El campesinato graduado

Decoding University rhetoric
By: Richard M. Berthold
12/6/07




There are a number of institutions and organizations at UNM, the nature of which you might think you understand. But after 31 years on the faculty, I can assure you that in the Alice in Wonderland world of the American university, not all is what it seems. Let's take a look at some of these building blocks of UNM.

Board of Regents: These are the rarely seen absolute rulers of the University, to whom even the most highly paid president is subservient. They are a collection of attorneys and businessmen who typically have no idea what a real university is like. They serve a function similar to that of the supreme religious council that rules Iran and controls their president.

Scholes Hall: This is the administrative green zone where the regents hold their show meetings after the secret personnel sessions and where each year, they introduce the new president of the University. Unlike the other office buildings on campus, it is regularly redecorated and has clean bathrooms.

Faculty Senate: This is the faculty governance organization created some 30 years ago because full faculty meetings could never get a quorum. It has many of the characteristics of the Weimar Parliament in pre-Nazi Germany and spends most of its time changing the names of departments in the College of Education and sending polite memos to the administration.

Associated Students of UNM: This is the student version of the Faculty Senate, with the difference being that ASUNM actually has real power in that it distributes monies. The ASUNM government, especially during periods of scandal, also serves as a training ground for future professional politicians.

Graduate and Professional Student Association: This organization is much like the social clubs of classical antiquity, through which slaves and the poor found companionship and mutual support. Such is extremely important for graduate students, most of whom are shocked to discover that they actually rank below undergraduates and staff in the University hierarchy and are, in fact, the academic version of campesinos.

University House: This is where the University President used to live before it was too dangerous for him to be on campus after dark. It is now used for meetings, retreats, faculty parties and anything else that does not involve drinking. A campus legend has it that a meth lab was housed in the basement.

Zimmerman Library: This, of course, is the place where the University tests its fire-suppression equipment and water clean-up techniques. It is also a convenient place for the University to store faculty with degrees in library science.

College of Education: This is not actually an academic component of the University, but rather an extrusion of the state and federal bureaucracy on to the campus. The college ensures UNM produces enough educators to fill the administrative needs of Albuquerque Public Schools and to restock its own ranks.

Anderson Schools of Management: This is another strange part of the University, since business has not traditionally been a facet of higher learning. Evidence of this is how little teaching the business faculty actually does because they are constantly engaged in business.

Student Services: Never having been a student at UNM, I am not sure exactly what this organization does, besides ensuring graduate stipend checks are always late.

El Centro de la Raza: This used to be simply Student Services in Spanish but has evolved into a fairly influential racist organization, reasoning that if Hispanics constitute only about 35 to 40 percent of the student population, they clearly need special protection from predatory whites and American Indians.

Office of Equal Opportunity: This is a shadowy federal organization that the University allows on campus only because UNM loses federal monies if it does not. It is a sort of gestapo of academic correctness, ensuring that no one at the University, other than white males, is ever offended. Faculty, especially, are terrified of the office, which, as an inquisition panel, naturally assumes the accused is guilty until proven innocent. If you want to hassle your professor, denounce him to the office. Seriously.



Richard M. Berthold is a retired professor of classical history at UNM. He is the author of Rhodes in the Hellenistic Age.