Concern grows over casualisation of university teaching - THES May 24 .

Good morning. Dons U Like.

Good morning. My name is Professor Lapping. University of Poppleton. We have a bit of a crisis. One of our staff has gone down with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder following the RAE ratings and we have no one available to teach a compulsory course this term.

What level?

Level?

Academic level. We can offer a full professor at ?200 an hour. Or you might fancy an emeritus. Slightly over the hill but guaranteed against serious speech and hearing defects. Only ?150.

Really?

Then we have Readers at ?125. Good value although a little bitter about not having a chair. Then there are your seniors at ?100 or your bog standard lecturers at ?75.

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I suppose we should have a senior.

Subject area?

The course is called the Political Economy of the Media. It's difficult to summarise the full range of the content but there's a particular focus on the manner in which the cultural industries manage the contradiction between mass production and innovation.

Mmmm. Media studies. There's been a bit of a rush in that area this week. We could offer a very bright chap from FE who specialises in satellite dish installation. Good clear voice. And he comes with an optional extension ladder.

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Does he know anything about the media?

All our dons are very flexible. We have one Reader in medieval stained glass who managed to knock up a second-year course on metallurgy in a fortnight.

Well, there's really no alternative.

Excellent. I'll get the forms in the post. One last pedagogic point. Will that be with ladder or without?