By Fletcher Shore, Freelance Journalist
What’s going on?
37 Arts and Humanities staff are facing redundancy, as five departments are being condensed to three to save money. The cuts were announced in June, to uproar from staff and students. At the moment, 30 academics and 7 technical staff are at risk of losing their jobs. Students across the university have come under the banner SaveHudAH to campaign against the university.
Both Linguistics and History are nationally renowned departments; History was recently ranked 13th in the U.K. by The Guardian, whilst Linguistics produce the world-renowned Babel Magazine, a publication about language.
Broadcaster Stephen Fry tweeted his support for the Linguistics faculty, saying “a savage knife has been taken to the quite brilliant department”. He visited the campus in June to present the magazine’s annual lecture.
What does this mean for students?
In an email to current students last month, Prof. Nic Clear, Dean of Arts and Humanities, reassured students the “restructure will not impact your studies”, with all courses and modules continuing as usual. However, the school are no longer offering a linguistics undergraduate degree to prospective students. It is currently unclear if other degrees are at risk.
Who are SaveHudAH?
SaveHudAH are an interdepartmental group of students who are committed to campaiging against the cuts. Posters began appearing across campus last month, encouraging students to sign petitions and an open letter, addressed to vice-chancellor, Bob Cryan. During graduations, members of the group were spotted distributing badges with the slogans “SHAME ON YOU, BOB” and “37 JOBS AT RISK, OUR DEGREES DESTROYED”.
How have the Student’s Union responded?
Posted online, former President Nat Stuart and former Education Officer (now president) Millie Avery said the SU’s priority is “ensuring current students are protected from these cuts, establishing where there may be future impacts”. They also said they would be willing to support students wishing to campaign against the cuts.
However, SaveHudAH have confirmed they are not working with the SU.
Why is this happening?
The cuts, announced in June, are reportedly due to a shortfall in the school’s budget. A spokeswoman for the university said the school is “reshaping to align itself to meet current and future areas of student demand”, and the university “continues to invest in areas of growth”.
Cuts like these are becoming commonplace among English post-92 universities, with many worrying Humanities subjects may only be available at Russell Group institutions in the future.
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