HÁ QUEM AINDA SE ILUDA

Esta forma de pensar faz parte do problema, não da solução (simplesmente, porque não há solução):

End the University as We Know It

GRADUATE education is the Detroit of higher learning. Most graduate programs in American universities produce a product for which there is no market (candidates for teaching positions that do not exist) and develop skills for which there is diminishing demand (research in subfields within subfields and publication in journals read by no one other than a few like-minded colleagues), all at a rapidly rising cost (sometimes well over $100,000 in student loans).

Widespread hiring freezes and layoffs have brought these problems into sharp relief now. But our graduate system has been in crisis for decades, and the seeds of this crisis go as far back as the formation of modern universities. Kant, in his 1798 work “The Conflict of the Faculties,” wrote that universities should “handle the entire content of learning by mass production, so to speak, by a division of labor, so that for every branch of the sciences there would be a public teacher or professor appointed as its trustee.”

Unfortunately this mass-production university model has led to separation where there ought to be collaboration and to ever-increasing specialization. In my own religion department, for example, we have 10 faculty members, working in eight subfields, with little overlap. And as departments fragment, research and publication become more and more about less and less. Each academic becomes the trustee not of a branch of the sciences, but of limited knowledge that all too often is irrelevant for genuinely important problems. A colleague recently boasted to me that his best student was doing his dissertation on how the medieval theologian Duns Scotus used citations.

The emphasis on narrow scholarship also encourages an educational system that has become a process of cloning. Faculty members cultivate those students whose futures they envision as identical to their own pasts, even though their tenures will stand in the way of these students having futures as full professors.

The dirty secret of higher education is that without underpaid graduate students to help in laboratories and with teaching, universities couldn’t conduct research or even instruct their growing undergraduate populations. That’s one of the main reasons we still encourage people to enroll in doctoral programs. It is simply cheaper to provide graduate students with modest stipends and adjuncts with as little as $5,000 a course — with no benefits — than it is to hire full-time professors.

In other words, young people enroll in graduate programs, work hard for subsistence pay and assume huge debt burdens, all because of the illusory promise of faculty appointments. But their economical presence, coupled with the intransigence of tenure, ensures that there will always be too many candidates for too few openings. The other obstacle to change is that colleges and universities are self-regulating or, in academic parlance, governed by peer review. While trustees and administrations theoretically have some oversight responsibility, in practice, departments operate independently. To complicate matters further, once a faculty member has been granted tenure he is functionally autonomous. Many academics who cry out for the regulation of financial markets vehemently oppose it in their own departments.

If American higher education is to thrive in the 21st century, colleges and universities, like Wall Street and Detroit, must be rigorously regulated and completely restructured. The long process to make higher learning more agile, adaptive and imaginative can begin with six major steps:

1. Restructure the curriculum, beginning with graduate programs and proceeding as quickly as possible to undergraduate programs. The division-of-labor model of separate departments is obsolete and must be replaced with a curriculum structured like a web or complex adaptive network. Responsible teaching and scholarship must become cross-disciplinary and cross-cultural.

Just a few weeks ago, I attended a meeting of political scientists who had gathered to discuss why international relations theory had never considered the role of religion in society. Given the state of the world today, this is a significant oversight. There can be no adequate understanding of the most important issues we face when disciplines are cloistered from one another and operate on their own premises.

It would be far more effective to bring together people working on questions of religion, politics, history, economics, anthropology, sociology, literature, art, religion and philosophy to engage in comparative analysis of common problems. As the curriculum is restructured, fields of inquiry and methods of investigation will be transformed.

2. Abolish permanent departments, even for undergraduate education, and create problem-focused programs. These constantly evolving programs would have sunset clauses, and every seven years each one should be evaluated and either abolished, continued or significantly changed. It is possible to imagine a broad range of topics around which such zones of inquiry could be organized: Mind, Body, Law, Information, Networks, Language, Space, Time, Media, Money, Life and Water.

