Inside the Current Issue

Academic Repression

In an effort to keep Advocate readers abreast of some of the more egregious cases of attempts to squelch academic freedom, we offer the following updates:

The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has announced that it will conduct an inquiry into academic freedom at CUNY. According to the Clarion, the newspaper of the CUNY Professional Staff Congress, the AAUP is planning to look into at least four cases of apparent "political interference in academic affairs." The two following cases, both at Brooklyn College, were initiated as reactions to articles in The New York Sun, which has established itself as a reliable bullhorn for ultranationalist right-wing New Yorkers:

Timothy Shortell, Associate Professor, Sociology Department, Brooklyn College
After Shortell wrote an essay on his blog asking "Could there be any doubt that humanity would be better off without religion" and called religious fanatics "moral retardsƒdoing real harm to others," an article in The Sun called on BC President Kimmich to step in to reject his consideration as department chair. Apparently eager to cow to the Sun, Kimmich wrote to the Sun to condemn Shortell's comments and promising an investigation and swift action. Citing a lack of support from the BC administration, but appreciative of union support, Shortell withdrew himself from consideration for the chair in June.

Priya Parmar, Assistant Professor, Education, Brooklyn College
On May 31, The Sun struck again, this time claiming that the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education was "screening students for their political views," and pointing out Professor Parmar to serve as the poster child for biased professors, in toe with the Council. Charges students made against Parmar include her questioning the notion of "grammatically correct" English and arguing for the legitimacy of Ebonics. Parmar was also charged with crass political indoctrination in showing Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911 in class. In their letter to Chancellor Matthew Goldstein, the AAUP said that, "the Sun's screed about Professor Parmar, who is a woman of color, leaned heavily on a mischaracterization of her teaching on Standard English and Ebonics, and treated with contempt the idea that reducing social inequities is relevant to education." AAUP called on Chancellor Goldstein to protect Professor Parmar and other professors from the Sun's attacks.

Update on the University of Colorado's Ward Churchill
Since the Colorado Board of Regents failed at its politically-motivated effort to remove tenured Ethnic Studies Professor Ward Churchill from the University of Colorado for controversial statements (you've probably heard about the "little Eichmanns") he made regarding September 11th, they turned toward undermining his tenure on a number of fronts. At issue is an accusation that Churchill lied on his application to benefit from affirmative action, misrepresenting himself as a Native American. In addition, the investigation looked into charges of "plagiarism" and "fabrication of authority" over an article that Churchill never claimed authorship of in the first place, making accustaions of plagiarism highly dubious. Though, the investigation is ongoing, Churchill was cleared of the charges of misrepresentation and it is likely that the plagiarism charge will be dismissed as well. As Churchill's colleague Natsu Taylor Saito has noted, "In other words, out of dozens of accusations against Ward, ranging from treason to advocacy of violence to personal threats to misrepresenting his identity to plagiarism, all that remain are a handful of questions regarding historical interpretation and the conventions of citation or attribution." Regardless, Churchill is still being denied an award for excellence in teaching, despite the fact that none of the charges that have been made deal with his teaching.