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Monthly Archives: August 2020
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Google Scholar
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Research Gate
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Happy 63rd Independence Day
Today is 31st August 2020. I wish all Malaysians a Happy Merdeka Day as we celebrate 63 years of independence. I am proud to be Malaysian citizen and hopefully, I can contribute for the development and betterment of the nation as an academician.
#MalaysiaPrihatin
Here is some photos to express our gratitude to our beloved country, Malaysia.
The Soul of the American University
This is the last book that I want to share about the thought of academia soul as been mentioned by Prof. Dr. Azlan Ab. Rahman. This book was written by George M. Marsden in 1996.
Attached herewith is the link for this book:
The author explores on how and why the dramatic changes occurred. Today, once pervasive influence of religion in the intellectual and cultural life of America’s preeminent colleges and universities has all vanished.
This author investigates the role of Protestantism in the higher education. He tells the stories of many of our pace-setting universities at defining moments in their histories, including Harvard, Yale, Princeton, the University of Michigan, Johns Hopkins, the University of Chicago, and the University of California at Berkeley.
He recreates the religious feuds that accompanied Yale’s transition from a flagship evangelical college to a university, and the dramatic debate over the place of religion in the higher education.
The soul of the American University exemplifies what it advocates that religious perspectives can provide a legitimate contribution to the highest level of scholarship.
The Corporate Corruption of Higher Education
Prof. Dr. Azlan Ab. Rahman shared a book that has the same thought on the soul of academia or university as been illustrated in the figure below. This book was published in 2008, written by Jennifer Washburn.
She opined that corporate funding of universities is growing and the money comes with strings attached. In return for this funding, universities and professors are acting more and more like for-profit patent factories whereby the university funds are shifting from the humanities and the less profitable science departments into research labs, and the skill of teaching is valued less and less.
Slowly, but surely, universities are abandoning their traditional role as disinterested sources of education, alternative perspectives, and wisdom.
This growing influence of corporations over universities affects more than just today’s college students (and their parents). It compromises the future of all those whose careers depend on a university education, and all those who will be employed,governed, or taught by the products of American universities.
The Struggle for the soul
Prof. Dr. Azlan Ab. Rahman recommended another book who was written by Julius Getman entitled “In the Company of Scholars: The Struggle for the Soul of Higher Education.
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The author probes the tensions between status and meaning, elitism and egalitarianism, that challenge the academy and academics today.
He shows how higher education creates a shared intellectual community among people of varied races and classes while simultaneously dividing people on the basis of education and status.
In the course of his explorations, he touches on many of the most current issues in the higher education including the conflict between teaching and research, challenges to academic freedom, the struggle over multiculturalism, and the impact of minority and feminist activism.
The Lost Soul
The above mentioned book was suggested by Prof. Dr. Azlan Ab. Rahman. The author of this book, Ellen Schrecker argued that the American University is under attack from two directions. Besides, outside pressure groups have staged massive challenges to academic freedom.
She revealed a distinct pattern of concerted efforts to undermine the legitimacy of forms of scholarly study deemed to threaten the status quo.
At the same time, she deftly chronicled the erosion of university budgets and the encroachment of private-sector influence and business-friendly priorities into academic life.
From the dwindling numbers of full-time faculty to the collapse of library budgets, this book depicted a system increasingly beholden to corporate America and starved of the resources it needs to educate the new generation of citizens.
Restoring the soul
Perry L. Glanzer, Nathan F. Alleman, and Todd C. Ream (2018) argued that Christian universities can recover their soul but to do so require reimagining excellence in a time of exile, placing the liberating arts before the liberal arts, and focusing on the worship, love, and knowledge of God as central to the university.
In terms of money, prestige, power, and freedom, American universities appear to have gained the academic world. But at what cost? We live in the age of the fragmented multiversity that has no unifying soul or mission.
This book was also suggested by Prof. Dr. Azlan Ab. Rahman