Intellectual Property Rights?

Media interest has surrounded Kathryn Sutherland in recent weeks. The Observer and The Telegraph both reported claims that a new book by award-winning biographer Claire Harman has taken, without acknowledgement some of her own radical ideas about the novelist, pulled together over 10 years of research and published by her in 2005.

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This week, Kathryn Sutherland writes exclusively for The Badger Online about voices, identity theft and plagiarism…

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`Hearing . holds the frontier, so to speak, at the point where seeing fails’ (Paul Valery)

Valery’s words (collected along with other thoughts in 1935 in Analecta; literally: `things picked up’) may be growing harder for us to hear and understand as we move rapidly into a world in thrall to the power of the visual. But they imply something we may be reluctant to abandon once we recognize it. Put another way, when we throw the emphasis of understanding on hearing rather than seeing we allow the possibility of something shared. We look at the world from our own point of view; we hear it from that of others. In eighteenth-century aesthetics, hearing was associated with the social passions of sympathy as opposed to the more individual range of the visual. The distinction was between the holistic knowledge of the eye and the partial truths of the ear, the truths found in speech, listening, and conversation. In Jane Austen’s novels, time and again, the imagination’s ear rather than the eye proves the better guide. By contrast, seeing is liable to illusion. Seeing promises to link us directly with a world of objects – with real solid things – but those solid things can and do refuse to connect; they especially refuse to endorse the single point of view. Time and again, conversation talks down the confident insights of the individual eye. Through conversation, Austen’s heroines reach self and social understanding – their faulty, egotistical vision is corrected.

Anyone who writes, whether from inner necessity or habit or as a way of earning a living, believes their voice is bound up in what they write. We recognize this in the case of great writers – the imprint of a voice on the page. At the heart of Justine Picardie’s recent novel Daphne is the seedy real-life figure of Alex Symington, improperly appropriating and altering Emily Bronte manuscripts, passing them off as her brother Branwell’s.
(http://justine-picardie.blogspot.com/) But do we care when the labour of less glamorous writers is taken over unacknowledged? Is the principle that our writing is ours any less true?

It is clear that something momentous is happening as we shift from print to digital communication: concepts of copyright are loosening; intellectual property rights are under threat – not least because the Internet loosens the bond between author/creator and product built up slowly over the last few centuries of print. We are becoming less sure of the rights of anyone to be identified with their own work. We are what we read but we are also how we read. Where print technology promotes a concept of reflective reading, digital tools encourage searching, linking, cutting-and-pasting. Literary texts bear a cultural burden; they are more than just information sites to be plundered. Good reading means reading thoughtfully and in the round – hearing all the voices. The current dispute between Louis Vuitton and Google offers an interesting twist on the issue. The charge is that an authentic and highly respected brand name is being used to disseminate more effectively those very fakes that steal its identity.

Over recent decades, academics have become ever more marginal figures in the larger cultural conversation; part of the reason for this lies at our own door. Often we appear wilfully to seek out a difficult style, to turn away from the conversations we might have with a wider audience. Sometimes we need more commercially attuned writers to help our ideas circulate and grow. But those who spread ideas must be scrupulous in acknowledging the routes they travel. Without that basic courtesy and decency they deny others their voice. At worst, they impersonate them, stifling the possibility of shared conversations between different groups of writers and readers, between communities. We rarely think of the right to freedom of speech in such terms, and properly so, because far worse crimes are perpetrated against that right. But if in a society that enjoys free speech we simply stand by as our voices are suppressed or our ideas travestied, then we deserve our humiliation.

The academy, above all, depends on the scrupulous acknowledgement of others’ voices – this is both a basic courtesy and our lifeblood. Without it, we lose our place in the dissemination of ideas and a vital part of our usefulness to society. Of course, being academic, we are schizophrenic about this issue: at the moment British universities are buying wholesale into a belief in bibliometric citation indices as the measure of intellectual worth and a way of apportioning government funding. Well, if people feel free to take your stuff – your research, your ideas – without reference or acknowledgement, how exactly will that work? Oh, and while we have no robust plans to enforce proper usage in public circulation we are also coming down like a ton of bricks on students we suspect of plagiarism.

Linguistics axed

One of the highest-ranking degree programmes at Sussex will close to new applicants at the end of the current academic year.

The University announced last week, without any prior consultation with staff or students, that there will be no new students accepted onto Linguistics courses from October 2009. Students currently enrolled on Linguistics degree programmes will be able to finish their degrees and teaching will continue for two years. As of the 2011-2012 academic year, English Language, MA courses in English Language and Applied Linguistics and research programmes will continue to operate but from within the English department. Staff were informed of the decision at a meeting with the Dean of Humanities on Wednesday 18 March; however no member of senior management was present at the meeting to discuss the decision. The word spread to the USSU sabbatical officers and students the following day. Read more

“Don’t silence us” say Sussex students

Students and staff taped their mouths shut to show their opposition to a management move that the protestors say will “end University democracy”. The protest took place on Wednesday 18 March during the opening of Senate, the highest decision-making body for academic matters at the University of Sussex and the place where management will deliver their proposal to slash the elected component of Senate by 66%. The proposal would make the majority of Senate un-elected which critics say will end the University’s democratic tradition. Read more

A coming together of Sussex University and USSU…in a good way!

Greetings! My name is Pat, I am the new Energy and Environment Manager for the University, and work in the Estates & Facilities Management Department. As I’ve been here for about 4 months now, I thought it about time that I penned something to tell you all a little about who I am and what I do.