Consider, for example, a Water program. In the coming decades, water will become a more pressing problem than oil, and the quantity, quality and distribution of water will pose significant scientific, technological and ecological difficulties as well as serious political and economic challenges. These vexing practical problems cannot be adequately addressed without also considering important philosophical, religious and ethical issues. After all, beliefs shape practices as much as practices shape beliefs.

A Water program would bring together people in the humanities, arts, social and natural sciences with representatives from professional schools like medicine, law, business, engineering, social work, theology and architecture. Through the intersection of multiple perspectives and approaches, new theoretical insights will develop and unexpected practical solutions will emerge.

3. Increase collaboration among institutions. All institutions do not need to do all things and technology makes it possible for schools to form partnerships to share students and faculty. Institutions will be able to expand while contracting. Let one college have a strong department in French, for example, and the other a strong department in German; through teleconferencing and the Internet both subjects can be taught at both places with half the staff. With these tools, I have already team-taught semester-long seminars in real time at the Universities of Helsinki and Melbourne.

4. Transform the traditional dissertation. In the arts and humanities, where looming cutbacks will be most devastating, there is no longer a market for books modeled on the medieval dissertation, with more footnotes than text. As financial pressures on university presses continue to mount, publication of dissertations, and with it scholarly certification, is almost impossible. (The average university press print run of a dissertation that has been converted into a book is less than 500, and sales are usually considerably lower.) For many years, I have taught undergraduate courses in which students do not write traditional papers but develop analytic treatments in formats from hypertext and Web sites to films and video games. Graduate students should likewise be encouraged to produce “theses” in alternative formats.

5. Expand the range of professional options for graduate students. Most graduate students will never hold the kind of job for which they are being trained. It is, therefore, necessary to help them prepare for work in fields other than higher education. The exposure to new approaches and different cultures and the consideration of real-life issues will prepare students for jobs at businesses and nonprofit organizations. Moreover, the knowledge and skills they will cultivate in the new universities will enable them to adapt to a constantly changing world.

6. Impose mandatory retirement and abolish tenure. Initially intended to protect academic freedom, tenure has resulted in institutions with little turnover and professors impervious to change. After all, once tenure has been granted, there is no leverage to encourage a professor to continue to develop professionally or to require him or her to assume responsibilities like administration and student advising. Tenure should be replaced with seven-year contracts, which, like the programs in which faculty teach, can be terminated or renewed. This policy would enable colleges and universities to reward researchers, scholars and teachers who continue to evolve and remain productive while also making room for young people with new ideas and skills.

For many years, I have told students, “Do not do what I do; rather, take whatever I have to offer and do with it what I could never imagine doing and then come back and tell me about it.” My hope is that colleges and universities will be shaken out of their complacency and will open academia to a future we cannot conceive.

Mark C. Taylor, the chairman of the religion department at Columbia, is the author of the forthcoming Field Notes From Elsewhere: Reflections on Dying and Living.

A version of this article appeared in print on April 27, 2009, on page A23 of the New York edition.

MERECE UM MOMENTO DE ATENÇÃO

Ken Robinson: “Os certificados universitários não servem para nada”

LABORATOIRE EN LUTTE

http://www.cemaf.cnrs.fr/spip.php?article18

ISCTE: A EXCELÊNCIA DO JARDIM DE INFÂNCIA

Salvemos o zombie

Now we’re getting somewhere

The Centre for International Communication Research (CICR) the Media Industries Research Centre (MIRC) and the Institute of Communications Studies at the University of Leeds are inviting you to a 

Conference on Porn Cultures: Regulation, Political Economy, and Technology

Funded by the British Academy

Monday 15th and Tuesday 16th of June in Leeds.

