Now there are 7145 signatures (after I finally was able to get to my home e-mail).
I'd like to think it will do any good; however, my experience in the SUNY system and my familiarity with SUNY Albany (I've been a faculty member at a SUNY community college in the Capital District/Albany area for a long, long time and grew up here) doesn't give me much confidence that we'll be able to make any impression on the politically-driven system and the powers-that-be at that specific institution. Albany's "College" of Nanoscale Science and Technology (which appears to me to be constructed, viewed, and treated much more like an industry than an academic unit of a university--please, correct me if I'm wrong) is in line with the region's attempt to be the next Silicon Valley--in fact, the region has been relabeled "Tech Valley" by all sorts of governmental and business agencies--yet we haven't been able to scrape off the rust yet (ie., as in Rust Belt). I'm far from a Luddite; however, the concept of EDUCATION is being driven out by a focus on JOB TRAINING.
And actually, the decimation of the humanities at SUNY Albany began in the 1970s: loss of the comparative lit program (which had been allowed to slide downhill); the compression of individual, discrete language departments into what is currently (for the moment, at least) the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures (http://www.albany.edu/llc/) . . . It's all too depressing.
I do hope, however, that we can make a difference.
Connie Ostrowski
---- E Wayles Browne <ewb2 at CORNELL.EDU> wrote:
> Thanks to Josh for starting the petition. I have signed it too. There are now 57 signatures. But the site doesn’t show who they are!! How are we going to make an impression on the SUNY authorities with a mere number and no names?
> Yours,
> --
> Wayles Browne, Assoc. Prof. of Linguistics
> Department of Linguistics
> Morrill Hall 220, Cornell University
> Ithaca, New York 14853, U.S.A.
>
> tel. 607-255-0712 (o), 607-273-3009 (h)
> fax 607-255-2044 (write FOR W. BROWNE)
> e-mail ewb2 at cornell.edu
>
> ________________________________
> From: Josh Wilson <jwilson at SRAS.ORG>
> Reply-To: "SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list" <SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu>
> Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2010 14:02:15 -0400
> To: <SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu>
> Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Letter of Protest to SUNY-Albany
>
> http://www.petitiononline.com/SUNY/petition.html
>
> Assuming that Chuck and no one else objects, perhaps we could all send this letter this way?
>
> Josh Wilson
> Assistant Director
> The School of Russian and Asian Studies
> Editor in Chief
> Vestnik, The Journal of Russian and Asian Studies
> SRAS.org
> jwilson at sras.org
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list [mailto:SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of Chuck Arndt
> Sent: Wednesday, October 06, 2010 7:17 PM
> To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
> Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Letter of Protest to SUNY-Albany
>
> Dear Colleagues:
>
> I want to thank everyone who posted on SEELANGS concerning the closing of the French, Russian, and Italian departments at SUNY Albany. My colleagues and I here at Union College were shocked and dismayed by the news. As neighbors to SUNY Albany, many of us know, personally, the modern-language faculty there and how incredibly dedicated they are. As the Department Modern Languages and Literatures at Union College, we have composed a letter to go both to the SUNY administration as well as state senators and assembly members.
>
> The letter may undergo some last-minute changes, but I wanted to share it with the SEELANGS community while the issue is still hot. People can use the letter below as a template, point of reference, or do something completely different -"дело ваше" как говорится. I hope, however, that all of us will keep writing SUNY Albany and bombard the university with a mass of feedback, which might cause them to reconsider. Writing state senators and other policy-makers is also a great idea, as has been pointed out (especially considering that, as has been pointed out, elections are coming soon). If anyone has other ideas, please post them and I will try to relay them to the rest of our department. Because SUNY Albany is the flagship university for such a multi-ethnic state, we think this is a battle worth fighting. Please see letter below:
>
>
> Заранее блaгодарю!
