EduLinks

What’s so potty about a Harry Potter course?

Durham University are about to start a module on Harry Potter.  Students on an Education Studies degree will get the chance to study Harry Potter in a social, cultural and education context, as well as consider the relevance of Harry Potter to education and how it impacts upon 21st Century education.

photo by bibicall

photo by bibicall

The course will not just look at the books, but explore the entire Harry Potter phenomenon.

Unfortunately, as soon as something popular or recent becomes an area of study, sensationalist headlines aren’t far behind.

For instance, the Daily Star ran the headline, “A HARRY POTTER DEGREE“.

A module isn’t a degree.  But some people will now think lazy students are going to spend three years doing nothing but reading J. K. Rowling’s books and perhaps writing the odd essay about what they’ve read.  If they can be bothered.  Bloody students…

The worldwide success and impact of Harry Potter gives it credibility to study further in an academic sense.  Serious attention will be given to the way Rowling’s books have changed the world and made a mark.  It would be sensible to study the texts, examine the historical perspectives, research the current and future impact, understand the way in which Harry Potter has changed the face of publishing and literature (if at all), and a whole host of other things.

Just look at Durham’s official module description for “Harry Potter and the Age of Illusion” and you’ll see an educational context given to the area of study.

It is entirely sensible for Education Studies students to be offered a module examining the influence of Harry Potter on education. Rowling’s novels are books for children that have sold millions of copies worldwide and gone way beyond the books themselves…if this isn’t a subject worth studying further, what is?

This isn’t the first time Potter has been frowned upon.  In 2008, one exam board included “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” on their syllabus.  As well as accusations of ‘dumbing down’, it was argued that recent works should not be included as they hadn’t stood the test of time.

Even if I believed this mattered, I would still argue that ‘standing the test of time’ doesn’t have much meaning.  There is no ruling to argue what should and shouldn’t stand the test of time.  The fact a book is placed on a syllabus means that it could remain there for many years.  In a decade, will Harry Potter have acceptably stood the test of time simply because it had spent a few years on a syllabus?  Forget the popularity and world-changing events surrounding the Potter brand, it’s still on an exam so it’s stood the test of time…

Back to the Daily Star article.  They print a comment from Nick Seaton, Chairman of the Campaign for Real Education.  Seaton is quoted as saying “It does not merit a course at one of the country’s top universities”.

What makes this module less worthy for study than another module? There are plenty of modules that look at literature from recent decades and they don’t even explore the impact on education and culture in the way this Harry Potter module will.  Does that mean all modern and postmodern literature modules should be scrapped?

Or perhaps the problem is because Harry Potter is not a science subject.

Science is, of course, on the cutting edge.  It regularly explores the ‘yet to be’.  Funnily, I don’t hear anyone complaining that the work is pointless because it hasn’t stood the test of time.

Okay, facetiousness to one side, let’s say we do look at STEM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths) as the important areas for academic study.  The government certainly do.  Should popular culture or emerging literary concepts be dismissed as irrelevant areas of study?

For instance, a decade ago, complaints were raised when Staffordshire University offered a course on ‘David Beckham Studies’.  What is the point of awarding a degree in Beckhamology?

But there was no David Beckham degree.  In this instance, a ‘Football Culture’ module covering the history of football included a focus on David Beckham’s impact in recent years.  The degree itself was Culture, Media and Sport.  Put in context, I find no problem with this idea whatsoever.

However, misinformation and sensationalism results in ridicule, making a mockery of higher education.  No wonder the public are quick to dismiss students as lazy and complain that there are simply too many graduates entering the workforce based on no proper work at all.

But these are false trails.  Any proper argument about graduate numbers, dumbing down, and so on, are left to one side as soon as conversation turns to ‘Mickey Mouse’ degrees and pointless areas of study.

In 2008, The Times talked of academic speeches covering the study of David Beckham.  Among them was Momin Rahman’s “Beckham: How ‘Queer’ serves ‘Heterotopia’ in the dialectics of celebrity”.

