AHRC Research Leave Scheme. In Peril?

Via the The Brooks Blog (and via Brian Leiter):

http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=403020&c=1

http://the-brooks-blog.blogspot.com/2008/07/uk-research-leave-scheme-for.html

http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2008/07/more-trouble-fo.html

By the sound of things the Arts and Humanities Research Council scheme for research leave may be changing. Although both Thom Brooks and Brian Leiter include headlines that sound like research leave funding might be axed altogether (this seems like a possible, but worst case, scenario), it seems fairly evident that the AHRC wants to address several problems with the current schemes. These would probably require the current scheme to be reworked or replaced, but not dropped without a successor. The issues are whether the scheme lead to completed research projects, whether it aids junior academic sufficiently, and whether it promotes collaborative research adequately? Of the three, that collaborative research is being presented as the biggest priority.

If collaborative funding is the driving force behind changes which eventually emerge from the AHRC, some dire portents might be justified. Presumably, the money currently lined up for individual scholars would have to be obtained from joint research proposals. This entails significant procedural changes, and may also entail significantly different probabilities of success, depending on how funding is eventually earmarked. I am not at all sure that this is healthy.

Collaborative research may be a desirable norm in some fields, but I wonder if it is appropriate to all kinds of research. As a matter of fact, I have enjoyed and continue to look forward to collaborative work in the history of political thought. That said, the joint papers I have given were both received in conferences as stimulating novelties. More importantly, I cannot conceive of having achieved my work on Lockean will and on Lockean language collaboratively.

Of course, one can always try to sell one's work as collaborative, even if that is true only in a thin kind of way. One might imagine a loose research group dedicated to a common theme, perhaps agonism in republican thought. By presenting work, in a series of seminars and hosting several conferences, some edited book or special issue of a journal might be pursued at the close of the research group. There is no reason not to think of this project as collaborative. The question would be whether this kind of thin collaboration satisfies, or whether the AHRC will be looking for something more like joint research. If thick collaboration is the goal, the accommodating research programme like that imagined here would probably not have the cohesiveness to command success.

At the moment, its probably to early to jump to conclusions, but the ramifications of potential changes, if currently indeterminate, could be staggering for how research is carried out and where.

Once more into the breach,

Ben

Flat Hunting

I've just been to Oxford to search for housing for the upcoming academic year. Teddy Hall put me up and gave me breakfast while I was there, which made the process much more comfortable.

 

I visited a few closets purported to be studio flats. One of them was owned by a real eccentric, blue blooded Briton of the upper class. Upon learning that I was from Wisconsin, she promptly mentioned that her brother owned a farm in Spring Green (the location of a Shakespeare company of regional fame, and a very nice part of the state). It soon turned out that this one farm was actually a portfolio of agricultural properties in Wisconsin, Illinois, Canada, and most recently in China. She then asked if I lived in a log cabin, (as all woodland Wisconsinites do) or whether I had every participating in building one. In the process she noted that the technique of cabin building required the use of a 'ghastly' substance to block the draft between the logs. Charming though this encounter was, I was not convinced by the dollhouse like proportions of the flat and pressed on.

 

This was a fortuitous decision because the next place I looked at, while not a self-contained flat, was a room large to accommodate the previous flat altogether. It had nice high ceilings, was airy, and included the use of a fairly well proportioned kitchen and washing/utility room. The other flatmates were said to be professionals and a graduate student. Plus the place was downtown, close to the railway station, and about a seven minute walk to my college. Not having to spend money on public transport, and having access to my office whenever I want is certainly worth the opportunity cost. So I made the move to secure the flat.

 

At the moment the estate agent (real estate agent for American readers or Maakelaar for the Dutch) is checking my references. When that is complete I will pay my deposit and the first months rent. Hopefully, this goes smoothly. My contract will start on 1 September, and matches my employment term date for date. This gives me to the chance to use Oxford's Bodleian library sooner rather than later, and that is an opportunity which cannot be missed.

 

A few photos of Teddy hall will be forthcoming in my next post.

 

Once more into the breach,

 

Ben

Cafe Espresso

I just want to give some credit to a lovely little cafe in Exeter, situated on the way up to the Rougemont Castle. I'll add some pictures when I remember to take a camera there, but it is has been the home of serious studying, writing, revising, and marking since I have been in Exeter. I was working there today, and thought about the many qualities of the operation. The barista’s are friendly and make a very fine espresso, and the chef concocts some fantastic cakes. And that is a compliment coming from someone who is rather obsessed with cake and pastry baking. The physical space incorporates two different idioms, with the upper floor clad in rich yellowy creams and overlooking the Rougemont Castle's surviving Norman tower, providing an atmosphere entirely unlike that in any chain cafe.

