We Won't be Schooled!

As students at the Centre for Comparative Literature at the University of Toronto, we, the Proustitutes, find it hard to post on the Proust blog these days without mentioning or at least referring to the potential closure of our Centre. It has been more than a week now since we received an email from our director explaining Dean Meric Gertler's proposal to close the Centre.

Since then, we, the students who are directly affected by the disestablishment have been only barely coping. Some of us are angry, some sad, some are taking action. Shortly after the proposal, many students protested in the blogosphere and on social networking sites such as Facebook. The resistance reached the journalists at the Globe and Mail and this morning, the potential closure of the Centre for Comparative Literature made the front page of the paper. This media grand slam has inspired me to keep hoping that the decision will be retracted.

I liken the Centre's closure to a death, as Jonathan has insinuated. And the comments under the Globe's online article are filled with so much passion, they are helping to fuel our fight to keep the Centre alive. What started as about 40 students using every fibre of our compassionate selves to spread the word, express our desire and need for the Centre to remain open, has now expanded to include major national print media and the Globe's devoted 935 000 daily readers. The response, in the ten days since that earth shattering email, has been loud and clear. The resistance now has a nation behind it.

Dean Gertler's initial - and perhaps only (?) - argument that closing the Centre for Comparative Literature is necessary due to budget cuts (to the tune of between $900 000 and $1.5 million) is now considered to be a poor saving strategy by many. The people have responded to the Strategic Planning Committee and it is clear that the Centre for Comparative Literature is deemed a good investment not only by the students who study there, but also by a large chunk of the Canadian public.

Today has been a good day.