by ...oh....at least several people. But we have all heard men like Terence far too often for them to be interesting anymore.
Shocking! I must point out that any male who defends this article will only be tagged as sexist themselves, and any female who agrees with this has nothing about her to let men refer to us in such a way. Yes I am at the university as a student and if I were asked by terrence what i thought of the article I would also tell him exactly what I thought! Guillaume i must say I am shocked at your view of the situation. Who the person is or what they have done previously as good does not alter the fact that he has written a sexist article which has offended many female students both in the university itself and universities around the country. Hopefully Terrence will now think a little more before writing such things.
I think we're all missing the true genius of the article by Dr Kealey. Even in an article on Lust he manages to get a dig in at the QAA. That's art.
Desire happens in the university. There's absolutely no question about that. Students get crushes on teachers. Teachers get crushes on students. It's male; it's female; it's transgender; it's gay, straight and somewhere in-between. Fine. The problem is that THE has given no thought to providing sin the diversity it deserves. It has instead chosen to demonstrate that not only does humour belong to men, it belongs to (from a quick search in Google) white men. (If I'm wrong and there are men of colour who have penned a piece, my apologies). The issue with such white-male-centred articles appearing in THE is that they repeat the white-male-centred situation in which most of us find ourselves in universities. This is by no means the only example of such a thing, nor will it be the last. I suppose what's really going on is that some of us, for some reason, had come to expect more from THE. We'd hoped that at least with THE we could find a humorous piece that makes fun of the diversity of debauchery.
It horrifies me to think that when I form a friendship with a male academic, as seems to be increasingly encouraged, or show my admiration for his teachings I am somehow giving him unspoken consent to think of me sexually, or really as anything other than an interested student. I came to university to learn, I study a course that interests me, of course I will show admiration of anyone who can provide the knowledge I am paying so highly to receive. Not only this, but it's dangerous to suggest, as this article does, that by showing my admiration that I find my lecturer to be a 'hero' whom I wish to be seduced by. This sends out the message to other lecturers that these young girls are not seeking more knowledge but rather a sexually suggestive relationship based on the supposed female fantasy of a girl being seduced by her teacher. I accept that physical attraction is natural, but the wording here goes beyond that. The comparison is drawn between a lecture theatre and a strip club, the difference being that the females in one situation are paid to be looked at and thought of sexually, in the other the females are the ones paying, and it's for an education. My main problem here is the derogatory terms employed. "All cats look grey in the dark"? I'm sure his wife is really pleased with that comment, knowing that he would rather fantasize about the young women he teaches. I am disgusted at this man and if I was every thinking of studying at Birmingham I would quickly swap courses. That is not to say that there are no such types at my university, but certainly none who feel the need to champion their perverted sense of humour. This is not humour or humourous. There are well established roles between what is acceptable between students and teachers. While it is encouraged, yes, that we bond with our lecturers, they are their as paid professionals, not horny men tired of their marriage there to get their eyeful of 'perks'. Disgraceful.
Also a female grad student here. Not shocked at all by the article, although I didn't find it very interesting either. Obviously meant to be humorous, although I wasn't laughing that much. a) saying that young women are more interested in abs than labs is not offensive, it is just a variation on a very common notion, that nobody really means although everybody will say it once in a while - namely, that undergrads care more about the fun and the sex than about their studies, and that the highlight of the year is spring break, not the conference by that famous mathematician. b) The author clearly states that most girls don't care about their lecturers, and that he's speaking about one student a year. c) He only talks about young students, not "women in academia". d) We all know this is happening. Yes, a lot of sex is going on. A lot of female students sleep with their lecturers, for a variety of reasons. It happens: face it, instead of being outraged by misoginy. From what I've seen, at the undergrad level, it is usually coming from the students, and they are not doing it for the grades - because yes, for undergrads, the professor has barely any power at all. It can though become a huge problem for some female grad students, as the powerless professor then becomes quite powerful indeed. Anyway, address the problem, instead of claiming that women don't ever think of sex and should be seen as only brains. Oh, and I don't really see what kind of humorous article on lust in academia could have escaped the attacks found here. Finally, yes, I've definitely met female professors doing exactly the same as their male counterparts...
I'm finding the comments section much funnier than Kealey's piece. In particular, I love two types of commentator: the ones who preface their remarks by stating something like "I understand that this is a satire" and then go on to prove that they clearly don't. And I absolutely adore those who tout Kealey's remarks as a bold anti-PC statement without taking into account Kealey's own claim that "this is a moral piece that says that middle aged male academics and young female undergraduates should not sleep together." To quote Swift--although Kealeys piece in no way measures up anything the Dean penned--"satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody's face but their own."
