Opinion

When I listened to Mike Daisey’s monologue on This American Life about the Foxconn factory where Apple iPads are made, I thought about assigning the podcast to students in a research class I’m teaching. It struck me that it would be a good way to consider the environmental and social issues that we tend to ignore when we think about the technology tools we use every day, tools that are essential for research. As it turned out, I didn’t assign it – and was relieved I hadn’t when Twitter lit up with the news that This American Life was retracting the story

It's hard to not feel that we are passing through a post-Gutenberg (post-Gutenbergian?) phase. Hasn't the e-book, the Kindle and the Nook, killed its paper cousin? Surprisingly, the answer is no. In 2010 publishing revenue increased 3.1%, to a healthy $27.9 billion. E-book sales rose almost 40% from the year before, bringing in $1.62 billion in revenue.

I walked into class last Wednesday and my students looked spent. They’d only been back from break two days, but it might as well have been two weeks. They were working on a paper for me, and it showed. They were exhausted, and in their exhaustion, losing focus.

Of late, I've been thinking a lot about how campuses and their surrounding communities interrelate in ways that affect the sustainability (or lack thereof) of both.

Mike Daisey says the truth is very important to him. I couldn't agree more.

Whether it goes by the name of exaggeration, half-truth, misrepresentation, distortion, or dissembling, lying is endemic in all of education.

Rick Santorum's critiques aren't helpful to the conservative academics he says need support, writes one of them, Matthew Woessner.

Kathryn Hume says you need to focus on the match between you and the specific department and institution, not general issues about why you want a job.