A letter! Forwarding …

Dear Colleagues

Writing letters to save palaeography

If you hesitated about whether to write in protest at the ‘strategic disinvestment’ at King’s College London which will lead to the abolition of the chair of Palaeography, with obvious consequences for the present encumbent, David Ganz, then please write now. There is still time (just), although it is very hard to know just when the real decisions are made, or what the chances are. I had a very courteous reply from Professor Palmowski, from which it was evident that he had read some of our letters, and that they are/were reviewing the position. There have been some very good letters. My *impression* is that the international protest is not being ignored, so even if you are skeptical about the chances, it is still worth trying. Trainor and Palmowski are both scholars of repute with a background in the Humanities, so you can write in any language (it may even increase the impact to have foreign languages, who can know?!). The collection of signatures is also going well, I was no. 1370 when I signed on this afternoon. There are two lists, the second very easy to access:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=info&gid=303202385890
and
http://www.petitiononline.com/spkcl10/petition.html [Ed. this one is indeed dead easy…]

Letters (in case you haven’t yet written) should be posted to:

Professor Rick Trainor,
The Principal,
King’s College,
The Strand,
London WC2R 2LS
(principal@kcl.ac.uk>)

and copy by email attachment to

Professor Jan Palmowski,
Head of the
School of Arts and Humanities
(jan.palmowski@kcl.ac.uk).

This email is just my private initiative, but I have had a lot of conversations over the last day or so and am aware that some people have been hesitating. My advice is to present arguments, from your own particular perspective, and to do so firmly and courteously, on the assumption that something might still be achieved.

Yours,

Nigel F. Palmer, Professor of Medieval German, St Edmund Hall, Oxford OX1 4AR