What is "social networking"? For all the vagueness of the term, which now seems to encompass everything we do with other people online, it is usually associated with three basic activities: the creation of a personal Web page, or "profile," that will serve as a surrogate home for the self; a trip to a kind of virtual agora, where, along with amusedly studying passersby, you can take a stroll through the ghost town of acquaintanceships past, looking up every person who's crossed your path and whose name you can remember; and finally, a chance to remove the digital barrier and reveal yourself to the unsuspecting subjects of your gaze by, as we have learned to put it with the internet's peculiar eagerness for deforming our language, "friending" them, i.e., requesting that you be connected online in some way". More here.

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Academics are "set in aspic" says Lord Mandelson

The Higher Education cuts in the UK have led to a vigorous debate on the role and nature of universities in modern society. Comments from the leading universities (the Russell Group) have provoked Lord Mandelson as follows in The Guardian.

"Lord Mandelson, the business secretary, defended the government's controversial £950m university cuts package and accused academics of being "set in aspic". Mandelson said that public spending cuts had to happen and it was an illusion to believe universities were being singled out for the harshest punishment.

But university lecturers are resistant to change "and think they have a right to be set in aspic in what they do", he said. "They are using the argument about spending reductions as a screen or a cloak behind which resistance to any sort of change and reform can be conducted ...

Mandelson's comments come a day after a leading scientist attacked the government for funding students doing "Mickey Mouse" degrees and called for the money to be spent on science instead.

Dr Richard Pike, chief executive of the Royal Society of Chemistry, said degrees in celebrity journalism, drama combined with waste management, and international football business management – all of which exist – should be "kicked into touch". More here.

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Many scholars feel that their freedom to question is in danger of being eroded or even lost.

In a related and lengthy article, Zoe Corbyn, in The Times Higher Education Supplement, examines the threat in the UK, while Christoph Bode and David Gunkel consider the state of affairs in Europe and America.

"There is an online retailer in the UK that sells T-shirts marketed specifically at academics. Most of them feature geek jokes and nerd humour (one sports the slogan "Chillin' with my genomes", another a Rubik's Cube image), but one carries an amended version of the popular short poem First they came. The original by Pastor Martin Niemoller was a rebuke to the intellectuals who stood by while the Nazis purged group after group of "undesirables" ("First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a communist;"). The T-shirt makes changes to detail the lack of voices defending black people, gay people and "bleeding-heart liberals", but it leaves the final line intact: "Then they came for me and there was no one to speak up for me."

Although it may seem odd to some, the sentiment speaks to many inside Britain's academy who feel they are in danger of losing a core feature of scholarly life: academic freedom. Barely a week goes by when Times Higher Education does not carry a complaint or a warning from an academic about threats to their cherished right to speak out. And it is not just high-profile people - there is a real sense of unease among rank-and-file academics that their right to speak truth to power, to set their own research and teaching agendas and to voice their opinions about the management of their institutions is being stripped away.

Despite the UK's generally liberal atmosphere, there have been many instances where officials have come down hard on scholars attempting to exercise their freedom.

Which examples give the true picture of the state of liberty in the UK academy in 2010? Are scholars being cowed? Is the UK academy suffering a catastrophic loss of liberty? What dangers are looming, what lines are being drawn and how is freedom being protected and defended?" More here.

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The noted author Gabriel Josipovici takes up the cudgels in a letter to the Times Literary Supplement, arguing that universities are not businesses

"Things seem to be happening to higher education in this country without any proper debate on the large philosophical and moral issues at stake, but entirely in terms of whether this or that individual or department or university can or should “survive”. Politicians debate the number of “university places” that exist and that they want to make available, but there is no debate about the kind of education universities will offer in the future. I hoped that the Sussex example might allow us to have a national debate about the very thing Nau and Howard take for granted: Are we going to allow market forces to determine the nature of British universities in the 21st century? There’s a perfectly serious proposition which says that the country can no longer afford classicists, historians, philosophers and literary scholars. After all, none of these subjects is going to bring the country any immediate tangible rewards.

Perhaps, too, universities should be treated strictly as businesses and those departments that do not attract enough students should be discontinued in the same way as Tesco or Marks and Spencer will discontinue a product that is not selling. On the other hand, does any country wish to forget its history entirely? To cease to read its great writers or those of the Europe of which we are a part? Research into price fluctuations in Kent in the wake of the Black Death, or Ronsard’s relation to Petrarch, might seem very far from the concerns of most British citizens in the twenty-first century, but the history and literature that get taught in schools are dependent on such research, which in time alters and refines our understanding of the past.

Were university departments of classics, history, philosophy and literature round the country to close, as many seem in danger of doing, because they could not pay their way, this would lead in the end to the disappearance of those subjects from the national consciousness. France, Germany and the United States seem to feel that it is important for these subjects to be researched into and taught at university level, and are pumping billions into higher education. Britain is cutting its higher education budget and squeezing those departments of classics and the rest that have survived the depredations of the past thirty years in favour of business and media studies. Is this something that every political party supports, however reluctantly? That every vice-chancellor accepts? If not, we need to hear from them".

More here.

While the situation in Australia is not as dire in terms of cuts, the British debates reasonate here in terms of freedom of expression, the nature and validity of research assessment exercises and the value of the humanities in modern society.

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Andrea Levy interviewed by Gary Younge in The Guardian

Andrew Levy will be a guest at the Adelaide Writers' Festival in early March. The Guardian piece includes the following.

"When Small Island was published five years ago it started out faring much the same as Andrea Levy's first three books: well reviewed but not particularly widely read. "Give me a basket and I'll go door to door with it," she joked to the publishers. The book "wasn't really selling. It certainly wasn't doing anything fantastic."

