Artists Urge Obama to Name a Secretary of Culture
Interesting idea. I hope Jones and company are able to help drive this into being (though can we please drop the whole ‘czar’ thing for once and for all? Monarchical terminology with autocratic overtones is just simply un-American).
A call for President-elect Barack Obama to give the arts and humanities a Cabinet-level post — perhaps even create a secretary of culture — is gaining momentum.
By yesterday, 76,000 people had signed an online petition, started by two New York musicians who were inspired by producer Quincy Jones . In a radio interview in November, Jones said the country needed a minister of culture, like France, Germany or Finland has.
Read the complete report in The Washington Post
on January 15th, 2009 at 1:53 pm
This is a bad idea, in my opinion.
The government needs to be focusing on First Principles. With deficits projected to run into the trillions, I think it would be an example of extremely bad stewardship for the government to borrow even more money it doesn’t have to fund these kinds of programs. Focus on fixing the core problems, and when we’ve done that *then* divert resources to side programs.
Furthermore, this line of thinking puts government in the driver seat to decide what culture “is” by the programs it funds. Does that also mean that government also has the power to decide what culture is NOT? Whenever funding is involved, it does.
Government’s track record is so poor, and its performance so inefficient and without accountability (one only needs to try to find data on the whereabouts of bailout dollars to confirm this), that a Department of Culture would be one more drain down which taxpayers dollars flow freely.
on January 18th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
I agree with what DM said. If you look at countries like France for instance where there are language policy organizations in government. They have the power to say what is and isn’t proper language. As language is an expression of culture, the government thus also has some control in defining culture.
I think it has less to do with funding and more to do with the fact that defining culture is probably the first step toward stunting its creative growth.