GU Journal no 5 2011

News

GUJOURNAL 5 | 2011

issue number 5 october 2011

Committed Patricia Lorenzoni is a researcher and independent debater.

She says that the important thing is not to lose your enthusiasm. fraud investigation

Exciting workshops

Frozen in time

How could it go so wrong?

Towards a new vision.

In the footsteps of Nils Strindberg.

page 4

page 7

page 12

page 8

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UNIVERSITY OF GOTHENBURG

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Words from the Vice-chancellor

A journal for the Universit y of Gothenburg’s employees

October

We cannot afford losing international students

E d i to r - i n - C h i e f a n d P u b l i s h e r

Allan Eriksson 031 - 786 10 21 allan.eriksson@gu.se e d i to r & d ep u t y p u b l i s h e r

Eva Lundgren 031 - 786 10 81 eva.lundgren@gu.se p h oto g r a p h y & r ep r o d u c t i o n

Johan Wingborg 031 - 786 29 29 johan.wingborg@gu.se T h e n u m b e r o f st u d e n t s that apply for our educational programs is again among the highest in the country and there is strong competition for openings. This is good news and shows that our courses and programs are interesting. It’s particularly good news that a completely new program and the first of its kind in Sweden – Liberal Arts – had over 11 applicants for each opening.

This program combines the humanities with science, which is in full agreement with our research and education strategy: to stimulate cooperation between different disciplines.

As a university, we have to contribute to the knowledge, creativity, openness and critical approach needed for a democratic and sustainable development of society. What happened at Utöya in Norway this summer was an eye-opener. It represents issues that must be reflected in what we teach. Students from outside of Sweden have a very important role here.

However, the Government’s decision to require payment of students outside of Europe as of this fall has had serious effects on the international character of the Swedish education system. According to the most recent figures from the National Agency for Higher Education, the number of students from countries outside Europe has fallen from 16 600 in 2010 to 1 280 in the fall of 2011. This is a far greater loss than expected. For the University of Gothenburg, the number of non-European students decreased from 350 to 41.

that we are losing international students. It isn’t only a threat to the diversity that is so important – there is also a risk of an acute shortage of skills. It reduces our opportunities to offer international education programs. The effect at our university is most obvious in economics and information technology. International students who leave Sweden after they have completed their studies are good ambassadors for both their university and for the country. They also help to vitalize our educational institutions – even our society as a whole – by giving insight into other backgrounds and other ways of thinking and acting.

Simply speaking, fewer international students mean a decrease in quality.

By requiring fees from students, Sweden departs drastically from the democratic tradiIt i s t ro u b le s o m e

g r a p h i c d e s i g n & l ayo u t

Anders Eurén 031 - 786 43 81 anders.euren@gu.se contributing author

Helena Svensson T r a n s l at i o n

Janet Vesterlund address

GU Journal University of Gothenburg Box 100, 405 30 Göteborg e-post

gu-journalen@gu.se internet

www.gu-journalen.gu.se ISSN

1402-9626 photo: Hille vi nagel

issues

7 issues/year. Next issue November 9, 2011. deadline for submission

tion of our educational system. It can also be a gateway to fees for students inside the country, which has happened in several other countries, among them Denmark. Speaking mildly, this would be very unfortunate in my opinion.

T h i s i s w h at we have to face at this time, however, and we must adapt ourselves to student fees. Even though the Government’s fall budget predicts a small increase in the present minimal scholarships, the country’s schools have to become more attractive and work to recruit more students from outside Europe. Sweden simply can’t afford to lose non-European students. This has to do to some extent with the economic situation, but much more with quality and competitiveness.

Quality and profiling educational programs are both extremely important issues for the University of Gothenburg and the documents on visions that we will work on during the academic year. I look forward to seeing that as many as possible contribute to the discussion – not least by participating in the workshops that will be held in the University’s main building every Wednesday this fall between 2:30 and 4:00 pm. Please feel welcome!

October, 21, 2011 m at e r i a l

The editorial office declines responsibility for unsolicited material.

You are welcome to quote, but indicate the source. change of address

In writing to the editorial office. c ov e r

Patricia Lorenzoni, Historian of Ideas, School of Global Studies.

Photography: Johan Wingborg

Reg.nr: 3750M

Reg.nr: S-000256

Contents

GUJOURNAL 5 | 2011

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Editorial, Pam Fredman

2 We can’t afford to lose international students NEWS

4 “The Research Council has damaged Sweden’s reputation as a research nation” 6 A long-awaited merger 7 Ready for the fall’s workshops on 2020 PROFILE

8 Resisting trends Patricia Lorenzoni, Idea historian misc.

11 The picture 11 Hans Rosling was the main feature when Sahlgrenska Academy celebrated its 10 years

5 The Research Council’s turnabout About the biggest fraud investi­ gation in Sweden’s history. We give you the story about what happened.

12 Before the ice melts Artist Tyrone Martinsson documents the Arctic in Andrée’s footsteps.

REPORT

12 Tyrone Martinsson follows Nils Strindberg’s footsteps.

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6

She chooses her own path

A long-awaited merger

Patricia Lorenzoni insists on writing in Swedish and wants to partici­ pate in social debates – which isn’t exactly encouraged today.

Göteborg Organ Art Center merges with the Academy of Music and Drama.

11 The picture Åsa Strand tries to find out what has happened to invading Japenese oysters.

7 Everything on the table Everyone is welcome the workshops in Vasaparken.

The Editorial Office: Welcome to the new GU Journal Do you see any difference?

We’ve been working for a year with designer Björn Eriksson to change GU Journal.

Our ambition has been to create a clearer structure in the Journal to make it easier to read. We’ve started to use signal colours and graphic features to mark certain types of articles. We hope you like the change.

