Anthropology Wars
October 11th, 2011 by Mike VasilindaGovernor Rick Scott will announce his legislative wish list starting tomorrow. Cutting taxes, regulations and making the unemployed gain skills are all part of the list, and so is abolishing the teaching of anthropology.
Governor Rick Scott got a friendly reception from this Tallahassee Business group. Facing another tight budget, Scott is going after the usual: taxes and regulations; but also University curriculum. “How many more jobs do you think there is for anthropology in this state?” Scott asked the crowd. “Do you want to use your tax dollars to educate more people who can’t get jobs? In anthropology? I don’t.”
Scott’s words are troubling to Dr. Geoffrey Thomas. Thomas just got his Ph d in Anthropology. Thomas believes Scott is just wrong. “There are numerous jobs in numerous universities across the country, as well as applications outside universities, outside academia,” says Thomas.
More than 350 anthropology students walk through these doors at Florida State every day.One of them is Melissa Dehart. She’s a creative writing major who uses her study of humanity as the basis for her writings. “I mean, you can learn from your past and all that stuff, and forgetting the past is not a good thing,” says Dehart.
But the message Scott seems to be floating is that Universities can’t keep raising tuition and that they are going to have to do without some programs. “Do we need to do all those programs, rather than the first thing is we’ve gotta raise tuition every year?” he asks.
Whether Scott will seek to keep Anthropology from being taught in each of the universities or whether it will be left up to individual schools is unclear.
Like his jobs plan, Scott says his legislative agenda will be focused on seven items, with university programs and tuition one of them. He is also expected to seek an end to tenure at the University level.
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