The pornography industry is an under-researched culture industry. Its links to mainstream media and to the sex industry are intensifying. The mainstreaming of certain aspects of the industry in global popular culture raises questions about the adequacy, efficiency or appropriateness of existing policy. Other aspects of the industry, such as its labour conditions, its geographies of production and consumption practices associated with it have largely fallen under the radar of scholarly analysis, while much more attention has been paid to the potential for emancipatory uses of aspects of sexually explicit cultural expression. Meanwhile, technological aspects of the industry’s operation are challenging our assumptions about ‘choice’ ‘privacy’ and ‘freedom’. With the proliferation of the pornographic product embedded in everyday life now more than ever before existing and new questions require our urgent attention about human rights, migrants, workers and communication rights, media literacy, media ecology and the public sphere, global production and consumption cultures as well as underlying politics of gender, class and ‘race’.

This conference aims to bring together scholars, policymakers and activists to discuss the global pornography complex. It is the second of two conferences organised within the British Academy funded projectSocialisation of the global sexually explicit imagery: challenges to regulation and research. The project has given birth to an international Porn Cultures and Policy Network, which involves scholars from a number of countries, engaged in comparative studies with an emphasis on policy. We are inviting colleagues to take part in this debate and colleagues who would be interested in working with the existing network to join us. Information on this and our first conference can be found on http://sgsei.wordpress.com.

Please send your 200 word abstract, along with a 50-word bio and contact details to Steven McDermott (cssem@leeds.ac.uk) by March 15th or earlier.

There will be a small fee to cover catering and room facilities. Please let us know if you require an earlier decision regarding your paper. If you would like to discuss a panel/round-table proposal and /or your paper please contact Katharine Sarikakis (K.Sarikakis@leeds.ac.uk).

The Gloomy Parade

On est pas la pour se faire assommer. On est venu pour voir le défilé…

 

Réforme des universités et de la recherche : des discours aux actes 

Par : 

Bruno Chaudret, chimiste, membre de l’Académie des sciences, directeur de recherche, Albert Fert, physicien, prix Nobel 2007, professeur, Yves Laszlo, mathématicien, professeur, Denis Mazeaud, juriste, professeur.

Depuis des mois, le gouvernement proclame sa volonté de réformer le système de l’enseignement supérieur et de la recherche pour le hisser au meilleur niveau mondial.

De nombreux représentants de la communauté scientifique, parmi lesquels des signataires de ce texte, ont manifesté un grand intérêt pour ce projet et ont proposé de nombreuses pistes de réflexion. Le ministère les a pieusement écoutés pour ensuite ne tenir aucun compte de leurs suggestions et remarques. Et les orientations finalement retenues, souvent en contradiction avec le but affiché, sont extrêmement préoccupantes.

Ainsi, alors que l’objectif affiché est l’excellence de nos universités et de notre recherche, alors que Mme Pécresse a proclamé sa volonté de porter nos meilleurs établissements aux premiers rangs du fameux classement de Shanghai, comment comprendre que les réductions d’effectifs annoncées touchent notamment les universités les mieux placées dans ce classement ?

Le ministère réplique que ces suppressions de postes pourront être compensées par la possibilité de moduler la charge d’enseignement des universitaires en fonction de leur activité de recherche, possibilité qu’introduit un récent projet de décret. Une modulation des services, dans son principe, pourrait avoir l’intérêt de réduire la lourdeur de la charge d’enseignement qui handicape l’activité de recherche de nombreux universitaires, notamment vis-àvis de certains collègues étrangers. Mais ses modalités de mise en oeuvre en font une mesure dangereuse, hypocrite et contre-productive.

