Tuesday, September 14, 2004
Rofflecopters
Check out what passes for a "research paper" in the sociology department. I thought it was stupid when summarized by a Daily Cal article, but assumed the actual paper would be a little less stupid. Boy, was I wrong.
An essential part of a sociology research paper is apparently the cover illustration. While real research has a title maybe four points larger than the article text and goes right into the gist of the paper a third of the way down the front page, this paper comes with a cover, a title page, and a foreward by someone not even on the research project, which warns "Caution: The report you are about to read may be painfully disillusioning." Forewarder Barbara Ehrenreich writes:
You can't pretend to value community when some members are treated as if they are disposable.
The purpose of this report, then, is nothing less to restore the conscience- and save the soul- of a great university.
Wow, that's a high bar. And the first statement is almost a contradiction of itself. Ehrenreich is claiming that the university pretends to value community when some members are treated as if they are disposable. (Reminder: Most members of the community are disposable)
Anyway, I'm not going to read the whole report (I don't have time), but it looks like it's mostly anecdotes. A study based on anecdotes alone (i.e. those which did not fit their thesis could be excluded) is pretty pathetic.
Apparently, part of a research paper in sociology is to have a list of demands. That really doesn't help much in convincing me that the information they found is representative of the truth rather than selected to support their own feelings about the matter.
Anyway, to add to their "research," they have a website and even a blog. I certainly hope this isn't the kind of research that we're saving racial information for, but it probably is.
. . .
|
. . .
|
