This magazine recently highlighted the fact that Kinki University in Japan is anxious to change its name, and you invited us at Bishop Grosseteste University to consider a similar move (The week in higher education, News, 29 May).
Robert Grosseteste’s surname may sound like a reference to an embarrassing part of his anatomy, but in fact it describes the other end of the body, namely his head. Perhaps this was large; or perhaps it was a reference to one of the finest minds of the 13th century, a mind that seems to have had the ability to anticipate modern ideas about the origins of the universe.
In a recent Campus Close-Up article (News, 1 May), you highlighted the work of the Ordered Universe Project, a group of scientists, theologians, Latinists and historians based at Durham University who are doing sterling work in drawing our attention to just how great this medieval mind was. Next month, academics from around the globe will arrive at our university to celebrate his achievements in our third international Grosseteste conference. On the back of all this, we have already instigated a campaign for our city to recognise its most famous son by commissioning a long overdue statue.
So you see, far from dropping the name of Grosseteste, we are proud of our association with this great medieval thinker. And we are sticking with the man with the big ideas.
Jack Cunningham
Academic coordinator for theology
Bishop Grosseteste University
