I believe the requirement for a 'professional' person to sign a passport
form has something to do with appearing on some form of professional
register and therefore for your existence and bona fides to be
proveable. I suppose that since we do appear on a register (or at least,
we do if we're members of the SoA) we should be classed as professionals
in that sense. As far as I can see, the passport requirement is really
just a relic of times when only members of the 'professional classes'
were considered trustworthy enough to sign official documents.
Regards
James
James King
Assistant Archivist
Modern Records Centre
University of Warwick
Coventry
CV4 7AL
Tel: +44 (0) 24 7652 4493
Fax: +44 (0) 24 7652 4211
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http://www.warwick.ac.uk/services/library/mrc/
>>> Peter Higginbotham
<[log in to unmask]> 01/28/02 11:56am
>>>
What actually makes anything a profession?
OED says "The occupation which one professes to be skilled in and to
follow. A vocation in which a professed knowledge of some department
of
learning or science is used in its application to the affairs of
others
or in the practice of an art founded upon it. Applied spec. to the
three learned professions of divinity, law, and medicine; also to the
military profession."
Nothing there about qualifications or getting paid for doing it.
I'm employed in a job that would probably get classed as "IT
Professional" but have no formal qualifications whatsoever (though do
have knowledge and apply it for others). So what is that distinguishes
the keen and knowledgable "amateur" from the "professional"?
And what about members of oldest profession - could one of them sign
my
passport form? I can just imagine it. "You doing business love? Er,
how
much for a full passport form...?"
Peter Higginbotham
Oxford University
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