From: Tony Williams English SIUC This debate is extremely interesting and does deserve some further continuation. However, the last comment seems to echo the arbitrary and increasingly reactionary (in terms of Lynne Cheyney and political attacks on academics) division between research and teaching. As far as a university is concerned, there is an essential link between both fields. Naturally, there is a complicity between the system and supposedly radical attitudes if faculty see their work exclusively in terms of fitting into the establishment via conference and arcane learned journal presentation which may have no radical results. However, good teaching, developing one's thoughts testing them upon students and respectfully lostening to feedback goes hand in hand with research if we look upon the latter as advancing the horizons of knowledge and developing new insights. Otherwise teaching becomes the worst type of high school conveyer-belt system of pedagogy - something Cheney and the Right would like to see, a return to the pre-tenure days of universities described in Upton Sinclair's THE GOOSE STEP (essential reading for those thinking about extending "term limits" into academia. Yes, much conference and article work does fit into the system. But others do not. Let's look at the differences. Otherwise this line of argument will reproduce the monolithic aspect of the diatribes recently delivered by Robin Wood in his "Old Boys" critique of higher education seen in FILM CRITICISM and cineACTION. Not all higher education work (either in conferences and journals) fits into Curtis's description. There is a danger that this type of critique will aid the developing new phase of anti-intellectualism always present in American cultural life. Let's discriminate and not make too many arbitrary judgements, please. Tony Williams.