File spoon-archives/lyotard.archive/lyotard_2002/lyotard.0212, message 42


Date: Wed, 18 Dec 2002 19:08:54 +0000
From: "steve.devos" <steve.devos-AT-krokodile.co.uk>
Subject: Re: EGS


Diane

Whilst I'm interested in the EGS as institution, your description of it 
as 'Star-Power' based system does give me pause - it's certainly not 
clear how this would be an improvement as an institution or model from 
the current state-based universities which I'm familiar with.

Nor does it seem to function as a more democratic institution than say, 
for example, Cardiff University or Westminster...


regards
steve

Diane Davis wrote:

>Hey everyone. Most of the questions raised here about EGS would be
>better addressed by Wolfgang Schiermacher. But I can say that the school
>is not free, no. There are bills and faculty salaries to pay. However,
>the cost of this program is not high, either--it is well under what a
>degree will cost you at most state schools. I don't think this makes it
>an elitist institution--on the contrary--but there is of course the
>question of whether education *ought* to cost anything. I admit that I
>believe that education and health care and food *ought* to be available
>for all. If only. ... But you know, there are decisions to make when you
>design a program like this one, and Lyotard and Schiermacher thought it
>would rattle more institutional cages if this program actually offered a
>legit degree, if it actually operated within the so-called system while
>breaking as many of that system's rules as possible. And I can also say
>that the student population is anything but WASPy. The program's first
>group of Ph.D. grads just defended and graduated this past summer--there
>were 4 or 5 of them, I believe, and I believe each of them save one (an
>artist from Monterey, Mexico) was originally a student Wolfgang's at the
>New School in NYC. Since that first group, however, the program
>diversified like mad, and the students are from all over; it's the most
>diverse group of folks I've ever worked with--both by ethnicity and
>profession. Age, too, for that matter, and personal background. 
>
>It is a rigorous school, however, that requires a fairly sophisticated
>background in or aptitude for philosophical and theoretical thought, and
>that of course is a delimiting factor in the admission process. One does
>not come to EGS for a "quickie" degree b/c it requires a lot of
>independent thought and quite a lot of personal motivation, etc. No
>spoon-feeding here. Through the year, students complete online prep
>together for each course (via a web listserv), reading together and
>engaging the materials. So throughout the year, one is working,
>thinking, becoming familiar with the general concepts and issues they'll
>face in the intense summer seminars. 
>
>Though each of the seminars is unique, depending on who's teaching it,
>in general they are designed to *introduce* students to
>philosophical/ethical/political/pedagogical issues, styles/modes of
>thinking, etc., and to *open* spaces of thought--not to close any off or
>to offer the last word on a question. The seminars, iow, are
>jump-starters for students who are independent thinkers. Students can
>then take the questions and run with them in their own work. The entire
>enterprise is geared toward shattering borders of thought, busting out
>of old molds, etc. There are no tests or "papers." There is only the
>student's project, the dissertation, and everything, every course and
>prep, is offered as fuel for that project, which must be original and
>must offer something "new."  
>
>I'm not quite sure what else to say. It is definitely a different sort
>of university set-up. Independent thinking is highly valued...as is a
>certain amount of defiance and rule-breaking, so long as something
>interesting results from it. Iow, slackers don't survive in this
>program, but thoughtful anarchists do. It is a star-power system. This
>is true. However, it's not quite that simple. Note that each of these
>"stars" is a major rule-breaker who has had it anything but easy in the
>university "system." The line is typically post-structuralist,
>deconstructionist--so with only a few exceptions, these are all thinkers
>who have paid a high for their defiant thinking, have been persecuted
>for it. We who have grown up on Lyotard, Derrida, etc., may tend to
>forget that these folks, as well as their students (Ronell, Nancy, etc.)
>have been kicked around mercilessly by a system that could find no way
>to appropriate or assimilate them--so it spit them out, over and over:
>they were fired or not hired or considered completely unemployable,
>blackballed, etc. Those on the faculty who aren't stars--like moi!--were
>hired to teach at EGS basically because they produce work that is not
>easily assimilable, that breaks rules, tries to open spaces for thinking
>otherwise--so the hiring criteria is not simply stardom. EGS offers
>students (also like moi) the extremely rare opportunity to work briefly
>but also intensely, intimately with these "stars"--to attend their
>seminars, but also to dine with them (breakfast, lunch, and dinner are
>taken together--it's almost like a commune), perhaps to meet them for
>after-hours discussions at the Happy Bar or, on an off-day, during a
>hike in the alps, etc. 
>
>I really do encourage anyone interested to check out the web site and/or
>to write to Schiermacher, the dean/director, for more info. I wasn't
>looking for a second Ph.D. when I entered the program--not at ALL. In
>fact, when I found this program, all I wanted was to attend one summer's
>intensive seminars. But it doesn't work that way--you commit to the
>degree or you don't. It was worth it to me to commit to a second degree,
>and I don't regret it at all. It has been an amazing and intellectually
>stimulating experience.
>
>Best, ddd
>
>
>



   

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