So what was Rahman actually talking about?  He asks, “What purpose does masculinity serve in contemporary society?  What does it mean to be a man?  Beckham has become a symbol of this whole issue.”

Rahman was looking at culture.  David Beckham was a valid route in.  The study of Beckham has gone beyond Beckham and asks some searching questions.

There are no easy answers to those questions.  Unsurprisingly, this is where academia comes in.

Academics have long explored topics that are foreign to many.  Shouldn’t this be a good thing?  If the work all made perfect sense and was obvious to all, it wouldn’t be research.  No new ground is covered when there’s nothing left to discover.

Why can we not use Harry Potter and David Beckham to find that new ground?  As soon as a higher level of study is brought to a topic with great public awareness and engagement, it’s like the world can’t make sense any more.  Is it really so difficult for a subject to be popular AND academic?

Press offices at universities must find the process of announcing new modules quite daunting.  On one hand, your uni is introducing something:

  • brand new;
  • exciting;
  • popular;
  • yet to be covered elsewhere.

On the other hand, the subject could be seen as:

  • a publicity gimmick;
  • a shameless way to encourage higher student sign-up;
  • an exercise in dumbing down;
  • a subject with no true academic relevance.

The study of something that has made a significant difference to many people must be a good thing.  The Harry Potter set is worthwhile of study because it is not simply a series of books.  David Beckham is worthwhile of study because he is not simply a footballer.

I don’t follow football, neither do I care what impact David Beckham has had on wider culture.  But I do know his impact has been massive and I do know that enough people care.  That, in my view, is more than enough to allow a focus on Beckham within a module on Football Culture, within a course on Culture, Media and Sport.

I would question a whole degree on David Beckham or Harry Potter in the same way I would question a whole degree on Jane Austen novels or atomic structure and bonding.  To get that in-depth on an isolated area is postgraduate territory and beyond.

But nobody is offering a degree on Harry Potter books.  Or Jane Austen novels.  Sensationalist headlines and entertaining news features don’t do higher education any favours when the detail isn’t accurately portrayed or explained.

EduLinks – Work, work, work and philosophy

More links to sink your teeth into…

BBC – The unstoppable rise of work experience

An increasing number of graduates are taking on internships. What’s going on?

Nick Petrie – Student media should work together

Online networks are so powerful when people come together. Student media could prove so much stronger if they emulate this collaboration.

Exquisite Life – Coalition politics, graduate taxes and the Browne review

What could come out of the Browne review and how will the coalition government deal with it?  William Cullerne Bown takes a detailed look.

BBC – Teaching philosophy with Spider-Man

Think that complex moral and ethical debates are stuffy and boring?  Think again. Academics have found that comics can tap surprisingly well into these discussions.

From Times Higher Education – Teaching graduates how to think will help them get jobs

“The point-scoring-let’s-assess-everything mentality seems to have turned off the genes for seeing the bigger picture. On graduating, the average student is rather like Kaspar Hauser on his first day on the streets: still needing to be taught how to think.

“What graduates really need is a broad grasp of ideas and concepts, with the ability to articulate them, either in writing or verbally, in a clear, logical, unambiguous way.”

From National Association of Scholars – Wanted: A college degree and the ability to lift 50 pounds

“Limiting job candidates to those who have completed college degrees erects an entry barrier for ‘less-educated’ individuals with quality work and life experiences, in addition to reinforcing the idea that everyone has to seek a college degree to have a successful career. In turn, this message (along with government and media influences) contributes to pushing millions of people who do not have the desire or ability—or need—for true higher learning through the college system. These pressures create a host of unintended consequences such as excessively lowered classroom standards in order to ‘maintain a respectful graduation rate’ or students overconsuming education in lieu of work experience – the latter of which is more likely to increase employability.”

