Linguistics at Concordia

Thu Apr 8 21:48:32 UTC 2004

(Apologies for multiple copies)

Dear all,

I urge you to read the message below and to write letters and/or make
phone calls if you feel that it would be appropriate.

The gist of the message is that the linguistics program at Concordia
University (Montreal) is under threat of closure, even though it is a
thriving and successful program despite its lack of resources.

Ash

---------- Forwarded message ----------

Dear Linguist or Cognitive Scientist:

As President of the Linguistics Student Association, at Concordia
University in Montreal, I am writing because I believe that recent events
involving the Linguistics program at Concordia University would be of
interest to you. Martin Singer, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and
Science and Provost-Elect of the University has suspended admissions to
our program for 2004/2005, and cut resources and courses to be offered.
These measures were taken in response to a letter dated Dec 17, 2003 to
the Dean and a meeting with the Dean on Dec. 18, 2003 where linguistics
faculty proposed that Concordia form a new Department of Classics and
Linguistics by splitting these two units from their current administrative
home in Classics, Modern Languages and Linguistics (CMLL). The Dean's
response came in a message dated March 9, 2004.

Typically, such measures are taken to enter a process leading to a closure
of the program. These measures come despite the fact that we are a very
successful program, in fact, the fastest growing program in our Department
(Classics, Modern Languages and Linguistics-CMLL). We have 145 Major and
Honours students with just 3 full-time faculty. Our recent students are
placed in employment positions and prominent graduate programs across the
continent, including McGill, UBC, MIT, Stanford, NYU, Toronto.

The Dean has received letters from the Linguistic Society of America and
the Canadian Linguistics Society describing the scientific and social
importance of linguistics as a field. We would like you to write to the
Chairman of the Board of Governors about the importance of Linguistics
generally, and if you know anything about us, the Concordia Program
specifically, which is being portrayed by the Dean and by the CMLL Chair
as in "disarray" and "dysfunctional", despite the fact that the faculty
all are active researchers (each has a SSHRC grant and they regularly
attend conferences), the fact that we have one of the highest retention
and graduation rates in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and the fact
that our students are successful.  Please see our webpage at
http://alcor.concordia.ca/~lsa/ which describes our talk series and our
upcoming undergraduate conference.

Because the Dean will soon be Provost, and because he has not responded to
any of our requests for information over the past three weeks, we find it
necessary to go directly to the Rector and the Board of Governors. We are
also concerned about the composition of the committee the Dean has
appointed to advise him on the future of linguistics at Concordia--we
believe that four of the five members are potentially in conflict of
interest by serving on the committee, an opinion shared by the University
Ombuds Office. In addition to two Vice-Deans, the members include the
chairs of English, French and CMLL. A sixth member, an ethnolinguist from
Anthropology may also be on the committee, according to verbal comments
made by the Dean. There is no representation of the Linguistics faculty or
students.

We request that you send either an email message to Rector and Vice
Chancellor Frederick Lowy at

FREDERICK.LOWY at concordia.ca

or a letter to Alain
Benedetti, the Chairman of the
Board of Governors  at the address below,
and copy the Linguistics Student Association,
as well---an electronic version is fine for the
copy: lsa at alcor.concordia.ca.
Since the Board will be meeting in ten days, time is of the essence--fax
it if possible.

Address for letter:

Alain Benedetti
Vice-Chairman
Ernst & Young, LLP
CP 4500
Succursale B
Montreal QC H3B 5J3
Canada

telephone 514 875-6060 x 4329
fax 514 871-8713

Telephone calls, either during office hours or left as voicemail to
Alain Benedetti will also be useful.

Our specific, immediate goals are to reverse the decision to suspend
admissions, to implement the schedule submitted by our faculty members for
next year, and to find a long-term solution to the administration of the
linguistics program that recognizes the importance of linguistics,
especially in the context of Quebec and Canada. In order to achieve this,
we would like to see two of the linguistics faculty and one student on the
committee.

You may be shocked to hear that the course Structure of a Native American
Language, proposed by our faculty for the 2004-5 schedule, has not been
included in the published schedule. This course has been taught in the
past, but was replaced with courses that have never been offered. This
decision was made unilaterally by the CMLL Chair, a Spanish professor, and
accepted by the Dean, despite vociferous objections of the linguistics
faculty.

In addition to harming linguistics students by reducing course offerings
and faculty resources, we find that these measures hurt students in allied
fields like psychology, TESL or biology who need linguistics courses for
graduate study in, say, speech pathology. By not supporting a healthy and
growing program, these measures also harm the job prospects of young
scholars from your own programs who may be seeking employment.

If you want more background on the situation here, please see the
following link to an article in Concordia's independent paper,  The Link:

http://thelink.concordia.ca/article.pl?sid=04/03/30/196250

You can also see a report in Concordia's Thursday report about
faculty  particpation in a $2.5 million SSHRC grant:
http://ctr.concordia.ca/2003-04/mar_4/index.html

There is also a brief discussion of issues of intellectual freedom in the
Hour:
http://www.hour.ca/news/brief.aspx?iIDArticle=2816

Sincerely,

Tom Erik Stower
President,
Linguistics Student Association

-------------------------------
Linguistics Student Association
Concordia University
Hall Building H-661-3
http://alcor.concordia.ca/~lsa
-------------------------------

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