So what does `Energy and Environment Manager’ really mean? Well, I would summarise my role by saying that I am here principally to champion the whole sustainability agenda for the University, improving our environmental performance through education, campaigning and project delivery. In practice, that includes contributing to the environmental design of the new buildings planned for the campus (- yes, you heard right, new buildings!), organising environmental campaigns (collaboratively with student and staff colleagues), running the Environmental Forum, developing pollution prevention guidelines, and delivering the University’s Environmental Management Scheme, “EcoCampus” to list but a few. All these require the challenging of existing thinking and a fair degree of technical knowledge.

In terms of background, I was a late starter to university education, although was involved in environmental campaigning and conservation projects in my then local Dorset for many years beforehand. I started my 1st degree in Environmental Science at the University of East Anglia at the ripe old age of 23, where I was hugely inspired by my Head of School, Professor Tim O’Riordan. Sixteen years later with a MSc under my belt, a 9 year career with the Environment Agency, a 5 year career with the RNLI, a brief career in the renewables sector, and a lot less hair (some of which is now grey!) I find myself at Sussex – and what a great place, with many challenges ahead!

So what have I achieved in the last 4 months? Well, not as much as I would have liked – my mobility is a bit impaired still after an accident in September, so I haven’t been as visible around campus as I would have liked to have been. Nevertheless, some of the headline results are that I’ve worked hard with USSU (particularly the Finance Officer and the most excellent Ethical & Environmental Officer, Ellie Hopkins), and we have really turned the tide in terms of a collaborative approach on environmental issues. I’ve secured, with my colleagues in Estates, the award of a £250,000 “Revolving Green Fund” to deliver carbon reduction projects across the campus. I’ve been busy making sure that the Executive Management knows all about the university’s environmental responsibilities and formalising this in a new environmental policy. I’m currently working with colleagues (both staff and students) to organise an informative yet fun Green Week in week 1 of the Summer term (watch out for Lee Vernon and I dressed up in lightbulb outfits!), scoping feasibility for a rainwater harvesting scheme at the Sports Pavilion, developing action plans for EcoCampus, completing Green Gown Award applications, and developing further carbon reduction schemes in anticipation of the forthcoming Carbon Reduction Commitment.

But its not all about the university. As I mentioned above I have been working with USSU too. Green Week will be the first of many collaborative events, but the union has a more day-to-day relationship with the university, and with me too. And this is where the Ethical and Environmental Officer comes in. Why is the Ethical and Environmental Officer post important to the University? Well it forms a critical bridge between university management and the student body on ethical and environmental issues. It presents an opportunity to demonstrate that a collaborative approach is more successful than individual effort. It provides management with a fresh insight to the issues that matter to the student population, and in turn provides insight to students as to the practical application of environmental issues in the campus environment (and beyond!).

So what have Ellie and I worked on together in the last 4 months? We both contributed to the Sound Impact Award application, which hopefully will see our accreditation rise from bronze to silver. We jointly planned an environmental session for the Big Picture event in InQbate in December. We jointly visited Brighton University to look at their Building Management System and rainwater harvesting scheme. And we have met regularly and

informally to discuss environmental projects across campus, including my intentions to influence the environmental design of the new buildings. So you will see that the role is wide and varied.

Ellie has done a fantastic job in this role, and I will really miss her, especially her enthusiasm and commitment to ethical and environmental issues. Whilst recognising that the role is voluntary and unpaid, it is really important to us, so I would plead to you, beg you, challenge you to go for the role of Ethical and Environmental Officer. Meanwhile, at night, I prefer to stroke motorcycles, howl at the moon, dance naked in the woods at the bottom of my garden, and start fires.

No monkeying around here

Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s film Three Monkeys is beautiful and captivating. Set in the dusty, hectic Turkish city Istanbul, the rushing trains and the honking cars lay in contrast to the still, lonely lives of the three main characters, Eyup the father, Hacer, the mother and Ishmail, the son, within a family shrouded by a series of secrets, lies and self-deception.
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‘Women responsible if raped whilst drunk,’ say one in three students

One in three students in the UK thinks that a woman is responsible for being raped if she’s drunk, according to a recent survey of students. The survey, carried out by Opinionpanel Research on the 11th and 12th of February this year, asked the opinion of 1,046 students­ from 119 universities. The results revealed that 31% of students believed that a woman “is partially responsible for being raped if she is drunk.” A further three percent deemed the woman to be totally responsible if she is drunk. Read more

ACAS shows off its diversity at Culture Fest

Until three days ago, I didn’t know the ACAS Culture Fest existed. When I walk through library square I tend to keep my head down for fear of being hounded by political warriors and canvassers or being plastered with flyers for fancy dress events I won’t go to. It seems I’ve been missing out.
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War against the HMOs?

Friends is the most repeated show in television history. Whenever there is nothing on, we can all agree to engage in the most common form of televised procrastination and settle down and watch a nice episode of Friends, the show that for ten years sometimes successfully – often hilariously – defined the sit-com genre. Last Tuesday, after somehow finding new laughs in an early episode I must have seen 4 times already, I felt prompted to ask my house-mate: why was there never a successful British Friends?
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Farthing watches the pounds

The Vice-Chancellor Michael Farthing has had a busy year. In the last 12 months he has forced through considerable structural reforms, begun to plan Sussex’s path out of the recession and completed the search for a new Chancellor. In an exclusive interview with The Badger he speaks about his vision for the University, meeting with students and the dangers of bankruptcy. Read more

Richie Phloe

Richie Phoe has been living in Brighton for five years now, and makes critically lauded dub and reggae. So why come to Brighton to play and produce reggae? “Before the move I was coming here on the weekend to buy reggae vinyl… there was just nothing in Portsmouth. Brighton’s got the reputation, and I knew it already…why not?”
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