Spring Break
Things I've Learned with Richard Bett, professor of philosophy
Professor Bett, who specializes in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, talks about his days at Oxford and the pressure to "publish or perish"
Issue date: 11/15/07
N-L: Where did you attend graduate school?
RB: Went to Berkeley. That was a real eye-opener. It was the change that I wanted. I had the choice of going to Harvard but I judged, correctly, I think, that Berkeley would be more of a contrast to my previous experience. That was in my early 20s, and that's when I moved to the US. It was a whole new world out there.
N-L: Were you looking for change?
RB: Oh yeah. Well not necessarily from England, but from Oxford, as an academic setting. As it turned out it was much more of a change than that. I mean, things have become more similar now, but at least in those days it was quite a big contrast. I graduated college in 1980s and then came to the US. From '80-'86 I was a Ph.D student.
N-L: Can you describe the surroundings of Berkeley, what it was like to live there?
RB: It was past the period of the '60s, but there were still some kind of throwback people who had clearly never left the '60s. Then, at least, it was quite easy for mentally disturbed people to live in that area because it was a pretty tolerant atmosphere and it was not too cold. I mean there were some people who had clearly been a part of the '60s radical movement and had never quite moved beyond that. But the mainstream atmosphere in the college and the town was quite different from that.
N-L: You finished your PhD. What came after that?
RB: I got a job as a professor at the University of Texas at Arlington. That was not a big change and not a physically desirable place. I mean, the Dallas, Fort Worth area, it has the amenities of a large urban area, but the overall culture there was a certain anti-intellectual atmosphere, as in many parts of the United States, but it was certainly exaggerated there. In the culture in general, those of us at universities felt like we were sort of a little enclave that was rather different from the overall culture, which was certainly not true at Berkeley and I don't find that to be true so much here, either.
RB: Went to Berkeley. That was a real eye-opener. It was the change that I wanted. I had the choice of going to Harvard but I judged, correctly, I think, that Berkeley would be more of a contrast to my previous experience. That was in my early 20s, and that's when I moved to the US. It was a whole new world out there.
N-L: Were you looking for change?
RB: Oh yeah. Well not necessarily from England, but from Oxford, as an academic setting. As it turned out it was much more of a change than that. I mean, things have become more similar now, but at least in those days it was quite a big contrast. I graduated college in 1980s and then came to the US. From '80-'86 I was a Ph.D student.
N-L: Can you describe the surroundings of Berkeley, what it was like to live there?
RB: It was past the period of the '60s, but there were still some kind of throwback people who had clearly never left the '60s. Then, at least, it was quite easy for mentally disturbed people to live in that area because it was a pretty tolerant atmosphere and it was not too cold. I mean there were some people who had clearly been a part of the '60s radical movement and had never quite moved beyond that. But the mainstream atmosphere in the college and the town was quite different from that.
N-L: You finished your PhD. What came after that?
RB: I got a job as a professor at the University of Texas at Arlington. That was not a big change and not a physically desirable place. I mean, the Dallas, Fort Worth area, it has the amenities of a large urban area, but the overall culture there was a certain anti-intellectual atmosphere, as in many parts of the United States, but it was certainly exaggerated there. In the culture in general, those of us at universities felt like we were sort of a little enclave that was rather different from the overall culture, which was certainly not true at Berkeley and I don't find that to be true so much here, either.
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