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Chapter 5 of Earthopolis: A Biography of Our Urban Planet discusses the relationship between cities, knowledge, and power, arguing against the casual link scholars often make between cities and “civilization,” a concept with too many congratulatory overtones. Referring to cities around the world, the chapter shows how urban monumental architecture and the mass processions and ceremonies that monuments were designed to accommodate repeatedly served to disseminate state-sponsored propaganda glorifying authoritarian rule and violence. It also traces the role of smaller spaces in cities in generating “Axial Age” knowledge that was skeptical of state propaganda, noting that authoritarian rulers sought to coopt or contain such knowledge to support their continued rule by building universities, libraries, schools, and temples and other spaces of worship while censoring ideas they deemed too critical. In this way, cities did help spread new knowledges and technologies, making it possible for smaller-scale cults and schools of philosophy to become the kernels of later “world” religions and secular knowledge systems. Throughout the pre-modern era, however, the spread of knowledge was subject to sharp boundaries delimited by the urban-centered infrastructure of basic literacy, even as city-based technologies often acted as a force in expanding the human population on Earth.
Higher education is undergoing unprecedented transformation. In the global knowledge economy universities are of paramount importance to governments worldwide. This creates a strong rationale for an element exploring how the interactions between universities and the state are being reconfigured, while highlighting the role policy analysis can play in explaining these dynamics. Specifically, this element draws on four theoretical approaches – New-Institutionalism, the Advocacy Coalition Framework, the Narrative Policy Framework, and Policy Diffusion and Transfer – to inform the analysis. Examples are drawn from a range of countries and areas of potential research informed by policy theory are identified. This element features a section dedicated to each of the three main missions of the university followed by an analysis of the institution as a whole. This reveals how universities, while typically seeking greater autonomy, remain subject to a multifaceted form of nation state oversight as they continue to globalise in an uncertain world.
In economics the labour force comes out of nowhere. Under capitalism children are still produced at home. Under slavery they were reared for profit. Children were reared collectively in kibbutzim and boarding schools. In industrialising Britain child labour paid for itself. Affluent societies rely on communal education. Even private schools are not-for-profit. The slogan of school choice was invented for racial segregation. Its appeal is social separation. For politicians and wealthy backers the charter school/free school/academy model is ideological money-laundering and opportunities for enrichment. Despite three decades of effort school choice has failed. Universities derive their economic support from student fees financed by government loans. This encourages expensive facilities, at the expense of students and staff. Student loans have become a lifelong burden exacerbating inequality. Bringing children to maturity relies on family altruism and public education. Other methods have failed.
No less important a structural development than the emancipation of natural philosophy from metaphysics was the self-conscious emancipation of theology from philosophy, largely achieved by making philology and historical scholarship – rather than philosophy – the primary handmaidens to the discipline. This did not happen at the hands of a small band of liberal outsiders (‘Erasmians’, ‘latitudinarians’, etc.), but within the theological mainstream. In the Catholic world, all major locales (starting with the Spanish Netherlands, and culminating in France) witnessed a self-conscious shift from ‘scholastic’ to ‘positive’ theological method. By the second half of the seventeenth century, a similar development had occurred in all the major areas of the Reformed world. Crucially, this shift should not be taken for a form of ‘fideism’, even if its conceptual resources sometimes seem to imply it. At the basic epistemological level, conceptions of theological truth remained broadly the same as they had been since c.1300: divine mysteries could be above reason, but could not contradict it; the truths of natural theology could be proved rationally. But within this broadly continuous framework a huge methodological shift took place, one that significantly curtailed the cultural authority of apriorist philosophy. Calls for the separation of philosophy and theology usually worked to the detriment of the former.
This chapter charts the way in which the study of nature was made increasingly less philosophical between 1500 and 1700. At the start of the period, natural philosophy was largely conducted as a form of ‘metaphysical physics’. The erosion of this approach was driven by three factors: 1) the impact of humanist critique; 2) The colonisation of natural philosophy by physicians; 3) The colonisation of natural philosophy by mixed mathematicians. Despite a spirited fightback from the metaphysicians, by the middle of the seventeenth century the anti-metaphysical physicians and mixed-mathematicians – often operating in tandem – had won. A major concomitant of this is that the idea that most of seventeenth-century natural philosophy was grounded in ontological mechanism is wrong. To the extent that natural philosophers were mechanists, they were operational mechanists, who modelled nature on machines but refused to commit to an ontological reductionism, and often directly opposed it. In this and other respect, Descartes and his followers, far from being representative of seventeenth-century natural philosophy, were outliers.
