Purdue

Academic Freedom in Name and Practice at Purdue

Submitted by BrianNapoletano on 12 November, 2009 - 00:41

Posted in

First printed in MRZine.org on 11 November 2009

If you were to wander about campus asking students at Purdue about the distinguished professor of education and senior university scholar at the University of Illinois in Chicago who was invited to speak at Purdue, or about the Cummings-Perrucci Annual Lecture on Class, Race, and Gender Inequality's inaugural presentation on the challenges facing urban schools, you would probably receive little more than a blank stare in almost every case. If, on the other hand, you were to ask about the University inviting a "domestic terrorist" or an "ex-radical" onto its campus, virtually every student would immediately identify William Ayers as the dangerous terrorist in question.

"Cultivating Happiness" by the Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet

Submitted by BrianNapoletano on 24 August, 2008 - 14:50

Posted in

On 26 October 2007, I enjoyed the rare privilege of listening to the Dalai Lama in person in the Eliot Hall of Music on Purdue University's campus. In spite of the many security precautions, I unwittingly smuggled a recording device into the auditorium (I had forgotten that my Sansa has a built-in microphone and WAV recorder). Once I realized this, I decided to record the lecture for the sake of my friends who could not attend. The recording quality is extremely low-fidelity, and his holiness was not the easiest speaker to understand, even in person. The auditorium was full, so I was forced to hold the recorder in my hand for the duration of the lecture, resulting in many bumps and clicks.