Author Archives: Robert Basil

Pretentiousness done right

Posted on February 19, 2019 by Robert Basil

God bless Janet Malcolm. What books are on your nightstand? I take it you mean the imaginary Doric column that supports a teetering pile of current and old books that the interviewee wants to bring to the reader’s attention. My … Continue reading →

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Naked Security

Posted on January 27, 2019 by Robert Basil

The “Naked Security” blogs published by Sophos remind me how vigilant online publishers – and all organizations, really – have to be to protect their content, their data, even their names. Indeed, the word “vigilance” needs to at the top … Continue reading →

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Free at Last

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Robert Basil

United States copyright law was changed repeatedly in the last century to grant copyright extensions to entire classes of works of literature and entertainment. This meant that such work could not be referenced at length in works of scholarship without … Continue reading →

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The Cannabis Curriculum

Posted on December 31, 2018 by Robert Basil

From my visionary university.

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“The Personal Essay”

Posted on December 29, 2018 by Robert Basil

From the wonderful Atrios: Generally, when any part of education rewards students for being confessional, you are going to attract/reward students who are comfortable with the genre of personal confession. It’s a weird thing to ask of students, and a weird … Continue reading →

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10% and “the crisis in knowledge”

Posted on October 12, 2018 by Robert Basil

Writes Jonathan Mayhew: Knowledge is under attack from several fronts at once. In science itself, it is due to corporate corruption and the inherent bias toward interesting but possibly false results. There was that paper about how most scientific findings are false.  … Continue reading →

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“Pedagogy of Delinquency”

Posted on October 2, 2018 by Robert Basil

From my friend Clarissa: There are several foundational principles to the pedagogy of delinquency. Respect. These are kids who value respect like nothing else in the world because it’s so rare in their world. Respect yourself, respect them, and accept … Continue reading →

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Alpha

Posted on September 28, 2018 by Robert Basil

The end is the beginning.

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Hello, business communicators!

Posted on September 7, 2018 by Robert Basil

My fall semester starts tomorrow. I have two online sections of Advanced Professional Communications. These are fun classes. Teaching at Kwantlen Polytechnic University has been such a blessing.

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“We Agree …”

Posted on August 30, 2018 by Robert Basil

“We agree much more than you think.” This was Niels Bohr‘s kind way of indicating profound disagreement with a colleague’s point of view.  The genial physicist knew that the literal truth of that statement – after all, all scientists would … Continue reading →

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