La modulation envisagée est dangereuse : elle dépend du seul pouvoir du président d’université et de son conseil d’administration, nullement liés par l’avis seulement consultatif du Conseil National des Universités. Cet organe représentatif, chargé de l’évaluation des universitaires, tire pourtant sa légitimité de son indépendance à l’égard du pouvoir central (ministère) et des pouvoirs locaux (président et conseils d’université) ainsi que de sa composition, qui garantit une évaluation des universitaires par des pairs compétents, ce qui est indispensable à toute évaluation impartiale et équitable. En le confinant à un rôle subalterne et en conférant des pouvoirs exorbitants aux présidents d’université, la réforme porte gravement atteinte au principe d’indépendance des universitaires. Or ce principe est consacré dans tous les pays dotés d’universités performantes, tout simplement parce que l’indépendance est indispensable à une recherche créative et à un enseignement de qualité. « L’université est une communauté de chercheurs scientifiques libres de suivre leurs idées dans n’importe quel domaine du savoir » a dit un président de l’université Rockfeller, célèbre université privée américaine. Loin d’améliorer la qualité de la recherche et de l’enseignement supérieur, la réforme projetée aboutira ainsi au « clientélisme » et au « localisme » si souvent dénoncés par le ministère.

La modulation envisagée est également hypocrite. Alors qu’on la présente comme un moyen d’améliorer la qualité de la recherche, on doit craindre qu’elle soit seulement un moyen d’alourdir la charge d’enseignement des universitaires. Comment le ministère peut-il supprimer des postes dans de très bonnes universités et soutenir, en même temps, que la modulation servira à alléger les charges d’enseignement de la majorité d’excellents chercheurs de ces universités ? L’érosion du potentiel d’enseignement empêchera de facto la modulation à la baisse et imposera la modulation à la hausse, quel que soit le niveau des Universités et des universitaires.

Et cette modulation s’avèrera ainsi finalement contre-productive. A l’inverse de la volonté affichée par le ministère, cette mesure, si elle aboutit donc à alourdir la charge d’enseignement, affaiblira durablement le potentiel de recherche des universitaires. Le souci de ne pas gaspiller l’argent des contribuables est légitime et nécessaire. Encore faut-il que ces économies s’avèrent productives. A l’heure où l’économie réelle a besoin d’investissements d’avenir aux dires mêmes du président de la République, la politique à courtevue de coupes claires sans discernement dans la recherche et l’enseignement supérieur est suicidaire.

Et là ne résident pas les seules contradictions.

Premier exemple, les « chaires organisme-université ». Ces postes, destinés à attirer les jeunes chercheurs les plus brillants, offrent une meilleure rémunération, des crédits de recherche et un service d’enseignement allégé pendant 5 ou 10 ans. L’idée, si elle ne doit pas cacher la « misère universitaire française », était assurément séduisante. Mais sa mise en oeuvre est désastreuse. Dans la configuration actuelle, en effet, chaque chaire, avec ses crédits de recherche budgétisés avec les salaires, coûte presque autant que deux postes d’enseignant-chercheur ou de chercheur : à budget constant, chaque chaire « consomme » donc deux postes ou presque et conduit ainsi à diminuer le nombre global de postes disponibles. Et le ministère a refusé tous les modes de financement alternatifs, même ceux n’entraînant pas d’augmentation du budget de l’enseignement supérieur. Cette diminution des postes disponibles réduira le nombre global de brillants chercheurs recrutés et ira donc à l’encontre du but recherché : attirer ou retenir les meilleurs. Une bonne idée potentielle a ainsi été travestie en « une idée astucieuse pour rendre des postes à Bercy ».

Deuxième exemple, la réorganisation de la structuration de la recherche. La France doit nombre de ses succès scientifiques aux organismes (CNRS notamment) qui garantissent la cohérence de l’effort national de recherche. La recherche universitaire est particulièrement performante dans les laboratoires dits mixtes, associant en partenariat l’organisme de recherche avec une université ou une entreprise. Il est surprenant d’entendre le président de la République annoncer le 22 janvier la transformation totale du CNRS en agence de moyens, ce qui serait la fin de cette fructueuse mixité, au mépris du plan stratégique de l’organisme pourtant accepté par l’Etat il y a 6 mois. Ce dans un discours où il célèbre l’un de nous, qui effectue sa recherche dans un laboratoire… mixte ! S’il importe de moderniser les Organismes, c’est en instituant un partenariat équilibré avec l’Université. Il faut aussi donner des moyens réels aux Organismes. Or, la réorganisation du CNRS en Instituts s’accompagne de nouvelles missions (notamment le développement de projets transdisciplinaires nationaux) pour lesquelles des moyens supplémentaires n’ont pas été déployés, ce qui handicape sa capacité de soutien aux laboratoires. Sans parler de la baisse du nombre de ses recrutements, dont la qualité est pourtant reconnue, ni du risque d’éclatement pur et simple de l’organisme qui sonnerait le glas d’une vision nationale pluridisciplinaire de la science française.

