Steven Dedalus Burch

One of the priorities of the federal government’s sweeping Universities Accord is to improve employment conditions in higher education. This is long overdue. Australia’s university sector once set the standard for working conditions but sadly this is no longer the case. Now the sector is plagued by an over reliance on casual staff, stress, burnout and precarious work conditions. As of 2021, almost one third of Australia’s academic staff were employed as casuals, or contractors on a part-time basis.

Huston, unlike Crane and his readers, had the actual experience of combat before him. What he discovered in Italy validated much of what Crane wrote. Huston, too, would attempt in his film adaptation to reveal the inner soul of the average soldier, but he would do it through his practical knowledge, his sensitivity to Crane’s themes and structure, and, ultimately would come to a nuanced difference in his conclusion.