1. This makes for chilling, albeit grimly humorous, reading. We would urge our followers to read it as it gives a real sense of the total disrespect shown to colleagues but also the thousands of academic and other allies who wrote to express their concern: uculeicester.org.uk/ulsb16/prof-bu…
2. Prof Burrell's statement that staff 'threatened with redundancy are now becoming used to seeing the tremendous strain that senior management exert in the selectivity of what single words we have used throughout our academic lives. Context stands for nothing' is noteworthy.
3. As if the stress and anxiety of wholly unjustified compulsory redundancy, on shadowy, shifting criteria, wasn't enough, some of staff have been/will be subject to show trials under the university's Dignity and Respect policy, weaponized in the most cynical manner possible.
4. Colleagues are facing show trials for tweeting such words as 'Putsch' (14th century Swiss German word used in common English parlance to describe political oustings since before the university was founded) in order to describe the ousting of legitimate, responsible governance.
5. The mental and physical anguish caused of these show trials, in addition to all of the other blatant attempts at bullying and harassment, bears out Prof. Burrell's words: 'ignoring all the history of learning, the meaning of other terms and concepts drawn from literature ...
6. ... and the rules of rhetorical emplacement that we, the poor scholars, take for granted, or of which at least we are aware.' Metaphor and figures of speech, cynically wrenched from their context, are now a matter of censure and possible disciplinary action in a university.
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