Troisième exemple, la politique de financement des projets de recherche. Le gouvernement connaît les dangers d’un excès de financement de projets à court terme ou trop ciblés, aux dépens des dotations annuelles des laboratoires et des financements de projets libres (dits blancs). Pourtant, la part réelle des dotations annuelles dans le budget des laboratoires diminue tandis que l’augmentation réelle des projets blancs est dérisoire à l’aune des standards internationaux. La ministre elle-même avait pourtant reconnu la nécessité d’en augmenter significativement la part.

Les enseignants-chercheurs sont, quelle que soit leur affinité politique, largement opposés à la réforme actuellement engagée, incohérente et mal pensée. La gravité de la situation et la stérilité des discussions avec le ministère contraignent le milieu à des actions de protestation inhabituelles dans une atmosphère explosive : appel de la conférence des présidents d’université au président de la République, rétention de notes, signature de pétitions, appel à la grève… Certains envisagent la cessation des responsabilités collectives qu’ils assument.

Nous en appelons au Gouvernement pour une réforme respectueuse des libertés universitaires et soucieuse réellement de la qualité de la recherche française. Madame la ministre, Messieurs les conseillers, la recherche et l’enseignement supérieur valent mieux que des mesures incohérentes et contraires à l’ambition affichée : la performance !

Allons enfants du CNRS

 

Um comunicado proveniente do Álamo:

Le discours du Président de la République prononcé le 22 Janvier 2009 présente explicitement la perspective de disparition du CNRS. Une réaction collective, nationale et puissante de notre communauté s’impose.

Les personnels de la recherche et de l’enseignement supérieur de la région PACA se sont réunis en Assemblée Générale le 28 Janvier 2009 à la faculté Saint-Charles à Marseille. L’ordre du jour de cette assemblée était l’organisation d’une réponse de lutte à la volonté de destruction du CNRS conjointement à la mise en place de la LRU dans les Universités. L’assemblée générale, qui a réuni 150 personnes, souligne la cohérence des attaques du gouvernement sur l’ensemble du système de recherche et d’enseignement supérieur français et affirme la nécessité de la convergence des luttes.

L’AG revendique à sa majorité moins une voix contre et une abstention :

• que le CNRS puisse vivre et poursuivre ses activités dans les contours structurels et opérationnels actuels. Le CNRS doit en particulier être maintenu dans son rôle d’opérateur de recherche national et couvrant l’ensemble du champ scientifique
• que le CNRS dans ses structures actuelles reste souverain dans la gestion des emplois et carrières de tous ses personnels (chercheurs et ITA)

Dans ce cadre, l’AG appelle l’ensemble des personnels des Universités et des EPST ainsi que les doctorants et les personnels précaires :

• à rejoindre le mouvement de la Coordination Nationale des Universités
• à multiplier dans les prochains jours les Assemblées Générales à tous les niveaux (labos, délégations régionales, etc.) pour refuser la perspective de destruction du CNRS
• à converger vers une initiative nationale (type meeting) à mettre en place rapidement