The main article in this issue is the story about Professor

Suchitra Holgersson, who was accused with fraud. We had already looked into the case before the Research Council decided to retract its inves­ tigation. Much of it seemed strange. When we spoke with a number of professors who had looked at the material in depth, they pointed out serious weaknesses in the Research Council’s investigation that had not been noted.

A reason for the Research Council’s turnabout was prob­ ably the justice ombudsman notification that came from journalist Sus Andersson at the Farad news site. Her investiga­ tion is a great journalistic feat.

It’s still too early to draw any conclusions about what the consequences can be for the scientific community. The accusations of fraud were a catastrophe for Suchitra

Holgersson – personally and as a researcher. Since so many formal errors were made in the case, it is not likely that it will be possible to sort out what actually happened. Hopefully, however, the case will result in greater legal security in handling suspected research fraud in the future.

The profile in this issue is Patricia Lorenzoni, who thinks that the researcher has an

obligation to participate in social debates. She’s also critical of the trademark trend, that universities more and more are becoming a marketplace. What she wonders is where there is room for education.

ALLAN ERIKSSON & EVA LUNDGREn

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News

“The Swedish Research Council has damaged Sweden’s reputation as a research nation” One moment she’s accused of gross misconduct in one of the largest investigations of research fraud in Swedish history.

The next moment the Swedish Research Council has retracted its opinion and isn’t even sure whether there has been any fraud at all.

“The entire case around Suchitra Holgersson has been managed incomprehensively poorly and has damaged Swedish research for the future,” says Börje Haraldsson.

Börje Haraldsson

complicated story that began in the summer of 2008 when Suchitra Holgersson came into conflict with one of her doctoral students at Karolinska Institute. The conflict escalated when she moved to Gothenburg and three former colleagues reported her for misconduct.

Börje Haraldsson, who in his then role as vice dean was given the task of monitoring the case

by Dean Olle Larkö, feels that the problems began then.

“The first thing you have to do when you investigate research fraud is to secure the material.

KI didn’t do this and thus the Research Council’s advisers weren’t able to follow the results of individual analyses, via compilations to pre-publication. For this reason it isn’t possible to find out now what happened several years ago.”

After KI’s investigation, the case was passed to the Research Council. It took a year and a half before the Council arrived at the conclusion that Suchitra Holgersson was guilty of very serious misconduct in research.

It ’ s a lo n g a n d

the Research Council published its opinion that Kristoffer Hellstrand, professor of tumour immunology, and Elias Eriksson, professor of pharmacology, became interested in the case.

“I got interested because I use similar equipment to what the fraud was said to be done on and I started to look into the case. My conclusion was that there wasn’t evidence for there having been any fraud at all,” says Kristoffer Hellstrand.

Börje Haraldsson came to the same conclusion after having put a hundred hours into his review.

“I don’t know whether she’s guilty but I don’t think so. If I’d found any evidence that she had committed fraud I wouldn’t have defended her.”

Kristoffer Hellstrand

It wa s w h e n

It wa s fo u n d that the investigation was full of ambiguities.

“It’s incomprehensible that the Research Council could have made such a lousy investigation.

Many documents aren’t dated and several accusations were raised after the fact. The Research

“The first thing you have to do is to secure the material.”

Börje Haraldsson

given access to her own research material, in spite of the fact that she requested that repeatedly. She’s also been accused of misconduct in manuscripts that weren’t even published.”

“It’s unfortunate that the original data for values in individual tables haven’t been found, but it doesn’t have to mean that there’s been fraud,” says Kristoffer Hellstrand, “and it’s hard to understand why it’s so obvious that Suchitra Holgersson in particular would have falsified results.”

O n e o f t h e m o st serious counts was that Suchitra Holgersson tried to mislead the Research Council’s investigators, such as going to KI and falsifying papers.

“At the time that this crime was said to have been committed, Suchitra Holgersson didn’t have access to KI and she had an alibi for the entire day,” Kristoffer Hellstrand tells us. “There were only 48 hours between the time that the investigators discovered the alleged falsification in June 2010 until the experts wrote their opinion on the Research Council’s homepage. In this record time, a crime was investigated that led to a withdrawal of research grants, a ban on applying for new grants for ten years and, by extension, dismissal as a professor.”

Both Börje Haradsson and Kristoffer Hellstrand believe that Suchitra Holgersson was sentenced in advance.

Council, which is an advisory organ, has acted as investigator, prosecutor and court. It hasn’t been possible to make an appeal against the decision. And KI made things even worse by spreading the rumour all over the world.

It’s had fatal consequences for Suchitra Holgersson since research fraud is a socially shameful crime that brings a lifelong professional ban.”

“To prove his or her innocence a researcher has to be able to report every step from experiment to the conclusions that are drawn,” according to Börje Haraldsson. “That Suchitra Holgersson hasn’t been able to do that can be explained by no one’s having safeguarded computers, binders and logbooks. She wasn’t

Chain of events dec 2007–jan 2008

Aug 2008

fall 2008

Dec 2008

Nov 2009

May 2010

sept 2010

Suchitra Holgersson (SH), who was employed at KI at the time, was recruited to the University of Gothenburg by transplantation surgeon Michael Olausson.

Several doctoral students wanted to go along to Gothenburg but some refrained. There was also a conflict between SH and one of her doctoral students, EE.

SH enters her position as professor at the University of Gothenburg.

KI thus loses important competence in transplantation surgery.

The conflict between SH and EE escalates, where SH reports to the prefect that EE has exaggerated her work in a scientific context. EE in turn reports about ten days later that SH had falsified data in a table.

Two other doctoral students, of whom one is married to EE, direct other allegations against SH.

