Brian, a historian of some note – although the world hasn’t woken up to that fact yet – has just read, on his laptop, the latest letter from his bosses passing him over for annual promotion due to his “insufficient research activity”. Pamela, on the other hand, a sociologist of much productivity but little originality (if truth be told, and certainly not to her face) was nonetheless prematurely promoted to the rank of professor years ago – by a committee of predominantly women, it goes without saying.
The problem with universities these days is that they place the renowned book on an equal footing with paltry essays when it comes to research, and therefore serious academics, such as himself, aren’t supposed to spend years (13.5 so far) on a magnum opus that will revolutionise his subject and go down in history. Oh no, the politburo at his university, primarily working-class women of colour and lesbians and the rest, are blocking his ascendancy to Senior Lecturer-ship just because he’s not an intellectual dilettante who churns out an essay-a-month from the conveyor belt of his mind. Furthermore, he’s had to be Admissions Tutor for the past seven years as penance for his lack of publications, which means turning up on campus on Saturdays, just when all his colleagues are happily enjoying boozy brunches away from the Gulag. He, on the other hand, has to try to persuade teenagers to come and study at his university, or rather to persuade the parents who accompany their fledgling human offspring because they’re the ones making the decision since tuition fees skyrocketed.
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