De plus, nous appelons à fixer un ultimatum au gouvernement au delà duquel, si des engagements clairs n’étaient pas pris :
• nous démissionnerons de l’ensemble de nos responsabilités administratives et mandats. Cette démission concernera l’ensemble des personnels (Directeurs d’Unités, élus CAP, CTP,  membres du Comité National, élus dans des Conseils d’Universités, représentants d’instances, etc.)
• nous fermerons les laboratoires

Signataires
———–
AG régionale des personnels, Directeurs d’Unités présents, SLR, SLU, SNCS, SNESUP, SNTRS-CGT, FERCSUP-CGT, SUD-Recherche, SUD-Education

À atenção de todos os tristes que andam neste momento a fazer candidaturas a projectos FCT

O American Way of Science

Luís Fernandes

O apelo à internacionalização dos cientistas equivale, na prática, à submissão ao sistema científico anglo-americano É comum ver hoje designadas as nossas sociedades como “sociedades do conhecimento”.

A produção e a difusão de saber científico são aspectos-chave do funcionamento deste tipo de sociedades, o que confere às suas comunidades científicas um papel estratégico. É por isso que, com regularidade, os governos reafirmam ritualmente o seu investimento na sociedade do conhecimento em geral – veja-se o caso recente do já famoso computador Magalhães – e no sector científico em particular.

Ora, a Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia tornou públicas, no final do ano passado, as classificações dos centros de investigação que financia.

Não pretendemos pôr em causa a necessidade de avaliar as estruturas da investigação científica ou, sequer, colocar em causa a idoneidade e a isenção do processo que foi levado a cabo. Visa-se, apenas, reflectir sobre o modo como tende a ajuizar-se hoje o trabalho de quem se dedica profissionalmente à ciência, procurando mostrar como este juízo responde a um sistema de regras, nem sempre claramente explicitadas, que relevam de factores extracientíficos.

O nosso ângulo de análise é elaborado a partir das ciências sociais e humanas, admitindo por isso que, para outros sectores da divisão das ciências, as questões possam não ser colocadas, em relação a alguns aspectos, do mesmo modo.

As investigações norte-americana e inglesa têm vindo a adquirir progressiva influência no sistema científico internacional, convertendo-se numa verdadeira dominação. É próprio dos sistemas de dominação um traço etnocentrista: são melhores do que os outros, como o demonstra o facto de dominarem, e, portanto, consideram-se, por uma espécie de direito natural, investidos da incumbência de ditarem aos outros um conjunto de regras. E é próprio dos dominados acabarem por incorporar essas regras, de tal modo que passam a achar que são naturalmente suas.

No caso vertente, elas ditam aquilo que deve ser investigado, o formato em que devem decorrer os certames de especialistas, em que órgãos da comunicação da ciência devem ser publicados os resultados e em que língua os investigadores devem expressar-se – o que decorre naturalmente do idioma dos países desses órgãos. As línguas inglesa e, em menor grau, francesa são os instrumentos de afirmação da hegemonia.

Sabemos como os sistemas de controlo apostam na vigilância das linguagens e das línguas – a hegemonia exprime-se numa linguagem positivista e na língua inglesa. Todo o sistema de dominação que não se impõe pela força, mas pela subtileza, tende progressivamente a ser incorporado como natural.

É por isso que as gerações de investigadores mais jovens, aculturadas no circuito de congressos internacionais e nos circuitos virtuais da net, onde o inglês é o veículo, não sentem isto como dominação, mas como proficiência – é-se tanto mais competitivo e, portanto, num sistema marcado por uma competição desenfreada, tanto melhor cientista quanto mais e melhor se falar e escrever em linguagem positivista e em língua inglesa.

Note-se que ainda há poucas décadas esta ditadura da língua pendia para o francês. E sabemos dos esforços que a França faz para se manter como língua internacional da ciência, numa consciência clara da perda de influência que a sua desvalorização acarreta – porque uma língua não é só um veículo, é um sistema de pensamento, é constitutiva de uma cultura. Enfim, o sistema internacional são meia dúzia de países, uma linguagem e duas línguas.

