From: MeKeady2-AT-aol.com
Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 00:37:21 EDT
Subject: Re: postcolonial-digest V2 #2229



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In a message dated 5/1/03 6:37:27 PM, 
owner-postcolonial-digest-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu writes:


> The rhetorical ploy of trying to make it look as if the Independent's
> future were somehow truly connected to charging one pound per read
> for Fisk articles is disingenuous to say the least..
> Academia is in the world and always has been-especially public
> universities. Don't know what planet you've been living on..You can
> count the number of branches of the San Francisco Public Library that
> subscribe to the Independent in print on the fingers of your
> hands.Even many college libraries don't and my students don't have
> access to Berkeley or Stanford.I am underpaid for the intellectual
> work that I do and I never suggested that Fisk work for free.Don't
> put words in my mouth.I'm not shamed by your accusation of not
> recognizing complexity.That ploy didn't work either.Worst thing you
> can say about an Academic isn't it.? You'd know best who you
> prostitute your self for.
> 
> 

     As for whom I "prostitute" myself, my "pimp" has been for over a decade  
 a public university in the Bronx.   I hope this doesn't open me to further 
charges of moral turpitude,   but the fact that between one and ten branch 
libraries in San Francisco provide access to the Independent sounds like 
access to me.   Can't anyone with a library card go there?   I can remember 
when there was no internet access and these publications could only be read 
at the main reading room of large urban libraries or at select universities.  
 My students don't have access to Columbia or NYU.   We have to shuttle among 
twenty schools in the CUNY system to   have the same access that others have 
by walking into their library.   So what?   Privilege is relative.   This is 
the state of public education, but anyone who navigates it can still have 
access to resources that people in other countries don't have.   Should this 
be changed?   Should access be freer for everyone? Of course.   Now how do 
you go about it?
      I stick by my point about the issue being more complex than your 
argument intially suggested.    Having grown up in academia and having worked 
for many years in publishing and running several businesses before returning 
to the life, I can emphatically say that academia is in many ways not in the 
world as the rest of us know it.   There are practical considerations that 
sometimes lead to certain decisions.   I think this is the point Salil is 
also making.   Sorry if I offended you, and I don't mean to be caught up in 
some kind of pissing contest.   I should not have characterized your initial 
posting as "nonsense" just because it made no sense to me.   
Best regards,
Anne

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