 

One barista trained in Australia, which might seem like a rather unusual place to learn the ropes of espresso. But with all seriousness, his work really surpasses much of what I have had in Italy (Florence, Bologna, Pisa, and Milan). I mentioned this to him, and he explained the cafe scene in Australia. Apparently the Aussies are quite particular when it comes to coffee. If they don't like a drink they will send it back. This is a regular, frustrating, and I can imagine a little bit humiliating experience. So he said he learned how to make coffee in short order. He used to work at Costa when they were an up and coming chain, and 'serious about coffee', but gave up on them when they started to really accomplish their sales goals and care less about the quality of their product. He's been at Cafe Espresso since then, and in my judgment is a real asset.

 

Interestingly, Exeter has recently been ranked as the number one clone town in the United Kingdom. That is to say, that its high street and central city retail districts are more dominated by chain operations than any other city in the land. In fact, the only store on the high street which is not a chain is the surviving tobacconist. Everything else is a hodgepodge of Cafe Rouge, Tesco, Carphone Warehouse, and Marks and Spencers. This has the advantage of predictability. I know exactly what is available, where, and when. But if I'm looking for something outside the margins, like some traditionally made welted 'veldtschoen'*, which I'd like to replace my current foam-made rubbish hiking boots, then Exeter has no known solutions.

 

Worse than the lack of certain eccentric opportunities is the dearth of care and class. Every city faces the homogenization that has blighted Exeter. Some may hold out more than Exeter has. But even here places like Cafe Espresso are little gems. They are personable where Starbucks is faceless, they are meticulous where Costa is ordinary and their pistachio and citrus cake must include a dash of the transcendent sublime.

 

Once more into the breach,

Ben

 

* The veldtschoen, or field shoe: shoe in which upper is turned outward when stitched into the welt of the shoe to form a flange.  When combined with durable, dense leathers, and a solid rubber sole, this results in remarkable water proofing and field resilience.

 

(Picture from http://www.herringshoes.co.uk/index.php.  Reproduced here for editorial purposes only.)

British Museum

I always enjoy a trip through the British Museum.  The Near-east and Western civilization wing is remarkably phenomenological in its approach (in the Hegelian sense).  The progression of Athenian ethical life from the more physically pre-occupied earlier Greeks and the cultures of the fertile crescent is part of the wing's physical layout.  But one must be careful not to draw abstractions too indiscriminately from a handful of artifacts, which may be none too representative.  Indeed phallic jokes in Aristophanes, sometimes pertaining to the Athenian politician/aristocrat Alcibiades, may tell us more about Athenian ethical life than Hegel or the Elgin Marbles.

 

Meanwhile, here are some photos.

 

 

 

 

 

Stephen Stills - Go Back Home - Eric Clapton

No comment.

Job Update

Long have I yearned for gainful employment. Quite seriously, the anxiety of job searching had gripped me. My hope was not exhausted, but there was a dearth of expectation.

Fortuna, however, smiles in her own time. In early June I was contacted by St. Edmund (or Teddy) Hall, University of Oxford, and was asked if I could be interviewed on Friday, June 13. I managed to say, 'that would be superb' or something to that effect, though I'm not sure how, as my throat had clenched into a swallow of elation fused with terror.

My colleagues at Exeter arranged to give me a practice interview on Thursday, which went more or less well. Though I felt I handled several questions disastrously and certainly needed more preparation. But the payoff was great, as they anticipated the questions asked in the real interview with remarkable precognition.

Friday came and I decided that Friday the 13 would be a day of bad luck - for the competition. Indeed, I arrived at Oxford by trains 5 minutes a head of schedule (likely the first early train in England for decades) and roughly 2 hours prior to the interview itself. I bided my time by locating Teddy Hall, wandering briefly around town, and taking time to practice my presentation over espresso at Starbucks. I went to the Blackwell's bookshop by the Bodleian, went to the politics shelves, and prayed.

The interview went as well as I could hope, and I had rectified the dilapidated performance of the day before. I even managed to borrow a joke from my supervisor. Even ignorant of the final result, it was a relief that I had shown them quite properly what I'm made of. I left having been told that I would probably be informed of the results about halfway through the next week.

My first move after saying fair well to my interviewers was back to Blackwell's. I decided I the first thing I would do would be to buy a new book on Locke for my collection. I have no illusions about being anything other than a eccentric academic. Much to my astonishment, when I left the bookstore I found that a message had been deposited on my phone. I called voicemail to discover that the interviewers had several questions which they forgot to ask. Being close, I marched strait down the Queen's lane and toward Teddy hall, my mobile phone in hand a prepared to dial back.

So not twenty-five minutes after the interview, I was on the phone with Dr. Karma Nabulsi (the lead Politics lecturer at Teddy Hall). The first thing she told me,

'We want to give you the job'.

I immediately said yes.