Southeastern social justice speaker scheduled
Wednesday, October 28, 2015 
by: Tonya Lowentritt
HAMMOND- Southeastern Louisiana University’s Department of Sociology and Criminal
Justice’s 11th Annual Social Justice Speaker Series will feature Dr. Marc Bousquet,
a major figure in the academic labor movement. Scheduled Wednesday, Nov. 4, at 2 p.m.,
the talk, “Monetizing the Students,” will take place on campus in the Student Union
Theatre and is free and open to the public.
Bousquet is the author of the well-known book “How the University Works: Higher
Education and the Low-Wage Nation,” which portrays higher education in the United
States as a world where faculty, staff, graduate students and undergraduates work
long hours for low pay. Bousquet’s presentation will reveal ways some universities
make money on students in the classroom and beyond.
“Low-wage undergraduates, many of them filling positions formerly occupied by
full-time staff, are often the largest workforce on campus,” writes Bousquet. “The
smoothly-functioning campus is a ... company town with a churning pool of ... cheap
labor that takes loans to spend in the company store, voluntarily poses for company
marketing materials, and pays for the privilege of serving as a ‘brand ambassador’
for the campus.”
Bousquet is an associate professor of film and media at Emory University. He
is a frequent contributor to the higher education trade press, co-editor of “The Politics
of Information: The Electronic Mediation of Social Change,” and co-editor of “Tenured
Bosses and Disposable Teachers.” He founded “Workplace: A Journal of Academic Labor”
and has served on the editorial board of several journals, including AAUP’s “Academe.”
The Sociology and Criminal Justice Department organized the annual Social Justice
Speaker Series as a means of bringing nationally and internationally recognized social
justice activists to the Southeastern community. Previous speakers have included Sister
Helen Prejean on the death penalty, Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty and Law Center
on race and racism, and Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Code Pink, on war and human
rights. For more information, contact the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice
at 985-549-2110.