KI carries out an internal investigation where it can not be said with certainty what happened.

For this reason, KI, together with GU, asks the Research Council to make an investigation.

The Research Council gives its opinion that SH is guilty of misconduct in several cases.

The Research Council receives a tip from KI about mysterious files on SH’s computer.

The Council establishes 48 hours later that SH tried to mislead the investigators.

The Research Council gives its opinion that SH is guilty of gross and very gross scientific misconduct on September 13.

News

GUJOURNAL 5 | 2011

Suchitra Holgersson comments

“The Research Council, which required absolute order in Suchitra Holgersson’s research result records, had no order in their own files.”

photo: Johan Wingborg

Kristoffer Hellstrand

“The Research Council, which required absolute order in Suchitra Holgersson’s research result records, had no order at all in their own file,” Kristoffer Hellstrand points out.

“That a person in Sweden can be accused without being given information about the counts against him, be called to a hearing without a judicial representative to defend himself alone against persons who act both as persecutor and judge and be forbidden access to documents can be described as an inquisition,” says Börje Haraldsson.

T h e o n ly p o s iti v e thing in the case, according to him, is that the Research Council is now retracting the entire investigation and appointing a commission to find out how the case was managed.

He feels that this should also lead to insight that suspicions of research fraud must be treated in a legally correct way.

“The investigation should first and foremost be conducted at the school itself and it must of course be possible to make an appeal against the decision.”

There are traces of heartlessness in the whole story, according to Kristoffer Hellstrand, who says that Suchitra Holgersson is a great asset for the University of Gothenburg.

“When the news came that vessels had successfully been produced using stem cells that had

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The Research Council is now retracting its fraud investigation. What is your comment?

“I’m of course very relieved. At the same time confused over how it could have gone on so long in spite of our repeatedly describing weaknesses in the investigation, from KI’s very perfunctory investigation to the Research Council’s investigation. No consideration has been taken to the formal arguments we reported about the investigation’s poor legal character and the proof in the question of guilt. I’m also very thankful that the news site Farad (Sus Andersson) showed interest in my case and actually went in and checked the Research Council’s diary so that the lack of order came to light.”

But having lived with accusations of fraud for several years – how has that affected you on a personal level?

“It’s difficult to be put in the position of perhaps losing your profession, but the absolutely worst thing is being pointed out as a dishonest cheater. You feel that you’ve become smaller as a person and wonder what the people around you think. You become depressed, quite simply. It hasn’t just affected me but my whole family, my husband and my children, and my work.”

Suchitra Holgersson is professor of transplantation biology at Sahlgrenska Academy.

been operated into the liver of a ten-year-old girl, the University of Gothenburg refused to name Suchitra Holgersson in the press, in spite of the fact that it was her research that laid the foundation for that success.”

V i ce- c h a n ce llo r Pam Fredman has now retracted the resignation.

Do you think that you’ve done enough in this question as the head of an authority?

“As the head of an authority I’ve handled the case in a formally correct way for the University. As the case developed with a decision from KI that there was misconduct in research, this meant that I didn’t have the freedom to act in any other way than I did.”

Was it right to submit a request to the National Disciplinary Offences Board when you were well aware of there being weaknesses in the investigation?

“Based on the information that existed at the time of the request, it was right. The same day that I was informed that the Research Council had withdrawn its fraud investigation, I made the decision to retract the University’s report to the National Disciplinary Offences Board. Thus there is now no report in this question at the University of Gothenburg.”

ALLAN ERIKSSON EVA LUNDGREN

The Research Council stopped research grants to you.

How has that affected your research career?

“It affects my whole research career since it isn’t only the Research Council that stopped my grants. It’s been more difficult to apply from funds everywhere, more difficult to publish and more difficult to speak at international congresses. Being suspected and accused of research fraud is the worst thing that can happen to a researcher.”

What lessons can be learned from this in terms of trust in the scientific community?

“For the future it’s absolutely necessary to get structure in investigations of suspected misconduct so that they can be conducted in a legally satisfactory way.

A combination of legal and scientific competence is needed. It’s obvious that all cases of suspected misconduct negatively affect the public’s trust in the scientific community.”

What do you think of Vice-chancellor Pam Fredman’s role in this case?

“I’m disappointed that she didn’t allow herself to be informed by people independent of me who had actually read the investigation in detail and come to a completely different conclusion than the Research Council did.

What’s frightening in the whole story is that everybody, without coming to their own conclusions, rested on the initial Research Council investigation. When it was found later not to be of worth – then everything fell like a house of cards. It could have been expected that anyway the Vice-chancellor of the University of Gothenburg would ask for an independent scientific and legal examination in order to have more than just a statement to lean on.”

Oct 2010

jan 2011

feb 2011

spring 2011

June 2011

aug 15, 2011

sept, 8

The Research Council decides to stop payment of research grants to SH and forbids her from applying for support for her research until 2020.

SH appeals the decision to stop research grants to the court, with the support of a plea by Kristoffer Hellstrand and Elias Eriksson.

The MAQS Law Firm is given the task by KI and the University of Gothenburg to investigate the allegations. It determines that it deals with misconduct in research and that there are grounds for dismissal.

The Research Council is reported to the legal ombudsman for not having treated the case management in a correct way. There is simultaneous labour negotiation with SH.

SH submits a text in which she swears her innocence.

Vice-chancellor Pam Fredman requests at the National Disciplinary Offences Board that SH be dismissed from her professorship.

The Research Council retracts its investigation of research fraud. Pam Fredman decides to retract the decision for a request of dismissal.