This chapter considers the major societal, economic and cultural changes that occurred in the 13th century. It also discusses the mendicant orders (Franciscans, Dominicans), the universities and the impact of Islamic scholars (Avicenna, Averroes) on scholastic theology.
Medical students are vulnerable to stress and depression during medical school and the COVID-19 pandemic may have exacerbated these issues. This study examined whether the risk of depression was associated with COVID-19 pandemic-related medical school communication.
Methods:
A 144 - item pilot cross-sectional online survey of medical students in the US, was carried out between September 1, 2020 and December 31, 2020. Items on stress, depression, and communication between students and their medical schools were included. This study examined associations of student perceptions of universities’ communication efforts and pandemic response with risk of developing depression.
Results:
The sample included 212 students from 22 US states. Almost 50% (48.6%) were at risk of developing depression. Students felt medical schools transitioned well to online platforms, while the curriculum was just as rigorous as in-person courses. Students at risk of developing depression reported communication was poor more frequently compared to students at average risk. Students at risk of depression were also more than 3 times more likely to report their universities’ communication about scholarships or other funding was poor in adjusted analyses.
Conclusion:
Universities communicated well with medical students during the pandemic. However, this study also highlights the need for ongoing efforts to address student mental health by medical schools.
This article develops an analytical framework to study the power struggles between status quo and gender equality actors underpinning the implementation of gender equality policies. While resistance to gender equality policies in different institutions has received considerable scholarly attention, examining this struggle in light of a multifaceted concept of power that encompasses both domination and individual and collective empowerment, we argue, offers a more accurate account of the possibilities of a feminist politics of implementation. Our analytical framework also accounts for the factors that enable resistance by dominant actors and counter-resistance by gender equality actors and the informal rules that are being upheld or challenged, respectively. Applying our framework to the study of Spanish universities, we identify both the forms and types of resistance that hinder gender reform efforts in higher education institutions and the counter-action strategies that seek to drive implementation forward and achieve institutional change.
To investigate nutrition knowledge (NK) in university students, potential factors affecting knowledge and predictors of good NK.
Design:
A cross-sectional study was conducted in 2017–2018. The revised General Nutrition Knowledge Questionnaire was administered online to assess overall NK and subsections of knowledge (dietary recommendations, nutrient sources of foods, healthy food choices and diet–disease relationships). The Kruskal–Wallis test was used to compare overall NK scores according to sex, age, ethnicity, field of study, studying status, living arrangement, being on a special diet and perceived health. Logistic regression was performed to identify which of these factors were associated with a good level of NK (defined as having an overall NK score above the median score of the sample population).
Setting:
Two London-based universities.
Participants:
One hundred and ninety students from various academic disciplines.
Results:
The highest NK scores were found in the healthy food choices (10 out of 13 points) and the lowest in the nutrient sources of foods section (25 out of 36 points). Overall NK score was 64 out of 88 points, with 46·8 % students reaching a good level of knowledge. Knowledge scores significantly differed according to age, field of study, ethnicity and perceived health. Having good NK was positively associated with age (OR = 1·05, (95 % CI 1·00, 1·1), P < 0·05), White ethnicity (OR = 3·27, (95 % CI 1·68, 6·35), P < 0·001) and health rating as very good or excellent (OR = 4·71, (95 % CI 1·95, 11·4), P < 0·05).
Conclusions:
Future health-promoting interventions should focus on increasing knowledge of specific nutrition areas and consider the personal and academic factors affecting NK in university students.