Is it not possible that the THES published the VC's shockingly sexist comments because they are shocking? When a VC freely offers such views to a journal, can a journalist be expected to resist the opportunity to publish an article that is bound to lead to a stream of outraged replies? Yes, it's outrageous to accuse female students of en-masse sleeping with lecturers to get their grades boosted; it's also unfair to the many decent male lecturers who don't sleep with students. It would appear that the THES, by publishing this article, has simply given this VC sufficient rope with which to hang himself.
@BTW stop sensationalising the article "Yes, it's outrageous to accuse female students of en-masse sleeping with lecturers to get their grades boosted". Did you actual read Kealey's piece? "most male lecturers know that, most years, there will be a girl in class who flashes her admiration...". Notice the "a girl" as in one, singular girl - hardly makes it en masse does it? More worrying though, doesn't en masse mean 'a group of people doing something together at the same time'? Blimey! If you're correct then Uni life is a lot more debauched than I realised and I'm surprised Kealey had any energy left to write his piece!
There has been some mention of "horror" by at least one student at the thought of her male lecturer possibly thinking of her sexually - or was the horror at being seen to be giving him permission to think of her sexually? Either way, I don't think there's much one can do about that. Men think about having sex more than women do, and probably see possible sexual partners more often in women they get to know. Perhaps this is a consequence of feminism, that men's natural sexual lust must be kept under wraps, even if only to ensure that the feminist myth of equality between men and women remains a goal to strive for. And how can equality be a goal if the real differences between them are brought out into the open, enabling all to see that true equality is simply not possible? It used to be the case that heterosexuals were often homophobic, and could feel horror at the thought of a gay man being sexually attracted to them, or even acting on that. I think heterosexuals are becoming more tolerant of gays, realizing that that's just the way they are, and that one can always say No. But if heterosexuals are feeling horror at the thought of even another heterosexual feeling sexually attracted to them, isn't this an overreaction? It isn't about 'giving' anyone permmission to think of them sexually. If it's going to happen it is, and it can't be helped. The problem only exists if there is pressure to meet someone's sexual expectations, and if one is at risk of being punished or excluded if one doesn't submit. There's enough women around who are willing to submit who actually do make it harder for the rest of us. And that's a result of the writing and actions of people like Germaine Greer, for one, who presented it to women as a form of liberated sexuality. What she didn't emphasize enough was that it's only liberation if it is a choice. Her way of life was taken up and presented as better than any other way. I've almost come full circle here. While we do have to tolerate men whose minds are on sex more than ever before, I think, and part of the reason why is biological, some of it is culture - it's the way our society has developed, mainly due to feminism. I guess we can feel horror when we think of possible outcomes of a lecturer or professor thinking about us sexually and problems arising from that - loss of education and career, exclusion from the kind of life and work we had wanted to do, fewer chances for fulfillment, and even poverty.
Sue. Please stop preaching and assuming that you are speaking for all your women. You are not. Your reasoning is apocalyptic. Are you really suggesting that if a man looks at you sexually that that leads to poverty? You make some incredible general generalisations and your language is condescending and pompous 'tolerate men whose minds are more on sex than ever before'. Basta
Feminists used to say that were the people most at risk of living in poverty as they became old, and the reasoning was that women were less often able to become financially independent. Women who grew up in the fifties didn't work or have careers as much as they do now, so if they didn't have a husband, this put them at risk of living in poverty. Yes, there is much between the idea of a 'man looking a a woman sexually' and the woman living in poverty. So yes, it used to that a husband was what stood between a woman and a life of poverty, but due to changes in our culture - sexual liberation and increasing numbers of women in the work force - it seems to me that women are expected to participate sexually whatever their thoughts are on that. For women at risk of living in poverty, either having a husband or conforming to the new sexual norms are ways out. Ennui, I don't think it's just men whose minds are on sex more than ever. It's women, and probably children too. We have the internet, as well as having tv introduced into almost every home in the western world since the 1950s (not to mention people like Germaine Greer). So yes, in general, people do seem to have become more willing to accept our culture's tolerance of sex and to put up with the consequences.