News

University of Gothenburg number 184 in the world According to the latest QS list, the University of Gothenburg comes in one place lower compared with last year. The University of Umeå is the only Swedish seat of learning that has clearly improved its position this year, while the Universities of Uppsala, Lund and Stockholm, and KTH, have dropped. The QS list is one of the more questioned ranking lists, depending primarily on the fact that it is constructed on a questionnaire investigation of what seats of learning have the best reputation, a method with considerable methodological weaknesses.

Topping the Internet list The University of Gothenburg has the great­ est impact on Internet of all Swedish universities and places itself very well in an international perspective as well: number 3 in Scandinavia, number 21 in Europe and number 120 globally. This was found when Webometrics updated its ranking list that compares how well the world’s universities are seen on the Internet.

“It’s fun to find yourself in a high place in this measurement since it means that our research gets a great deal of international attention,” says Magnus Gunnarsson at the unit for analysis and evaluation.

The University of Gothenburg has advanced quickly on this list, but the change has something to do with Webometrics having changed its method.

“This has meant that all Swedish universities have moved up on the ranking list, but not as much as the University of Gothenburg, which has passed four other Swedish universities in just one year.”

Small changes The University of Gothenburg is in the 203rd place on the prestigious Shanghai ranking of the world’s top universities.

The list, which is published annually by Shang­ hai Jiao Tong University, chiefly measures excellent research and Nobel prizes.

The University of Gothenburg rose from 212th place, primarily because of publications in Nature and Science, which are given great value. At the same time, the University of Gothenburg is ranked as the number two Swedish medical university (place 50 to 75 in the world) following the Karolinska Institute.

“It’s a stable list with small changes. We’ve risen slightly, but that doesn’t say much about our quality – although it would be exciting to go further so that we rank under the 200 limit,” says Magnus Gunnarsson at the unit for analysis and evaluation.

A long-awaited merger GOArt is merging with the Academy of Music and Drama (HSM) and creating a complete environment. At the same time, a new Masters program in organ is being started, related to keyboard instruments in close cooperation with the Gothenburg International Organ Academy Association.

D i s c u s s i o n s h a d already started in 2003 about the Gothenburg Organ Art Center (GOArt) merging with the Academy of Music and Drama (HSM). A year later, the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts took a decision for a merger, although it has taken a long time to realise the plans.

“We both become stronger by a merger – HSM has a sharper orientation and GOArt a broader one,” says Staffan Rydén, Rector of HSM. GOArt became a research centre in 1999, but it’s been difficult for such a small unit to manage on its own.

“It was tough establishing continuity in personnel and financing. The demands for administrative reporting increased and there was a dependence on project grants,” says Johan Norrback, GOArt Director, who sees no risk that GOArt would drown in HSM’s large operations.

“We’ve formally been directly under the Faculty Board, but it will be simpler now when we belong to a department,” he says.

Staffan Rydén points out that “GOArt has the research while HSM has the undergraduate program in church music. So the merger is also in line with the University of Gothenburg’s ideas about complete environments.”

One fruit of the merger is

photo: Johan Wingborg

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The well-known British organist Gordon Stewert gave lessons during the Gothenburg International Academy.

the new Masters program in organ with related keyboard instruments that is starting this fall. This means that students have access to an internationally known group of organs. Another new thing is that the Gothenburg International Organ Academy Association – this year with British organs during the 1800s as its theme – will now be scheduled during the school year and cooperate with the Master degree.

GOA r t n o lo n g e r has its large workshop at Ebbe Liberathsgatan in Mölndal. Instead there are plans for cooperation with the Department of Conservation which has a craft lab in Mariestad. The hope is to build up a pipe research workshop where the instruments in which investments have been made and that have been completed can be maintained and taken care of.

WELCOME TO THE INTERNATIONAL CAFÉ

s j s

We have an International Café on the first Monday of every month – an informal meeting place for international researchers, international staff, PhD students, their families and hosts.

Location: Ågrenska villan, Högåsplatsen 2, Gothenburg Guest Services, www.gu.se/guestservices

“GOArt is coming at just the right time – it strengthens our international profile and will attract more students,” says Staffan Rydén.

HELENA SVENSSON

Merg er of GOART & H SM A formal merger between the Gothenburg Organ Art Center (GOArt) and the Academy of Music and Drama (HSM) as of July 1, 2011.

GOArt’s research and administration has been located at Viktor Rydbergsgatan since the fall of 2010. The Masters program in organ with related keyboard instruments is starting this fall and will offer 120 credits.

Other news is that the Gothenburg Organ Art Academy Association will now conduct its activities during the school year and cooperate with the Masters program.

Announcements

photo: Johan Wingborg

GUJOURNAL 5 | 2011

Everything on the table How can education at the University of Gothenburg become more international? Is a complete academic environment always possible? And what role does the University have to play in the future with harder competition for students?

These are a few questions that will be discussed at the fall’s workshops at Vasaparken. All employees and students are welcome.

T h e wo r k s h o p s , which will be held every Wednesday afternoon during the fall, are meant to engage as many people as possible in the work toward a new vision for the University of Gothenburg.

“We want to turn every stone,” says Deputy Vice-chancellor Margareta Wallin Peterson. “All the questions that we have to take a position on will be on the table. For example, is graduate work a part of education or a part of research?

And what does it mean that the education has a scientific basis – is it sufficient to have teachers that are PhDs? Why are researchers in the heavy environ­ments so often men, and is that something we should try to change? And how should we work on the whole with education, research cooperation and inno­vation?”

Ot h e r q u e sti o n s in which opinions may diverge are what differentiates universities from other educational institutions, what role lifelong learning should have in higher education and whether it is truly good to invest in programs, as many students would like, instead of independent courses. Or can they be combined?

“In earlier documents we’ve emphasized the importance of complete environments with education, research and cooperation.

