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Published 5 March 2021
A fortnight ago, the news broke that Distinguished Humanities Scholar of the University of Texas, Austin, Prof. Toyin Falola, has been awarded a Doctor of Letters degree by the Postgraduate School of the University of Ibadan. Were the latest academic memento an honorary degree, it would have caused little or no stir, especially as the recipient is already bedecked with laurels of recognition from across the globe. However, the statement posted online made clear that this is an earned degree being awarded by the University of Ibadan for the first time.
A Doctor of Letters can be described simply, as a Higher Doctorate degree, patterned in the Anglophone University tradition on the Oxford University, England’s prototype. Initially called the ‘Doctor of Literature’ at Oxford, the degree became known by the broader and more significant ‘Doctor of Letters’; some countries apply the name, ‘Doctor of Humane Letters’ to empha
On January 18,
actor Bala Kumar had uploaded a video message for over eighty thousand of his followers on Facebook. He had some happy news to share. According to the actor, popular for his roles in various Tamil and Malayalam film and philanthropic work, he was awarded the Doctor of Humane Letters by The Royal American University and was apparently the first South Indian to be awarded such an honour by a foreign university.
Owing to COVID, the convocation wasn t held in Delaware, where the university was apparently headquartered, says Bala in the video. However, since the video was released, there has been a lot of hue and cry about the legitimacy of the university by academics across Kerala. A lot of them were further irked by the prefix Dr added to Bala s name in a poster for a college event, where he was felicitated.