Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/11/26
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Quite frankly, having someone teach photography based on anything else would be, at best, pretty silly...;-) After all, would you rather be taught photography - as in using a camera as a tool with which to make images - by a Chris Killip, or by someone with a PhD. in photography, awarded for a thesis entitled "Socialist realism and its impact on portrait photography in Berlin in the third week of August, 1929?" ;-) B. D. Tim Atherton wrote: > Chris Killip - one of my all time favourite Brit photographers (subject of a > new Phaidon 55 book) teaches photography at Harvard, Professor of Visual > Studies > based mainly on his credentials as a photographer, going by an interview I > read a few years ago. > > Tim A > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Guy Bennett" <gbennett@lainet.com> > To: <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us> > Sent: Monday, November 26, 2001 12:36 PM > Subject: Re: [Leica] OT:Photo grad school. > > > >>>Guy Bennett wrote: >>> >>>>>Though much of this activity is >>>>> >>>>without significance in the "real world," real world values are >>>> > meaningless > >>>>in the academy: it is a self-validating system that generally does not >>>>recognize non-academic achievement. >>>> >>>Actually, my experience has been precisely the opposite - While I agree >>>entirely that virtually no one in the 'real world' gives a rat's behind >>>about your academic credentials once you get past your first job, I have >>>found that some folks in academia will grant 'equivalence' to certain >>>real-world accomplishments when hiring for positions in academia. At >>>both Harvard Medical School, where I was briefly the Director of Media >>>Affairs and had an academic appointment, and at MIT, where I teach, my >>>credentials in the world of journalism are viewed by academics as being >>>the equivalent of a doctorate in their world. The bottom line, I >>>believe, is that at these particular institutions the academics have >>>enough self-confidence to understand that they know what they know, and >>>that I know what I know, and what I know is as much of value to students >>>as what they know. (Does that make sense:-) ) >>>B. D. >>> >> >>It definitely does. And your case is a great example of how the "real >>world" can and should exist within the rarified world of the academy. From >>my experience, however, this is rather exceptional. I've been teaching the >>humanities - languages and literature - at the university level for about >>14 years now (first at UCLA and various community colleges in the L.A. >> > area > >>and, for the last 2-3 years, at Otis College of Art and Design) and have >>never seen anyone with less than a PhD given a teaching appointment in >> > that > >>field. Even in community colleges, a full-time teacher in the humanities >>with only a MA is becoming something of an anachronism. >> >>Guy >>-- >>To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html >> >> > > -- > To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html > > - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html