Synopses & Reviews
In an age when innovative scholarly work is at an all-time high, the academy itself is being rocked by structural change. Funding is plummeting. Tenure increasingly seems a prospect for only the elite few. Ph.D.'s are going begging for even adjunct work. Into this tumult steps Cary Nelson, with a no- holds-barred account of recent developments in higher education.
Eloquent and witty, Manifesto of a Tenured Radical urges academics to apply the theoretical advances of the last twenty years to an analysis of their own practices and standards of behavior. In the process, Nelson offers a devastating critique of current inequities and a detailed proposal for change in the form of A Twelve-Step Program for Academia.
Review
"Manifesto of a Tenured Radicalis the Silent Spring of higher education." -Constance Penley,University of California at Santa Barbara
Review
"Armed with a keen conscience and a fearless wit, Cary Nelson exposes the moral bankruptcy that underpins the current crisis of academic labor. From underpaid cafeteria workers and underemployed Ph.D.'s to overindulged professors and CEO- wannabe university presidents, Nelson's groves of academe are littered with inequality and injustice. Whether on the topic of the future of literary studies or the unionization of graduate students, Manifesto of a Tenured Radical presents a devastating case for the correction of the profession."-Andrew Ross,author of Real Love and The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life
About the Author
Cary Nelson teaches at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he is Jublilee Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences. He is also the national president of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). Among his twenty-five books are Manifesto of a Tenured Radical (also published by NYU) and the landmark coedited collection Cultural Studies.
Table of Contents
Against English as it was : theory and the politics of the discipline -- Multiculturalism without guarantees : from anthologies to the social text --Relativism, politics, and ethics : writing literary history in the shadow of Poststructuralism -- Always already cultural studies : academic conferences and a manifesto -- Progressive pedagogy without apologies : the cultural work of teaching noncanonical poetry --Canon fodder : an evening with William Bennett, Lynne Cheney, and Dinesh D'Souza -- Hate speech and political correctness -- What happens when we put the left at the center? -- Dichotomy is where the money is : anti-intellectualism inside and outside the university -- Late capitalism arrives on campus : the corporate university's expendable employees -- What is to be done? : a twelve-step program for academia --Reaction and resistance at Yale and the MLA : union organizing and the job market.