>
> Charles Arndt
> Visiting Assistant Professor of Russian
> Union College
> Schenectady, NY 12309
>
>
>
>
>
> To the Administration of SUNY-Albany
>
> To local State Senators and Assembly
> Members
>
> To the US Representative from the 21st
> District
>
> To
> Members of the Press
>
>
>
>
>
> We
> at the Modern Languages and Literatures Department at Union College would like
> to express our concern and dismay at the decision recently taken up by the
> president and his advisory board to eliminate French, Russian, and Italian from
> SUNY Albany’s curriculum.
>
>
>
> Not
> only are we concerned for our colleagues at SUNY Albany, whom we know to be
> dedicated professionals and committed to their students, but we are also
> gravely disturbed by the irrevocable damage this would do to SUNY Albany’s
> reputation and the students at SUNY Albany, to their opportunities, and to
> their ability to succeed in our global environment. Furthermore, we feel the decision
> contradicts SUNY Albany’s stated values of diversity and “giving its students
> first-hand international experience” (SUNY’s Strategic Plan 2010, p. 19), and
> even its logo (until very recently) of “The World Within Reach.” As a major
> institution of learning, SUNY Albany’s reputation could very well slide
> downward as a result of being unable to provide its students with skills that
> most other comparable universities provide.
> Lastly, the way the decision was reached in no way allowed for students
> or faculty to contribute to a decision which affects their futures.
>
>
>
> As
> a university representing a large section of New York State’s population, SUNY
> Albany has an obligation to prepare its students for our global environment,
> and this naturally includes the ability to speak and understand foreign
> languages. According to the Académie
> Francaise, the French-speaking world includes around 60 countries worldwide
> (approximately 500 million people).
> French is the international language of trade and business, one of the
> major languages in the European Union, one of the eight UN languages, and a
> language spoken on five continents. Moreover, Canada is our country’s largest
> trading partner, with French-speaking Quebec (this one province alone) our 6th
> largest trading partner.
>
>
>
> As
> for Russian (which is also one of 8 UN languages), the move by SUNY Albany’s
> president comes at a time when the US State
> Department and the US Department of Defense both recognize Russian as a
> “critical need foreign language” and has begun awarding money through the
> Foreign Language Assistance Program to secondary schools across the country,
> specifically in order to teach Russian and other “Critical Languages.” It appears
> SUNY Albany will not even be in the running regarding this national initiative,
> since it will not be able to continue the students’ Russian. Furthermore, we
> have been informed by our colleagues that this means there will be no Russian
> major anywhere in the SUNY system, a stunning fact for the Empire State with
> its internationalist orientation and large Russian population.
>
>
>
> Lastly, for a major university not
> to recognize the importance of Italian language simply seems inconceivable in a
> state with such a large Italian-American population, to say nothing of the
> enormous influence of Italian culture on this state and the world.
>
>
>
> We believe the actions of president of
> SUNY Albany and his advisory board resulting in the destruction of entire
> programs are unprecedented in their rashness and scope. They will severely
> diminish their students’ competitiveness in a world that is becoming more, and
> not less, integrated. If these moves are
> implemented, SUNY-Albany will be alone nation-wide among major universities in
> closing an entire French program, and nowhere in the entire system will a
> student be able to have a Russian major.
> We cannot see how SUNY Albany can propose to “send students abroad”
> (SUNY’s Strategic Plan 2010, p. 19), without being embarrassed and ashamed that
> they will be some of the few students from a major university unable to
> communicate with so many peoples of the world. We hope that the president and
> administration at SUNY Albany will reconsider this destructive action. We hope that policy-makers in Albany will
> take note of how much less competitive this will make students of this great
> state and will work to find a better
> alternative to this unprecedented move.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Respectfully
> Yours,
>
>
>
> Prof.
> Cheikh Ndiaye
>
> Chair,
> Department of Modern Languages and Literatures
>
>
>
> For himself and
> all 25 members of the Department in multiple language programs, unanimously
> united
>
>
> --
>
>
>
>
>
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