Required Reading
The associate provost of SMU sent out the following memo today (boldface in the original):
The Selection Committee to determine the common reading for students arriving fall, 2005 finished its work in fine style at the beginning of this semester. We have now formed an expanded committee to lay plans for implementation. The committee has representatives of all four undergraduate schools, and includes faculty and staff members as well as students. The group's excitement about the selection is best expressed by Selection Committee Chair Tom Stone, who wrote,
In Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, Barbara Ehrenreich tells the story of her first-hand investigation into what it takes to survive "on the wages available to the unskilled." She tries to "get by" as a waitress in Key West, a worker for a "maid service" in Maine, and an "associate: at a Wal-Mart in Minneapolis, facing in the process all the obstacles confronted by millions of Americans who struggle every day to "look for jobs, work those jobs, try to make ends meet." The selection committee was drawn to the book by its potential to familiarize our incoming students with an aspect of American life to which, we suspect, they have had limited exposure, and to provoke discussion of issues associated with the day-to-day lives of those Americans who can easily remain "invisible" to many of us: the working poor.
We are grateful to all those faculty and staff who suggested so many fine books; we gave serious consideration to each suggestion. In the end, we were won over by the seriousness of Ehrenreich's subject and the quality of her writing, which manages to be engaging and provocative without trivializing the issues or preaching to the converted. Our hope is that her book will begin within the university community a dialogue that lasts well beyond the first week of fall semester."
A bonus for us is that Barbara Ehrenreich will be on campus this month as featured speaker for this year's Women's Symposium (February 22). Faculty and staff can attend either the lecture or the lecture/lunch for $10.00. [Emphasis added.--vp] Students can get in for free. Faculty/staff who are actively involved in the first-year reading project can get in for free if they contact Rebecca Bergstresser ahead of time. This will be an excellent opportunity to see and hear the author.
As the Implementation Committee proceeds we will know better the ways in which the book will be used in the fall. One thing we know already is that we will need as many faculty discussion leaders as will volunteer. Last fall we had 35 faculty members leading small discussion groups during the Week of Welcome event, which turned out to be a lively, substantive, and enjoyable way to meet and greet our new students. You'll receive more details as they are determined. Meanwhile, thanks for your interest in this important campus-wide project.
For obvious conflict-of-interest reasons, and because I haven't read the book, I have no comment, except to say that SMU is the only university I've ever heard of that routinely charges faculty to attend public lectures. Nickled and dimed, indeed.
Professor Postrel had recommended Vladimir Bukovsky's great work To Build a Castle: My Life as a Dissenter, which would have given students an important look at the world before they were born.