It was a mark of the enduring quality of the first three – Every Light in the House Burnin', Never Far From Nowhere and Fruit of the Lemon – that none had gone out of print. It was perhaps a mark of their limitations that she had not managed to sell a single one abroad. "Middle aged and middle list," she points out. "It's bloody tough out there in that position. They were giving up."

But then came the prizes. First there was the Orange. Even then, she says, Small Island only got a halfway decent bump in Britain, and no one abroad was interested. Then, in fairly quick succession, came the Whitbread, the Commonwealth and the Orange Best of the Best, as well as being shortlisted for the National Book Critics Circle award in the United States, Romantic Novelist of the Year and two National Book awards in this country. The novel – about four Jamaicans who emigrate to Britain during the Second World War – broke through, in a very big way indeed. Translated into 22 languages, from Vietnamese to Macedonian, it became a bestseller both in the UK and Canada and was chosen as the Big Read in Hull, Liverpool, Bristol and Glasgow". More here.

The Canberra Times Literary section on Saturday 13 February also featured a long piece about Levy by Bron Sibree.

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Heat up your Kindle with a free penny-dreadful

Seattle's Nancy Mattoon of Book Patrol notes the following fascinating digitisation.

"It's a red-hot, red letter day for Amazon Kindle owners. The British Library has announced that 65,000 rare 19th century

literary first editions will be offered as free downloads to owners of the device beginning in Spring of 2010. Thanks to a

joint venture with Microsoft, the no-cost titles will reproduce the original type-face and illustrations from such classic

works as Charles Dickens's Bleak House, Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, and Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge.

While having an electronic facsimile of a valuable first edition is a treat for fans of highbrow literature, what about

readers seeking the pleasure that comes from biting into a nice, juicy, raw, piece of pulp?

Can kinky Kindle owners looking for graphic kicks with a side of sensationalism find anything to sate their savage appetites from the staid British Library? Happily, along with the high class fiction, the UK library's freebies will also include the world's finest collection of cheap, tawdry, lowdown, lowbrow, Victorian trash. Get ready to heat up your cold Kindle with a torrid "Penny Dreadful."

The British Library was fortunate to receive a fine collection of these Victorian pulps from a single donor. In 1948, music hall performer Barry Ono gave over 700 pop fiction titles to the institution's archives. It is from this group that the Amazon Kindle downloads will be taken. So for those who yearn for some spicy and exotic dishes to go with the everyday wholesome fare on their literary menu, the British library has cooked up just the right combination. A little taste of the pulps alongside a dollop of the classics. Let's just hope none of it comes from Mrs. Lovett's House of Pies. You know the one, right next door to Sweeney Todd's barbershop".

More here.

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Markus Zusak's top 10 boxing books

Markus Zusak will be another big name at the Adelaide Writers' Festival. The London Guardian writes he "is an Australian author born in 1975, the son of Austrian and German parents. His novels for younger readers have won numerous awards and one, The Book Thief, has become a worldwide bestseller.

Zusak says, "When I was growing up, my brother went through a whole catalogue of sports both in and outside the house. Football was banned because we wrecked all of our mum's plants. Cricket ended after a hat trick of broken windows. So we turned to boxing, which turned out to be something I would write about in Fighting Ruben Wolfe, and read about for years to come.

Here are 10 of my favourite books on the subject ..."

1. Rope Burns by FX Toole

You can almost inhale the smelling salts in these short stories. FX Toole, a former corner man, serves as a perfect reminder to any writer to follow the write-what-you-know rule; you read one page and you know he's been there. Standout pieces here are "The Monkey Look", "Black Jew" and, of course, the devastatingly beautiful "Million Dollar Baby".

2. The Half Brother by Lars Saabye Christensen

Although this is not exactly a book about boxing, there's a brilliant fight-night moment within this epic novel. The enigmatic half-brother, Fred, trains as hard as any boxer on the planet but, as constantly happens throughout this Norwegian writer's masterpiece, he has a surprise up his sleeve when he enters the ring.

3. The Greatest Boxing Stories Ever Told by Jeff Silverman

This is a great book to dip into, depending on your mood. If you feel like hearing from the likes of Norman Mailer, Joyce Carol Oates or Richard Ford one day, but feel more like a boxing passage from Homer the next, you can find it here. It's interesting (and amusing) to see a character from Homer talking up his chances in the fight, too. Already back then, boxers were big-noting themselves before climbing into the ring."

Full List here.

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Oddest book title of the year long list

The Guardian reports on the Booksellers Long List for 2010, which includes:

From Bacon: A Love Story to An Intellectual History of Cannibalism, Collectible Spoons of the Third Reich and The Master Cheesemakers of Wisconsin . . . A strong leaning towards the scatological characterises many of the 49 longlisted books, with Peek-a-poo: What's in Your Diaper?, Father Christmas Needs a Wee, Is the Rectum a Grave? and The Origin of Faeces all vying for a place on the shortlist.

The prize's custodian, Horace Bent, said he received a total of 90 submissions for this year's prize, almost three times as many as last year, but was forced to reject many of them for either being too old – Sketches of a Few Jellyfish was published in 1880, and On Sledge and Horseback to Outcast Siberian Lepers in 1895 – or for failing to meet his "properly published" criteria." More here.

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Odd book title

Helium in Canada from 1926-1931. By P. V. Rosewarne. Ottawa. F. A. Ackland. 1931.

Debbie Campbell from the National Library reports Trove has found this in OAIster as an earlier article - 1926 - here, or a 1926 book, here.