But how does that work in practice? If you work in a research intensive part of the university,

“The main problem in Swedish research is not a lack of money but that we have too few skilful researchers. We have to put a stop for the systematic inbreeding that is a consequence of the fact that Swedish universities as a rule employ only their own doctoral students.”

BO ROTHSTEIN

DAGENS NYHETER DEBATE, AUGUST 28, 2011

Thorvald Stoltenberg to Global Week

Everyone is welcome to the workshops at Vasaparken, says Deputy Vice-chancellor Margareta Wallin Peterson.

it’s difficult to gain pedagogic merits. And the reverse – how is the person who has a full plate with teaching have the time to conduct research? I’m sure there are many opinions on this.”

In addition to workshops, which are open to everyone, a number of seminars will also be held for invited participants.

These will treat how we actually know how things go for the university, how much we ourselves can direct our development and what role the university should play in tomorrow’s society.

“This fall has a lot to do with collecting support and getting different opinions. And all the work we’re doing now will lead to a large vision conference in February next year,” explains Margareta Wallin Peterson. “We’ll be inviting 100 to 150 guests from all parts of the University.” that emerge in the workshops and seminars and in the conference will be documented and be available on the web. They will also be put together with other investigations, such as RED 10 and BLUE 11, the two evaluations of research and education. All this material will then form the basis for the overall vision for 2013 to 2020 that the board will decide upon on September 6 next year.

“That it’s an overall vision means that it can’t go into detail.

Each faculty and department has to be able to translate the vision A ll t h e i n s i g h t s

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into an action plan adapted to its special needs.”

Parallel with the work on strategies, efforts will also be made to change the organisation.

“Much of the organisation work will also go on during the fall and will of course affect the vision,” according to Margareta Wallin Peterson. “Everything goes together and has the same goal: to create a stronger and more competitive university with high quality in everything we do.”

EVA LUNDGREN

WORKSHOPS DURING THE FALL The fall’s workshops will be held on Wednesdays from 14:30 to 16:00 in room 10 of the University’s main building, Vasaparken. Everyone is welcome.

The program will offer: Oct 5: What distinguishes a complete academic environment – and is it always possible?

Oct 12: How can we create clear research connections in education – and what models exist for this?

Oct 19: How should we work with the communication between researchers and the university environment?

Oct 26: Equality and research – synergy or conflict?

Nov 2: Is work on cooperation and utilization a factor for success?

Nov 11: Profiling – political dream or instrument for survival?

Take the chance to reserve November 21 to 25 for Global Week, this year’s international days. One of the big names is Thorvald Stoltenberg, Norway’s former defence and foreign minister, who will hold the “Gothenburg Annual Lecture on Global Collaboration”.

Thorvald Stoltenberg, father of the current Norwegian prime minister Jens Stoltenberg, has long experience as a well known politician and worker for peace, particularly in refugee questions. The lecture will be held in the lecture hall at Vasaparken on Wednesday, November 23.

It is the second year in a row that the University of Gothenburg is arranging Global Week and the goal is to offer a fun, interest­ ing and developmental week for the University of Gothenburg’s students, employees and international partners. View the entire program at: www.globalweek.gu.se

Doctoral student salaries – correction According to the last issue of GU Journal on page 9 “The Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts uses education grants for the first two years and employed positions for the two remaining years.”

This is not correct (although a somewhat unclear formulation in the investigation about doc­ toral student positions can give this impression).

All doctoral students who were accepted at the Faculty’s most recent review of applications (they began their studies in September of 2010 and are thus at the end of their first year of studies) have doctoral positions. Thus there is no education grant but we apply the principle of doctoral employment from the very first day.

Sverker Jullander

graduate studies conductor at the Faculty of Fine, Applied and Performing Arts.

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Profile text Allan Eriksson | photography Johan Wingborg

Resisting trends There’s far too little reward today for writing in Swedish and taking part in social debates. The most important thing is instead to publish and gather merits. Patricia Lorenzoni, historian of ideas, thinks this is an unfortunate development. n J u ly 2 2 , Pat r i c i a was on board a Norwegian cruise ship far out in the Barents Sea, on the way back to Tromsö from Svalbard. She was working for the second year in a row as a cruise lecturer. When the news of the terrorist attack on Utöya reached the ship, Patricia wondered why it wasn’t given attention. She received a sound dressing-down.

“The policy on board was not to talk politics or religion with the passengers. The feeling was: Don’t disturb us, we’re consuming! It was like a pretend world. The world could go under, but here we continue to serve drinks and play bridge.”

When they left the ship in a windswept Tromsö she found out that both Norway and Sweden had held a minute of silence.

When we meet at the Department of Global Studies one morning when Gothenburg was swathed in a grey mist, Patricia tells us that there were manifestations throughout Tromsö.

“It was an unbelievably strong experience. Everyone in the city joined in the manifestation, nothing else happened. But you can also ask yourself: if the perpetrator hadn’t been so desperately Norwegian, would there have been an equally strong need to speak about tolerance, peace and democracy?”

Pat r i c i a Lo r e n zo n i is an idea historian and active in cultural debates. The combination of doing research half of her time and being an independent debater in the other half suits her perfectly.

But the recent debate on multiculturalism has depleted her energy.

“It’s starting to get tiresome,” says Patricia in a serious voice.

During the summer she wrote a critical review in Helsingborgs Dagblad of Axess issue on multiculturalism, most because it lacked history. A bitter, enflamed debate followed. She believes that you have to be

prepared for tough comments but she dislikes personal attacks.

