It’s the hydra-head problem again. When the head of the group that assembled the upcoming report on the impoverished state of the humanities in America is herself way over-compensated (plus – reportedly – the daily user of a chauffeured limo) it makes it easy for enemies of funding to say Hey well humanists seem to be doing right well for themselves. When the person responsible for the report is alleged to have been an inhumane boss, it makes it easy for enemies of funding to ask In what way do the humanities as presently carried out make you more humane?
The problem has things in common with university presidents who have chauffeured limos and private jets and first-class travel – American University’s Benjamin Ladner being the highest profile example of this in the last few years. The problem is also related to university presidents who use up a good deal of their time and make hundreds of thousands of extra dollars sitting on the boards of places like Goldman Sachs; shady hedge fund guys on boards of trustees; and schools with multi-billion-dollar endowments. It’s just hard to keep aloft the Beautiful Suffering Misunderstood Humanities banner when high-profile people very publicly making the case for them are making out like bandits.
It’s a very similar hypocrisy to the over-compensated law professor at the public interest law school.
Everyone gets hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is one of the easiest things to understand.
June 12th, 2013 at 11:40AM
It’s true that Ladner won the salary sweepstakes, but there were others:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/22/education/22sidestevens.html?ref=peterdiamandopoulos
The correction at the end of the article is a classic, btw.
June 12th, 2013 at 3:04PM
MattF: NOT forced to resign after students rioted. LOL. You’re right. A classic.