A new toy to play with. Dr. Richard Price has just launched a website, www.academia.edu, which does two things: – It displays academics around the world in a ‘tree’ format, according to what university/department they are affiliated with. – It enables an academic to have an … Read more
LONDON — There is a powerful narrative today about how many young European Muslims are susceptible to terrorism, how Islam leads to radicalization and how Muslims, because of their creed, choose to live in ghettos and therefore create swamps that breed terrorists.
Security guard the Lourdes Sanctuary as Pope Benedict XVI arrives in the Papamobile to celebrate Mass at La Prairie on September 14, 2008 where the pontiff is on a pilgrimage to the shrine where the faithful believe the Virgin Mary appeared to a peasant girl 150 years ago. The 81-year-old Benedict celebrated a Mass for more than 150,000 people on a field in the shadow of the sanctuary built over the cave where Bernadette Soubirous said the Madonna appeared and spoke to her 18 times in 1858.
REUTERS/Regis Duvignau (FRANCE)
Erdal Eren, a high school kid, was one of the executeds…
Sept. 12: Military coup, violence, torture, executions and lost generations.
Yesterday was the 28th anniversary of a bloody military coup that took place on Sept. 12, 1980, the effects and vestiges of which still cast a dark cloud over Turkish politics.
Dark clouds stretch across the Houston skyline as Hurricane Ike approaches Houston, Texas September 12, 2008. (Carlos Barria/Reuters) It has been 3 years, I haven’t been to Houston but still feels like another home. Feels very familiar and so I am watching the live news in CNN..
Written by Amine on September 12, 2008 – 6:13 am –
As you may have been following through the DigiActive Twitter Feed, Moroccan blogger Mohammed Erraji was arrested last Friday, September 5th following the publication on the online news site Hespress.com of an article entitled “The King Encourages His Subject’s Dependency” (English) He was sentenced 72 hours later, in an expedited trial without assitance from a lawyer, to two years in jail and a fine of 5000MAD for “failure to uphold the respect due to the king”.
In a movement of solidarity reminiscent of the one which surrounded the campaign to help free Facebook prisonner Fouad Mourtada earlier this year, the Moroccan blogosphere was quick to mobilize and condemn the arrest. Various international organizations such as Reporters without Borders, Amnesty International, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and IFEX also issued statements calling for his immediate release. On Thursday September 11th, citing procedural misteps, a court in the southern city of Agadir granted him bail and he has been “provisionally released” pending his appeal trial next Tuesday.
Faster than you can say “Larry Summers,” James Otteson was gone from Yeshiva University.
The former head of the Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Honors Program at Yeshiva College, the intuition’s undergraduate college of liberal arts and sciences for men, resigned from his leadership position near the end of the spring semester after administrators at the university uncovered remarks viewed as sexist on his pseudonymous blog, Proportional Belief. One particularly controversial remark — which he revised — refered to “high-functioning women.” Now, following months of rumor concerning the nature of his resignation, Otteson has taken a year-long visiting professorship at Georgetown University, though he maintains a contract for a tenured full professorship with Yeshiva.
In a recent article in Insider Higher Education, " ‘Two Cultures’ Tension in Social Science" it was reported that
Key philanthropic and government programs offering grants for Ph.D. students appear to be excluding proposals for graduate students in sociology and political science, while favoring proposals from those in history, anthropology and a range of relatively small disciplines, such as art history and ethnomusicology, according to data released Friday. The analysis was presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association and focused on programs to support field research or international research.
It is ironic. We know that Political Science is one of the disciplines that gets funded much. But they complain to get the last fragments of funding. In the political economy of academia, humanities and theoretical social sciences had lost their ground. They should be the one to complain. Besides,political science and sociology have become so quantitative that there is probably some need for qualitative assessments…
Professor Ayşe Soysal, a former rector of Boğaziçi University, said “academic freedom” is a distant idea for many Turkish universities and that this has left many researchers feeling restricted. “The main problem is that most of the universities in Turkey are still autocratic.
PM Erdoğan promised to open up new files by this weekend. As the deadline gets closer, no side seems to be backing off. Today Hürriyet’s chief editor, Ertuğrul Özkök replied back/threatened angrily in NTV channel. Once again I have to underline: This is not a case of freedom of speech. Only this media mogul’s own papers (and plus the staunchly Kemalist, Cumhuriyet) support their bosses at the moment…
What is Lighthouse e.V? Lighthouse e.V. was a Germany-based charity foundation that operated between March, 2001 and April, 2007. Its director Mehmet Gürhan, his successor Mehmet Taşkan and
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News] Did you know that the Turkish military sees postmodernism as a “threat” that should be fought against? We all learned that about a week ago when the new Commander of Land Forces, Gen. Işık Koşaner, made a speech which summarized all the enemies that the Turkish Armed Forces despise. These included the usual groups: “Separatists,” religious orders, and “unpatriotic” circles. But the latter included a new cadre of treacherous citizens: “the post-modernists.” The high-brow general openly stated: “The propaganda network that consists of a postmodern clique of some media, academics, finance circles and NGOs are working in order to weaken and disintegrate national unity and national values.” He also added that these “postmodern” traitors are “manipulated by global powers.”
Turkey’s main opposition parties were reluctant to read a key document detailing the country’s National Program, prepared by the government to present to the European Union. The program……
"Poll finds Europeans favor Obama over McCain in US
WASHINGTON: Despite some optimism in 12 European countries that Democrat Barack Obama could improve relations with Europe if elected president, most Europeans polled in a survey released Wednesday do not want closer ties with the United States.
Following Julian, where this blog stands: (!) hmmm, this was at a higher level before, as far as I remember.
Better luck next time, Ukraine.
One of these days the EU powers that be are going to realise that when you’ve got countries torn between a European and non-European identity, to keep on telling them “sorry, you’re not European enough yet” is just going to drive them into the other camp.
How much longer are the likes of Ukraine and Turkey going to put up with these repeated, very public rejections before heading off to the waiting embrace of Moscow or non-secular Islamism?
Growing migration is putting strains on rich and poor economies alike, according to the OECD.
Latest one: “national dads” Fathers of players act in the ad.
update: this time it was harder. spent all my afternoon. but don’t worry. i am free until December, until the next postponement… I will be on my way to the military office in Bahçelievler to postpone the mandatory duty for another 4 months. It is always stressful to do that. Turkish army does excuse us … Read more