Para os avaliadores da FCT, não conta publicar um artigo numa revista brasileira ou espanhola? E polaca ou grega? Os polacos ou os gregos não conseguem fazer uma revista científica que valha pontos?

Quando fazemos investigação solicitada e financiada por instituições portuguesas, devemos escrever os relatórios em inglês? E, se a problemática for pouco interessante para os norte-americanos, por razões da nossa especificidade sociocultural, não podendo publicá-la nesses países, esta investigação não vale pontos? Publicá-la aqui não serve para nada? Então a produção de saber não deve ser utilizada pela comunidade a que diz respeito? Não visa agir na nossa realidade próxima? E, se publicar aqui não vale nada, como pode algum dia chegar-se a ter uma boa revista científica?

Portanto, o justo apelo que é feito aos cientistas para se internacionalizarem – o que, nas regras do jogo científico, é não só sensato como indispensável – equivale, na prática, à submissão ao sistema científico anglo-americano.

Publicando nas revistas que, neste sistema, são consideradas de qualidade, estamos internacionalizados. E são estas que lemos, são estas que pomos os nossos alunos a ler e é nestas que alguns deles algum dia publicarão – fechando-se assim o círculo da dominação, que a reforça e, no limite, a hegemoniza, tornando-a indiscutida e indiscutível.

Foi este o mecanismo pelo qual uma série de países alimentou o sistema financeiro liderado pelos EUA convertido em tentativa de hegemonia neoliberal e cujo círculo acaba de romper-se. Se esta dominação se verificasse a outros níveis, desqualificando tudo o que se passasse noutras latitudes que não a do eixo anglo-americano e, em menor escala, francófono, esses países seriam acusados de imperialistas e de praticarem a discriminação.

Como podem pessoas que pertencem à nossa cúpula intelectual, como são os membros da comunidade científica, não se darem conta de que estão a ser alinhados por uma mão adestradora que é, em particular no caso das ciências sociais e humanas, exterior à sua lógica de produção e difusão do conhecimento?

Como não se dão conta de que estão a ser infantilizados em interrogatórios de senhores que vêm, por meia dúzia de dias, ao nosso país constituir um júri desfasado da nossa realidade e incapaz de ler, sequer, o melhor da nossa produção porque este não está, as mais das vezes, nas línguas deles? Que fazemos do pensamento crítico, que devíamos ter tão treinado? Como somos tão complexos e críticos para umas coisas e tão simplórios e amorfos para outras?

Fiquemo-nos, para já, com estas questões, enquanto não chega o próximo júri internacional convidado pela FCT e não nos ajoelhamos de novo, prontos para o exame de consciência científica…

Investigador

in Público – Opinião 27.01.2009

FIELDNOTES

Some fieldnotes taken right after attending an international scientific congress in September 2008:

Participants are precious and must be as many as possible. They pay well and need to attend congresses in order to make a living. Scientific congresses are good business. Cities welcome them.

At the sessions, they present papers one after another. It doesn’t matter if, in order to anticipate “last remarks”, a participant must skip some in-between steps. The audience applauses every presentation. It is polite. Debate should be brief, another presentation is waiting.

Language skills are not absolutely required. Translation is dispensable. Communication is not a fundamental thing.

Slideshow presentations are almost plenary. Presentations tend to be schematic and fragmentary. Slideshows create illusory sense of unity.

These are occasions for the researchers to meet. A scientific debate would risk unwanted disagreements. Organisers offer many opportunities for them to meet each other. They have lunch together. A formal dinner is also offered. In their spare time, they can visit the city together in planned excursions.

Participants conspire in order to get research subsidies. They exchange “business cards” during casual meetings. Some international networks are born spontaneously. Strangers become potential partners in a couple of minutes. It is important to have different nationalities and disciplines represented in networks. Identification cards (name, institution and country) are very helpful. Participants exchange previous experiences as applicants to research funding.