From Walter Raleigh’s The Study of English Literature (1900) to the Newbolt Commission’s report, The Teaching of English in England (1921), the first two decades of the twentieth century saw the consolidation of ‘English’ as a school subject and university discipline, within and against a critical culture that was often international, anti-institutional, dissonant. This chapter tells the parallel and divergent stories of this disciplinary formation and this critical explosion: institutionally, university chairs and formal examinations in English literature were established; counter-culturally, new manifestoes and little magazines blasted past forms of critical discourse. But histories of this criticism have often remained parochial, in both scope and method. Focusing on three figures (Leonard Woolf, Sarojini Naidu, and Caroline Spurgeon), the chapter shows how their various passages – geographical, social, and literary – might offer both an alternative, global, critical history for these decades, and a new sense of how we might tell that history.
The COVID-19 pandemic has heavily impacted Australian universities and their libraries but has been felt most strongly by students and staff who are already marginalised. This article, written by Kay Tucker and Becky Batagol, draws upon both published literature and the authors’ own experiences as a librarian and academic employed at Monash University, Australia's largest university. Important lessons from the pandemic for universities and university libraries at times of crisis and disaster include: actively recognising and responding to structural inequalities amongst students and staff; organising services so that all can participate to their fullest ability; providing students with opportunities for social connection, enhanced digital capabilities, safe and inclusive spaces and accessible materials; as well as flexible employment practices.
Goldsmiths, University of London, started teaching LLBs in Law in 2019/2020. Greg Bennett was hired in 2018 to be the subject librarian for law, and to stock the library before teaching commenced. In this article, based on his presentation at the BIALL Online Annual Conference in June 2021, the author will discuss his decision-making and selection processes regarding his choices about what to include, and what not to include in the collection.
The University is an institution that disciplines the academic self. As such it produces both a particular emotional culture and, at times, the emotional suffering of those who find such disciplinary practices discomforting. Drawing on a rich array of writing about the modern academy by contemporary academics, this Element explores the emotional dynamics of the academy as a disciplining institution, the production of the academic self, and the role of emotion in negotiating power in the ivory tower. Using methodologies from the History of Emotion, it seeks to further our understanding of the relationship between the institution, emotion and the self.
This chapter provides the conclusion to the book, summarizing the findings and main points of each chapter. It also outlines the contribution the book makes to an understanding of the characteristics of dyslexic university student anxiety and an identification of ways of coping that students with dyslexia employ to deal with the cognitive and emotional difficulties manifested by their dyslexia. Implications of this for dyslexia practitioners, for universities and for academics responsible for teaching and delivery of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes are specified. In relation to the dyslexia practitioner, the chapter provides pragmatic advice on ways of using appropriate support styles that combine targeted emotional support with delivery and development of suitable cognitive techniques. Guidance is also provided on ways that emotional support could be utilised during individual sessions with students to encourage open discussions on academic areas where the student may feel vulnerable and sensitive emotionally. For universities, practical suggestions are made on ways of ensuring that the academic environment fosters an inclusive culture to establish a suitable, supportive and inspiring place of learning for students with dyslexia where they feel secure and encouraged to discuss any emotional difficulties they may be susceptible to.
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and the necessary social isolation and distancing measures – that were adopted to prevent spreading the virus, including the suspension of university classes – negatively impacted the mental health of young adults. The aim of the current study was to investigate whether returning to online classes, even not presential, during the social isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic, affected the mental health of university students.
Methods:
Forty students (10 men and 30 women) (age, 22.3 ± 3.8 years; body mass, 62.5 ± 17.8 kg; height, 165.6 ± 8.7 cm) from undergraduate health courses participated in the study. The students answered a self-administered questionnaire designed to gather personal and quarantine information as well as information about the frequency of depression (PHQ-9) and anxiety (GAD-7) symptoms. The questionnaire was answered before and after the return to online classes.
Results:
There was a significantly lower frequency of depression symptoms after the return to online classes (Z = −2.27; p = 0.02). However, there was no difference in anxiety symptoms before and after returning to online classes (Z = −0.51; p = 0.61).
Conclusions:
Return to online classes positively impacted the mental health (decrease of frequency of depression symptoms) of university students. Future studies are needed to observe whether the changes observed after returning to school are maintained over time.