Learning Styles Don’t Exist

Hat tip to @amcunningham for that video.

EduLinks – Bursaries, bank accounts & breaking out

Got that Friday feeling?

New York Times – Plagiarism Lines Blur for Students in Digital Age

It seems that many students don’t realise they are plagiarising, even when the plagiarism is huge.  Why?  Because “concepts of intellectual property, copyright and originality are under assault in the unbridled exchange of online information”.

PhDBlog – The rationality we routinely adopt

While Teh Pesky Interwebs is changing views of copyright, is it also helping to “give us a richer, nuanced and more authentic perspective”?

Guardian – Student bank accounts: Overdrafts and incentives

Not all bank accounts are the same.  And not all freebies are as worthwhile as you think.  The Guardian gives the lowdown on all the offers currently available to students.

From PsychCentral – The End of Privacy, The End of Forgetting?:

“Far from our becoming a society that doesn’t care about privacy, the more our privacy is misused and abused by Big Companies for their own profit and gain — or used against us by a potential future employer, current employer, significant other, etc. — the more sensitive we become to privacy issues. That’s because people aren’t stupid. They know if they post something online, it can come back to haunt them. If they didn’t know that once, they’ll know it the minute they do it and find out it prevents them from obtaining something they want out of life.”

Inside Google Books – Books of the world, stand up and be counted!

Google says there are currently 129,864,880 unique books in the world.  Given that revelation, are you doing enough research for your coursework…?

XKCD – University websites: the truth

Inside Higher Ed – No Laughing Matter

When XKCD published the cartoon above, it got noticed.  Students, academics, parents, all sorts of people were linking to this comic and talking about it.  When something like this speaks to so many of us, it’s time to consider change.

From Swift Kick Central – Valedictorian Speaks Out Against Schooling in Graduation Speech:

“I am graduating. I should look at this as a positive experience, especially being at the top of my class. However, in retrospect, I cannot say that I am any more intelligent than my peers. I can attest that I am only the best at doing what I am told and working the system. Yet, here I stand, and I am supposed to be proud that I have completed this period of indoctrination. I will leave in the fall to go on to the next phase expected of me, in order to receive a paper document that certifies that I am capable of work. But I contest that I am a human being, a thinker, an adventurer – not a worker. A worker is someone who is trapped within repetition – a slave of the system set up before him. But now, I have successfully shown that I was the best slave. I did what I was told to the extreme. While others sat in class and doodled to later become great artists, I sat in class to take notes and become a great test-taker. While others would come to class without their homework done because they were reading about an interest of theirs, I never missed an assignment. While others were creating music and writing lyrics, I decided to do extra credit, even though I never needed it. So, I wonder, why did I even want this position? Sure, I earned it, but what will come of it? When I leave educational institutionalism, will I be successful or forever lost? I have no clue about what I want to do with my life; I have no interests because I saw every subject of study as work, and I excelled at every subject just for the purpose of excelling, not learning. And quite frankly, now I’m scared.”

Student Bursaries

Bursaries were in the news this week.  Universities are spending more of their fee income on poor students, but figures show that ‘top’ universities tend to spend far less than others.  Here be the linkage:

Office For Fair Access
BBC
Guardian
Telegraph
UCU

Have a great weekend!

What you get when you graduate

I was thinking about writing a piece on what you get when you graduate.  The recognition, the skills, the anecdotes, the endless possibilities…

It could have been epic.

Then Joe Oliver came along.  Oliver, Sheffield’s Education Officer, recently graduated himself.  He summed up what you get when you graduate with great clarity:

“I officially added six extra letters to my name, now being able to call myself B.A. (hons), on application forms, name badges, online pizza delivery forms, tombstones, and the like.”

Anyone who did a B.Sc must be laughing.  Seven extra letters surely beats six. 😛

My congratulations to Joe and to everyone else who graduates this year.  Please remember to share some of your pizza with me.  I’d be terribly grateful.