life in these far parts
Alan Sondheim
you an indication of the quality of education in Miami and why I'm a bit
frustrated. Ignore if you want - it's very local. The Panthers are a
football team the university is starting; it's costing millions of course.
The whole damn place is filled with stadiums and playing fields.
Alan -
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 6 Dec 2001 16:57:19 -0500 (EST)
From: Alan Sondheim <sond...@panix.com>
To: bea...@fiu.edu
Subject: letter to the editor -
My name is Alan Sondheim; I'm new professor of new media in the art and
art history department here at FIU. I read with astonishment that the
president's new house cost 2.4 million - when we hardly have enough
funding to keep our area running at all.
So I did some calculating. It turns out that the minimal budget we need is
about $20,000 a year - this includes repairs. It's what I asked for, for
starting funds for the department, but nothing came through. (We could
really use $58,000 on exact calculation.)
So I figure we could run the new media area for 120 years on the same
budget. By then some of our equipment might have to be replaced, but by
careful saving...
Our real budget was $4000. Here's where it gets interesting. I do believe
we could run the area for 600 years, if only we were guaranteed this. On
this money, however, we might have to do with pantomime and performance.
I understand of course that all these monies come out of different areas,
but everyone knows the arts and humanities in general are vulnerable; all
they can supply is a Micheangelo in comparison to the Roman Aqueduct.
It does seem worthwhile to applaud the efforts to get the new football
team up and running. So I have a suggestion: If we eliminate all the
courses, students, and professors here, we wouldn't have these problems.
I'd support that - an institution dedicated to the Panthers, to elegant
entranceways, to architecture and grounds (which could be turned into an
excellent golf-course for player relaxation).
Why bother with education, when we can have so much more?
On another note - something sent to the staff called Holiday Insights has
a lead article, 12 Pitfalls of the Holiday Season. #2 is called
[ Excessive Sympathy for the Less Fortunate ]. This is unbelievable, but
then since our budget is so fragile, be careful about pitying us.
Alan Sondheim
Art and Art History
sond...@panix.com
Ryan Whyte
Unfortunately of course these issues are not local as one would wish --
pretty consistent for art departments here too...
Alan Sondheim
been told). We have one lower-end consumer camcorder, one tripod, no
microphones, sound equipment, earphones, tech support, lab monitors, TAs,
DVD burners, etc. We have 2 G4s with 20 gigabyte RAID and one low-end Sony
Vaio; none of the equipment is online because we have no connectivity - so
no Internet. Our one firewire cable seems to have disappeared along with
the remote for the camcorder.
In other words - for around 18 students, including MAs, this is dysfunc-
tional. The three teachers before me quit.
Me, I'm just sick/stressed most of the time and tired of the local artists
telling me Miami is a "wasteland" which it is.
The corruption is endemic. Read Carl Hiaasen.
yours, Alan
Internet text at http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt
Partial at http://lists.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html
Trace Projects at http://trace.ntu.ac.uk/writers/sondheim/index.htm
CDROM of collected work 1994-2000/1 available: write sond...@panix.com