Zen and the art of package delivery

We sent 20 boxes with DHL to Sweden as part of the process of dismantling our London home. Nothing expensive, just our old memorabilia — drawings by the kids, letters from family and friends, things we wrote as teenagers, photos of old girlfriends, gifts from people now dead. DHL managed to deliver 1 box but […]

Marking

I really hate marking. There is something particularly loathsome about reading piles and piles of exam scripts. Last year I read over 300 and I’ll do it again this year. It’s too much like real work, like the kind of work normal people do — like working in Tescos or answering phones. I’m supposed to […]

On strike

As a new union member I now find myself on strike. It’s terrible to have to inconvenience students but what can I do? You can’t ask the union to stand up for you if you don’t stand up for the union. Going on strike during exam time is of course our only opportunity to exert […]

10,000 and counting

This blog just had its 10,000th visitor! Amazing result in just one month. There are 32,605 hits altogether (clicks on individual pages) and my Open Day speech has been read by some 1,965 people. Two individual computers at the LSE has clocked up over 600 hits each. Btw, the Davies vs. Ringmar poll just closed. […]

China syndrome

If you wonder why I’m banging on about freedom of speech on the internet, check out today’s news: A Chinese Internet writer was sentenced to jail for 12 years on Tuesday for “subversion of state power” after backing a movement by exiled dissidents to hold free elections, his lawyer said. Yang Tianshui, 45, who has been […]

Transgression, here I come

I’m off to Taiwan next academic year, as professor at the Center for Social and Cultural Studies at National Chiao Tung University. There I’m going to give a course on transgression, on the crossing of borders — geographical borders, cultural, moral and psychological. This seems appropriate given the transgredi I’ll be making. There is a […]

Some news

Some recent developments: a journalist from the Times Higher Educational Supplement just called me. There might be a story in the paper; if there is I’ll try to link to it from here. They wanted a photo but I declined. It makes me feel uncomfortable to have my face in the paper and the real […]

what I want

The LSE authorities are clearly trying to put the whole issue of blogs and freedom of speech behind them. My 15 minutes of fame seem to be coming to an end. The official statement from the LSE director claims that ‘we regard the matter as closed.’ At long last they even seem to be winding […]

Extra, extra, read all about it

The story of this blog and the LSE authorities has made it into the papers. First The Beaver, The Guardian and then Times Higher Educational Supplement. I’d be very interested to hear your views. Meanwhile I’ve turned down an interview with the Sunday Times and an offer from Mail on Sunday to write an article […]

Mayday! Mayday!

I just joined the union! A little late one might argue, but better late than never. I was always a great supporter of unions but I thought they were for people who couldn’t take care of themselves. I also thought that doctors only are for sick people and that lawyers only are for people who […]