This chapter focuses on an important work of Angelo Poliziano, called Lamia. In it, Poliziano does two things relevant to the humanities today: he offers a new way of thinking about the enterprise of philosophy as it was understood since antiquity – the search for human wisdom and a wise style of life. In doing so, he suggests that academic philosophy as practiced in universities is not enough in the project of gaining wisdom and living wisely. Second, he suggests that philology – the deep, borderless reading of texts – represents a master discipline and one that is in fact more in line with philosophy’s authentic mission. Poliziano makes his most trenchant points by using narratives and fables, rather than syllogistic argumentation. In so doing, he makes a case for philology as an overarching discipline of disciplines and sets forth a new way of looking at philosophy
Defining an entity so geographically, culturally and linguistically varied as the Latin west is difficult: despite the spectacular achievements of the Carolingians and Ottonians, fragmentation and plurality prevailed. Smaller political structures proved more durable, and, while the English and French realms gained sharper definition from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries on, the western empire became a loose federation headed by secular princes, lesser nobles and urban communities – all setting their own codes of conduct. New polities emerged on Christendom’s margins, adopting some Carolingian and Ottonian norms and administrative practices. The church – especially the papacy from the thirteenth century on – set the tone, holding kings and other secular rulers to account, while universities were both agents of clerical control and breeding grounds of dissent. But the range of participants in the political game was expanding, imposing limits on royal power, bringing access to additional resources and offering a potential counterweight to papal power. This was one of the west’s many paradoxes: strong elements of unity alongside the gravitational pull of many different centres.
Chapter 6 explains the uneasy integration of the Copperbelt region into the two nation-states of DRC and Zambia. It explores how the Copperbelt border was given new political and moral meanings in official attempts to impose national identities on the region’s mobile communities. It shows how the centrality of Copperbelt mining wealth to projects of national development necessitated political control from distant capitals, generating conflict (in Zambia) with labour unions and fuelling political opposition, while (in Haut-Katanga) the secession was followed by military occupation and political rule by decree. The chapter explains the nationalisation of copper mining companies and the ways that ruling elites sought effective national control over mineral wealth and Copperbelt societies, but also the limits to this control. It also investigates the nationalisation/Africanisation of knowledge production about the Copperbelt in the region’s universities and among leading Zairian and Zambian intellectuals.
New institutional economics (NIE) studies institutions and how they emerge, operate, and evolve. They also include organizational arrangements, intended as modes of governing economic transactions. Universities offer an exciting ground for testing the role of different institutional arrangements (governance forms) in coordinating (academic) transactions. In a context of contractual incompleteness where production is characterized by a highly specialized nature and requires the cooperation among co-essential figures, we argue that shared governance models (versus models with more concentrated authority) foster idiosyncratic investments in human capital and promotes performance. From the evolutionary viewpoint, we explain why institutions based on shared governance have developed within universities. The normative question of how universities should be governed is a debated issue in the literature. Since the 1980s, the new public management paradigm provides a theoretical framework that suggests analyzing university like firms. It is based on the firm's archetypical conception as top-down hierarchical organizations and as a descending sequence of principal–agent problems. We advance a different interpretation of the university–firm analogy leveraging on the NIE and its developments. To empirically analyze our hypothesis, we collected original data from Italian universities in 2015. We find that more shared decision-making processes are correlated with better research performance.
Universities and public research institutes are encouraged to collaborate with industries and promote knowledge transfer from academia to the private sector in order to promote commercialization of inventions and to foster innovations that would facilitate economic growth. Patenting research outputs is one way of facilitating this knowledge transfer. This chapter focuses on tracking patenting as a way of measuring performance of public research organizations. The chapter proposes how patent filings across different countries using patent data filed through the Patent Cooperation Treaty can be captured and compared and how national-level patent data can be compiled using the PATSTAT database. The chapter shows that global patenting by public research institutions and universities has increased in the last thirty-five years, with patenting dominance shifting from Europe and the United States to Asia. It shows that while private sector businesses continue to play a major role in global patenting, public research organizations are emerging as important innovation drivers. The chapter concludes that while there are limitations in using patent data and the extent to which it measures innovativeness, these data are still useful in helping to identify potential weaknesses and highlight strengths of public research organizations.