I've read the comments in this thread with interest (at least initially). Let's take a calm view here. Was Kealey's piece ill-advised? Surely Does he cast aspersions on the motivations of female students? Yes, he does Can there by sexual undertones in interactions that occur between students and staff? Certainly - it happens sometimes (thougb far less often than some male academic would like to believe!) Do female (and male) students occassionally use their attractiveness to further their interests. Alas yes - not often, but it does happen Do male, hetero academics, have sexual thoughts and fantasies about their female students sometimes? Yes, absolutely. They are human beings, not brains on stilts - one can't simply erase one's sexual subjectivity in a workplace setting. Should they let this attraction be made apparant, or act on it any way? No - morally as well as professionally inappropriate I think Kealey's piece is a reflection of male fantasy, rather than reality for the most part. I remember, as a young academic (just out of my doctorate) being approached by one of my UG students in a nightclub, who make an explicit and unambiguous sexual overture towards me. In *fantasy* this would have been enjoyable (I admit that I found her attractive). In reality I was horrified, and couldn't make my excuses and run away fast enough. As was right and proper. One final thought - what Kealey's artcile unfortunately does is cast suspicion upon all male academics who seem to have a close relationship with their female students. I develop quite close relationships with my students (both male and female) sometimes - usually when they are bright, able, intellectually inquisitive, and want to learn. They end up becoming friends in effect (especially so in the case of posgradute students). However, the view of male academics as lecherous casts any such friendship into immediate suspicion, the idea being that something untoward and inappropriate must be going on. I know colleagues who won't have a one-to-one meeting with a female student without leaving their office door wide open, so fearful are they of accusations/rumours of sexual misconduct. Something is wring with this picture!
There is a contradiction in what you say, Academicus. On the one hand you state that there may sometimes be "sexual undertones" between students and staff, and that sexual attraction should NOT be acted upon inappropriate settings. On the other hand you admit that academics are human beings and can't simply erase their "sexual subjectiviity". I think this idea only just starts to get close to the real influence one's sexuality has on oneself, even to the extent of behaving in possibly sexually inappropriate ways, without meaning to. Especially when people are newly 'exploring' their sexuality they may not realize the effect of their behaviour on others, or if they are not comfortable with their sexuality they could make choices which are not the best, under the circumstances. I do think lecturers need to find better ways of handling delicate matters besdes turning on their heels and running away. When this is considered acceptable, it makes it a legitimate response to any circumstance, even a sexual incident initiated by the lecturer. In this situation, all the professor or lecturer has to do if rebuffed by a student is to turn and run the other way when he sees her coming. Other staff members will automatically see the student as being the one at fault, rather than the devious professor. And I think this relates to an earlier commment I wrote here, about the idea of "horror", as expressed by another commenter. It's unfortunate when sexual attention or sexual incidents are seen as horrific, but then, as we know, the consequences to a lecturer of being accused (or to women students not looking for sex), can lead to loss of career or the ending of academic career aspirations. I don't imagine that most women students are eager to jump into bed with professors even though they are making what seem to be sexual overtures. It's men who are more likely to see something continuous between the flirtatious act and the sex act, not women.
Dr Kealey is clearly misinformed and totally out of out of line for a Vice Chancellor of a University. A member of faculty who has sex with a student is most definitely abusing his position of power-and betraying the trust put in him by the University for whom he works, the students themselves and parents who send their vulnerable 18-year-olds away to University. He is also failing in his duty of care. Sorry Dr Kealey, but no parent sends a daughter to University to be exploited by her lecturers for their sexual gratification. What you also need to know is the devastating psychological effects that can result on students who have been drawn into such ‘relationships’. You have not done your research. Unfortunately it appears from a study carried out in the 1990s by staff at the University of Northumbria in Newcastle (See ‘A Very Private Affair-Sexual Exploitation in Higher Education’ by Pam Carter and Tony Jeffs-Education Now Books) that many departments in our Universities protect a sex predator who will deliberately manipulate his professional relationship with many students during his working life time, in order to meet his personal needs. This often leads to the students becoming so damaged that they are not able to study and have to terminate their course. How many young women fail to achieve their potential due to this, I wonder? Much has been written on the subject, particularly in America-try ‘The Lecherous University-What every Student & Parent should know about the Epidemic of Sexual Harrassment on Campus’ by Charles and Colleen Hobson pubished by the authors in 2002. If only Universities UK would take responsibility for this huge, largely ignored and misunderstood problem and direct all our institutions of higher Education to a common resolution instead of leaving it to individual Institutions, which may well have leaders with misguided attitudes like Dr Kealey’s. It is the same problem everywhere and our students need protection and they need to be warned. Here are some warning signs for students in the meantime: 1. Violation of professional boundaries- teacher getting too close and makes you feel uncomfortable. 2. Teacher questions you about your private life. 3. Teacher questions you about your sex life. 4. Teacher tells you about his personal life. 5. Teacher uses inappropriate sexual illusions during a class or tutorial. 6. Teacher is controlling and insists on his own way without discussion. 7. Teacher undermines your self confidence. 8. Teacher arranges to meet you socially. 9. Teacher shows anger and behaves unpredictably. 10. Teacher invites you to his home for a private tutorial. Of Course, all this applies equally to female teachers and their male students and to same sex ‘relationships’. Assess the situation and run a mile at once if you feel threatened.