Patricia is strongly against the discussion about double identities, despite the fact that her mother comes from Brazil. She feels that cultures aren’t building blocks that you can easily combine, but mixtures are also a part of Sweden. Patricia grew up in an academic family in the middle class neighbourhood of Kåbo in Uppsala. She had difficulty adapting herself to school, however, and quit when she was 16 years old.

“There’s a lot that I still rebel against.

My uncompromising way is both a strength and a weakness. It causes problems, which wasn’t entirely easy during my teen years.”

At that time, she was active in the field biologist movement in Uppsala but landed a job in Gothenburg when their local office was looking for an assistant. She made an unsuccessful attempt to start high school but felt very uncertain and made a living for a while as a street vendor.

“It was pretty poor and miserable. But thanks to the sale of our summer house I was able to go to Brazil and live with my aunt for a year. I also wanted to learn the language well.”

It was an instructive trip in many ways, although with the perspective of time she realises that there was much she didn’t understand.

“I felt so Swedish, there was so much I didn’t get. The social codes and the fact that I didn’t fit in, despite that I should have fit in. It was an important lesson.”

S h e sta r t e d to understand the importance of using the possibilities that Sweden has – possibilities that her friends in Brazil lack: a social safety net and a federally funded educational system. The trip motivated her to start adult education.

“It was liberating to come there. I was treated like an adult. I was very motivated, studied very hard, but I also knew what I had to do to get good grades.”

There have been many trips to Brazil

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since her brother moved there 13 years ago. She’s also made research trips to northern Amazon.

“Even now when I go back I feel like an elk in the tropics. I’m clumsy and can’t dance the samba. It’s hard to come back to the city that I lived in for a year. I think of the young people that I hung around with and wonder how things have gone for them.

Meanwhile I’ve gotten a university education and done my doctorate. I get grants to go back.

It’s incredibly unfair. I get a first-world-badconscience for the trip that I’ve made.”

One reason why she started to study idea history was Amanda Peralta, who died a few years ago.

“She was a personal friend of mine, it was that family I went home to and ate Sunday dinner with. Amanda had written a book about liberation theology that inspired me: ‘Wow, can you get involved with things like this when you study the history of ideas!’

It was an extremely inspiring environment with exciting people like Michael Azar, Mikela Lundahl, Edda Manga, Amanda Peralta and, not least, Sven-Eric Liedman. Many of them studied the post-colonial perspective. I met people that theorized about personal experiences that were very deep for me.”

T h e r e wa s a l s o a desire to participate in a public debate and write in Swedish for a Swedish public.

“I’ve made an active choice to combine; I want to stay, but not full time. I want to be a researcher and like teaching. But I also want to participate in something else. But that isn’t something that you’re encouraged to do. You’re expected to publish articles, gather merits as quickly as possible for an associate professor. That’s good for the universities; they come higher up in the ranking lists.”

Violence, power and colonization are the themes of Patrica Lorenzoni’s research. Her doctoral thesis written in 2007, Travelling under the Sign of Death (Att färdas under dödens tecken), is an idea historical study about how Western civilization hides the violence and the victims that were a requirement for Europe’s conquests.

Most of all, the thesis gives a deep critical analysis of anthropologist J.G. Frazer’s classic work The Golden Bough, where she examines the relationship between European conquest and the Christian worldview. The thesis was praised by the press.

She thinks that the demand for everyone to write in English is impossible to understand and

“I also wonder what is meant by all the talk about excellence.” simply stupid. She asks herself what internationalization actually is.

“No one in Sweden had written about J.G. Frazer in a deep way and I tie things in the thesis to a great deal of international research.

It’s a part of the internationalization but it doesn’t count.”

Pat r i c i a t h i n k s that we’ve become prisoners in a continuously ongoing self-referring system,

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“She’s the saint of desperate cases. The prayers are wonderful. You turn to Santa Rita when life feels hopeless and you don’t dare pray to God: “I am so little and wretched, please put my words well for Him.”

where we stop asking ourselves: what do we want with our research?

“I also wonder what is meant by all the talk about excellence. What in fact is excellence, more than that we measure ourselves against other schools in the world? It has very little to do with the surrounding community.”

She’s strongly against “trademarking” the university, an identification that slowly and unconsciously sinks into our consciousness.

“Education is seen as a product that students come and purchase. The product has to be predictable, nothing can happen in the course that isn’t known from the beginning. All teaching goals have to be defined exactly, what the course will result in, and if the course doesn’t agree with the description, the customer, the student, can complain. To me it’s a completely crazy way to run higher education.”

What do you do to fight the trend?

“You can’t constantly worry about adversities – you have to see the possibilities that exist, too. And I also fight to some extent by insisting on writing in Swedish and writing articles on cultural issues outside of the university.”

Thus she thinks it’s important to defend higher education as fine education.

“It’s one reason to be active in the university. You can do an unbelievable number of things and I think that my research is incredibly exciting.”

For a year and a half, Patricia has been involved in a national research program, called Time, Memory and Representation (Tid, minne och representation) that includes 24 researchers from the social sciences and humanities.

“It’s very exciting. Just the fact that we have long-term financing for six years is a sign that there are counter-trends. There’s a clear goal that we will report what we do in Swedish and not be panicked by bibliometric measures.”

Pat r i c i a i s n ow working on a study that deals with the picture of “the Indian” in Brazilian thinking.

“I’m interested in the Indian as a figure, what conceptions there are of the Indian in relation to nation and territory. Brazil is extremely interesting. There’s a national state but there are also populations that have

no idea of what a nation is. They haven’t yet been colonized. How do you justify that Brazilian law is valid there? These small, poor and marginalized groups fight with small means to make their voices heard. But it’s also interesting to see how certain groups use the picture of them that exists in their struggle. The Indian is seen as something authentic and original, which was important when the country of Brazil was formed.”

