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Washington DC is the nation’s most literate city; El Paso ranks third from last.

So let’s head into this post with the understanding that whatever UD – a native Washingtonian – says, she’ll sound like a snob. She’ll sound like someone who doesn’t know that the purpose of a university is to provide venues for boxing bouts full of beer drinkers. She’ll sound as though she doesn’t understand that public universities in particular exist to rent out arenas for whatever activity the voters of some city – say, El Paso – find amusing. She doesn’t understand that the head of a university is someone who spends most of his time in negotiations with the representatives of fight fans who like to drink.

The University of Texas system’s chancellor first tried to keep the fight from taking place in the university arena. He lost. It will go forward. He is now trying to prohibit liquor. The city of El Paso, and the elected leaders of the state, are screaming at him to back down on that too.

And he will. He will be made to back down on the liquor prohibition.

And that is university life in El Paso, Texas.

Margaret Soltan, May 6, 2012 9:31AM
Posted in: sport

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One Response to “Washington DC is the nation’s most literate city; El Paso ranks third from last.”

  1. Michael Tinkler Says:
    May 6th, 2012 at 5:00PM

    I will say that for my travels in the last decade I saw more people READING in Chicago than anywhere else!

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UD REVIEWED

Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
New York Times

George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
The Electron Pencil

It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
Professor Mondo

There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
AcademicPub

You can get your RDA of academic liars, cheats, and greedy frauds at University Diaries. All disciplines, plus athletics.
truffula, commenting at Historiann

Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
Dagblog

University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
Dissent: The Blog

[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
The Wall Street Journal

Professor Margaret Soltan, blogging at University Diaries... provide[s] an important voice that challenges the status quo.
Lee Skallerup Bessette, Inside Higher Education

[University Diaries offers] the kind of attention to detail in the use of language that makes reading worthwhile.
Sean Dorrance Kelly, Harvard University

Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
Roland Greene, Stanford University

The irrepressibly to-the-point Margaret Soltan...
Carlat Psychiatry Blog

Margaret Soltan, whose blog lords it over the rest of ours like a benevolent tyrant...
Perplexed with Narrow Passages

Margaret Soltan is no fan of college sports and her diatribes on the subject can be condescending and annoying. But she makes a good point here...
Outside the Beltway

From Margaret Soltan's excellent coverage of the Bernard Madoff scandal comes this tip...
Money Law

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Anthony Grafton, American Historical Association

The inimitable Margaret Soltan is, as usual, worth reading. ...
Medical Humanities Blog

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Ducks and Drakes

As Margaret Soltan, one of the best academic bloggers, points out, pressure is mounting ...
The Bitch Girls

Many of us bloggers worry that we don’t post enough to keep people’s interest: Margaret Soltan posts every day, and I more or less thought she was the gold standard.
Tenured Radical

University Diaries by Margaret Soltan is one of the best windows onto US university life that I know.
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[University Diaries offers] a broad sense of what's going on in education today, framed by a passionate and knowledgeable reporter.
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