Date: July 21, 2010
To: President David Naylor, University of Toronto
Provost Cheryl Misak, University of Toronto
Dean Meric Gertler, University of Toronto
From: Dr. Karin Beeler, President of the Canadian Comparative Literature Association and Members of the CCLA Executive Board
Re: Proposed Closure of the Comparative Literature Program at the University of Toronto
As members of the board of the Canadian Comparative Literature Association, we were astonished to hear of the proposal to close the internationally and nationally recognized Centre for Comparative Literature at the University of Toronto. The Centre, was founded by the eminent scholar, Dr. Northrop Frye in 1969, and his vision helped develop the Centre as a site for cross-cultural and interdisciplinary studies. The Toronto Centre has been a cornerstone of Comparative Literature studies in Canada. Faculty have excelled in their research in this field, as is evident in the international and national reputations of faculty associated with the Centre. Dr. Linda Hutcheon, a professor affiliated with the Centre, is a 2010 recipient of the prestigious Molson Prize which recognizes her outstanding contributions to the intellectual and cultural life of Canada; she has been one of the leading supervisors of graduate students in this program. Two of the Centre’s faculty, Dr. Rebecca Comay and Dr. J.E. Chamberlain have delivered keynote addresses for Canadian Comparative Literature Association conferences to large groups of scholars from a variety of disciplines. Graduate students from the Centre for Comparative Literature have also had a significant presence in the annual Canadian Comparative Literature Association conferences held in conjunction with the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, thus demonstrating that there is a new generation of Comparatists who are building on the foundation of the discipline of Comparative literature in Canada.
We as members of the board of the Canadian Comparative Literature Association therefore urge the University administration to reconsider the proposal to close this Centre. The discipline of Comparative literature continues to have a strong future in Canada as is evident in the ongoing interest in the field by new generations of scholars. The national journal of the CCLA, the /Canadian Review of Comparative Literature/ edited by Dr. Jonathan Hart, also enjoys one of the highest SSHRC ratings for humanities journals. For some time now, Comparative Literature has been the driving force behind scholarship aimed at understanding the complexity of connections across national languages, cultural traditions and various artistic forms and media. It has been able to exert such a lasting influence thanks to an established network of units, departments and programs which, at the regional, national and international levels, provides students and scholars with sound institutional structures for training, teaching and research purposes. The belief that other disciplines now offer, here and there, the very same possibility for exploring cultural connections fails to recognize how crucial established academic frameworks are to the purposeful and concerted development of scholarship and knowledge. At a time when such connections are increasingly instrumental in fostering a mutual understanding of different cultures in local and global contexts, we need to strengthen rather than weaken the position enjoyed by comparative literature, as a discipline in the humanities aptly focused on understanding complex cultural interactions. We believe that if you decide to proceed with the dismantling of the Centre for Comparative Literature, you will be eroding not only the reputation of the University of Toronto as a leader in cross-cultural studies but also, at a national level, the well-established network of programs and centres which positions Canadian academic institutions at the forefront of comparative studies.
Sincerely,
Dr. Karin Beeler, President, CCLA
Dr. Susan Ingram, Vice President, CCLA
Dr. Markus Reisenleitner, Treasurer and Webmaster, CCLA
Dr. Pascal Gin, Secretary, CCLA
Dr. Jonathan Hart, CCLA Board Member and Editor of the Canadian Review of Comparative Literature
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