“There are fantastic pictures,” Patricia says, taking a book with black and white pictures from a bookshelf.

“Here are the Cayopó Indians marching into the square and the Congress building in the ultramodern city. The origin of the nation comes to the heart of the modern nation. It’s a small fragment of the population that could so easily be hidden, but it’s impossible since they’re a symbol of the birth of the nation.”

However, as the Indians do not have the right to own land according to Brazilian law, it’s a difficult and uneven fight.

Thanks to a national myth founded on immigration, Patricia experiences Brazilian racism as softer and more negotiable than in Europe. But there’s a harsh limit toward the Indians.

“Even educated Brazilians can talk about this group as a wild and lazy race. They say to me, but you know that they have small children that sleep on the ground like dogs.

On the one hand, it’s a picturesque and exotic feature and, on the other, people think it’s embarrassing for a modern country to have savages on its territory that go around with penis sleeves and talk strange languages. But they forget the violence that these groups are constantly exposed to.”

She returns to J.G. Frazer and how he actively looked away from human suffering.

“It’s something all of us do every day when we walk past the beggar on the street.

As Martin Luther King pointed out, it doesn’t only have to do with evil people’s actions but also about good people’s indifference.”

Where does your strong commitment come from?

Patricia leans back in her office chair, puts her hands behind her head and stares up at the ceiling. Thinks a moment.

“Junior high school in Uppsala was a horrible time. A boy who went in my parallel class was completely destroyed by bullying. When he was eleven years old he’d had enough and threw himself on the road outside the school and screamed that he wanted to die. When my mother brought this up with the headmaster he denied it completely and said that there wasn’t any bullying at the school. That affected me deeply and still makes me so angry.”

Patricia converted to Catholicism a few years ago. On her nightstand she has an altar and the patron saint Santa Rita of Cascia, which she received from her grandmother in Brazil.

Patricia Lorenzoni Most recent work Mama Dolly, book of essays about the myths of motherhood that will be published by Norstedts in January.

Occupation Idea historian and writer, researcher at the Department of Global Studies.

Age 36 Family Yes. A boyfriend in Norrköping.

Background Quite a lot.

Lives In an adult commune in Vasastan that she shares with four persons.

What you didn’t know about Patricia “Maybe that I skipped school half the time in junior high school and quit high school.”

Interests Many, for example horror movies.

Strength Uncompromising Weakness Uncompromising Afr aid of Losing enthusiasm Makes her happy Astor and Zäta Irritates her Exaggerated belief in quantifiability Favourite food Kim chi (Korean pickled Chinese cabbage) Most recently read book Walled States, Waning Sovereignty by political scientist Wendy Brown. “That book made a great impression on me.”

Most recently seen film The Lace­maker with Isabelle Huppert Favourite music Loretta Lynn always works.

Motto Mourn not, organise.

misc.

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photogr aphy: Johan Wingborg

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But we still don’t know anything about how the oyster will affect the ecology in a longer perspective.

On this particular occasion I’m out with a water telescope together with a number of high school students who participated in the researcher school that the Faculty of Natural Sciences held August 17-21. Being supervisor for high school students is a lot of fun but it’s

also important. It’s a way of teaching young people how we researchers work and in what environment we work.

Seventeen young people from different high schools in Western Sweden took part in the researcher school. In addition to marine ecologists the students also got to meet mathematicians, and there was a visit to Vitlycke museum.”

The world

photogr aphy: Sofia sabel

Sahlgrenska academy 10 years

Tell us what you’re doing in the picture, Åsa Strand, researcher at the Department of Marine Ecology!

”I follow the situation with the Japanese giant oysters that have been observed along the Bohus coast since 2007. Will a larger number of oysters be born than die during the winter?

Here, outside of Tjärnö, there seems to have been a massive recruitment but it looks like the oysters don’t survive as well down in Kristineberg. Since they have very sharp shells and live near beaches, they can injure bathers.

is just getting better “The number of children born in the world today has stopped increasing. We won’t become more than 9 billion people.”

That was one of the things that Hans Rosling, Professor of International Health at Karolinska Institute, said as head speaker at Sahlgrenska Academy’s 10-year anniversary on September 9.

“Egypt has reduced its child mortality from 40 to 4 per cent, Indian women now give birth to only 2.5 children and Brazil has become a larger donor country.

Many countries have taken large steps forward in the space of 50 years.”

Thus he explains that it’s no

longer possible to divide the world up into rich and poor.

“Now I’m going to do some­ thing unusual. I’m going to commend former president George W. Bush. When he needed to borrow money and didn’t gain the support of his friends in G7, he expanded his circle of loan-givers to Brazil, China, Saudi Arabia and others, in other words G20. He felt that the world had changed and that countries that were poor before no longer were poor. So if Bush can reconsider, so can you.”

The anniversary also offered other symposiums, a poster exhibition and a party in the evening.

Hans Rosling was inspiring and got a lot of laughs when he laid myths about world conditions to rest.

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Report text eva lundgren | photography Tyrone Martinsson; vilhelm svedenborg

Frozen in time In Nils Strindberg’s photograph taken in 1896, the Adam glacier reaches all the way down to the sea.

The ice has diminished since then.

In two different projects Tyrone Martinsson will examine what that means for our relationship with the Arctic and how we see environmental changes.

He’s already on his way to Svalbard.

h e t h r ee b o d i e s after engineer Andrée’s catastrophic attempt to fly over the North Pole in a hydrogen balloon were found in 1930. The men had succeeded in getting to the inapproachable Vitön (White Island) but had then perished, perhaps because of food poisoning or perhaps simply exhaustion. Among the material found, 93 were photographs taken by the expedition’s only scientist, Nils Strindberg.

The photographs were developed but the negatives were moved around and finally remained in safe custody at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences until 1999.

“The pictures were starting to decay,” says Tyrone Martinsson, lecturer at the School of Photography, “that historical research hadn’t previously regarded them as being serious sources shows the low status of photography far into the 20th century.”

A s t h e n eg ati v e s lay pressed between sheets of glass that couldn’t be opened, they’ve been difficult to copy in a good way. It’s only now, with modern digital techniques, that the photos can be scanned through the glass, which means that entirely new pictures have emerged with unexpected detail and clarity.

“Andrée’s balloon trip has fascinated people for over a hundred years but interest

in the photographer, Nils Strindberg, hasn’t been great. Still, his fate is fascinating: since he was the only one of the three men that was buried, he must have died first, only 25 years old. Waiting for him at home was his fiancée, Anna Charlier, that Nils wrote moving letters to during the expedition’s doomed march over the ice. After a time she married an Englishman – but her heart is buried next to Nils Strindberg’s urn in the Andrée grave.”

T y ro n e M a r ti n s s o n wrote his doctoral thesis at the University of Westminster about these photographs, which had gained a new lustre after a hundred years.

Photographs from the Arctic are also the focus of his new project in which artists work together with natural scientists.

“The project is called Rephotography: A Dialogue with a History in an Arctic Landscape and is being financed by the Swedish Research Council. In the project we’ll travel to Svalbard to locate exactly the camera position of early Arctic photos, primarily Nils Strindberg’s but also others.

The idea is to take the same photos again.

That way we can compare how the landscape has changed between the end of the 1800s and today.”

That this project is possible at all has largely to do with Nils Strindberg’s precision. A map still exists where he marked 14

camera positions. They show for example where he took a large number of photo series that consists of 360 degree views over the landscape, which is thus photographed from all directions. is an area where much is unstudied in Sweden,” Tyrone Martinsson explains. Still, a series of pictures can say a very great deal about changes in the environment. Over a hundred years, for example, it is obvious that the glaciers in the Arctic are diminishing.

The project will mean pure studies of the role of photography in creating our understanding of these areas as well as investigations of an ecology in change. The results will be an exhibition and a book.

Tyrone Martinsson is already on the M.S. Stockholm, destination northern Svalbard.

During September, 12 researchers and artists from Sweden, Great Britain, Spain and the US will gather in a meeting about Svalbard’s history and discovery – and rediscovery.

“The Art, Science and the Research Journey project means visiting the area of which Andrée is a constant part but with a starting point in the special cultural history along Svalbard’s coast; we’ll visit areas full of stories about whaling, mining, exploitation possibilities, journeys of discovery and adventures. But the project will also treat

“ L a n d s c a pe p h oto g r a ph y

S. A. Andrée, 1854–1897

Book tips: Tyrone Martins­son: Nils Strindberg: En biografi om fotografen på Andrées polarexpedition (2006) (Nils Strindberg: A Biography of the Photographer on Andrée’s Polar Expedition). Tim Jackson: Prosperity without Growth (2011). Henry David Thoreau: Walden (1855).

Report

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Vilhelm Svedenborg’s photograph of the balloon Eagle (Örnen) when it lifted from Dansk Island (Danskön) (by permission of Grenna Museum).

“Over a hundred years it’s clear that the glaciers are getting smaller.” the situation today with global warming and new attempts to exploit the environment.”

Sva lba r d i s fu ll of memories of old expeditions and unsuccessful projects. Think of the men at the German weather station, Haudegen, who were forgotten during the Second World War and only found out in September 1945 that Germany had capitulated. Or of the Russian mining settlement Pyramid that once had a population of 1 200 and a bathhouse, hospital, movie theatre and football grounds but was abandoned in 1997.

Others on the trip are glaciologist Pelle Holmlund, scientific historian Urban Wråkberg, writer Rebecca Solnit and Hasselblad prize-winner Sophie Calle. The project will lead to a book and a film, popular science lectures and, hopefully, new cross-disciplinary research projects.

“It may sound a little original for artists and researchers to be working together,”

Tyrone Martinsson

says Tyrone Martinsson, “but in fact it’s the reverse: in early times it was obvious for an artist to be along on different scientific expeditions to paint animals and nature.

And I see more cooperation between art and different sciences as only positive.

Ecologists and geologists have to have an instrumental approach toward getting their exact data, but we artists, who have visual training, can offer completely other angles.”

The cooperation will in time lead to a graduate course on the living landscape in which nature’s conditions will be discussed because we know that our modern society, where we constantly look for new, untouched areas to exploit, is not sustainable. Svalbard is just one example of an ecology in change where the ice has given way to an Arctic stone desert. “ I n e it h e r c a n nor want to reject our modern culture. It’s contributed to so much that we daily need and appreciate. But we have to create alternatives to our technified and economically steered society, where we work, consume and eat too much – but live too little. The threat against nature and thus also man isn’t just global warming but just

as much our inability to agree on the necessity of change. We continue as always, ‘business as usual,’ in spite of the fact that we’re standing with a knife against our throats.

Still, as Thoreau established, we can never get enough of nature, because man needs nature – while nature doesn’t need us.”

REPHOTOGRAPHY The project Rephotography: A Dialogue with a History in an Arctic Landscape has received 2.6 million crowns from the Swedish Research Council. The cross-disciplinary project will use pictures from the previous century to investigate and understand the dramatic changes in the Arctic landscape on Svalbard. The project will carry out field studies in the summer of 2012 and will result in an exhibition and a book. Already now, it’s time for the international research meeting Art, Science and the Research Journey on Svalbard led by Tyrone Martinsson and Hans Hedberg. The project will also lead to a book, a film and different public events.