The votes by the MLA’s largest governing council came in an at-times-surreal five-hour meeting. Cary Nelson, author of Manifesto of a Tenured Radical, was in the position of being the leading moderate, offering alternative language to defeat Radical Caucus proposals. Critics of Israel repeatedly talked about “facts on the ground†to refer to the treatment of Israel’s critics on campuses today, and it was unclear whether the term was being used ironically in light of the phrase’s use to describe Israel’s settlement policy on the West Bank and a recent book at the center of a Barnard College tenure controversy.
While material distributed by those seeking to condemn Churchill’s firing portrayed him favorably, and as a victim of the right wing, some of those who criticized the pro-Churchill effort at the meeting are long-time experts in Native American studies and decidedly not conservative. Many attendees were confused by the parliamentary procedure, and at least one proposed amendment that appeared to have significant backing (in theory) fell apart when questions were raised about its syntax. [emphasis mine]
After one vote that his side lost, Grover Furr, a Radical Caucus leader who teaches at New Jersey’s Montclair State University, called the meeting “a perversion of parliamentary procedures.†[ed. good alliteration!]
Others dismissed the idea that the MLA should worry about whether Churchill’s record made him worthy of support. One professor cited the history of the civil rights movement, in which some women prior to Rosa Parks were not defended because they weren’t seen as perfect from a PR perspective  an attitude this professor criticized.
Foley of Rutgers said that it was true that Churchill had a “flawed history,†adding, “I don’t think anyone is saying he is the perfect scholar.†But she said the relevant fact was that Churchill was under attack unfairly. “We are condemning the university for its politically motivated investigation. They would not have undertaken that investigation unless they wanted to get rid of him,†she said. “If we can’t support this individual then everything we say about academic freedom is bullshit,†she said.
Finley C. Campbell, a retired English instructor at DeVry University, said that Churchill was being punished for being the “uppity†minority person whom the powerful could not tolerate. He said there was no way the MLA could pretend there was not an individual at the center of this issue. “Crucifixions are always personal,†he said.
I’d never really thought of firing someone from a position fraudulently obtained, subsequently maintained by threats, and so on, as crucifixion, but . . . then I’m Catholic.
“Finley C. Campbell, a retired English instructor at DeVry University, said that Churchill was being punished for being the “uppity†minority person whom the powerful could not tolerate.”
Er, I thought all that thar investigatin’ showed that Mr. Churchill was most definitely NOT a “minority”… Guess Mr. Campbell was whining un-truth to non-power.
Having been a reader of Protein Wisdom for years, I am shocked — shocked! — to discover that there is a formally identified Radical Caucus involved with an organization that seeks to define language in our times.
Shocked!
Big Chief Walking Eagle is a minority because he’s a collegiate leftist America-hater who has actually paid a price for wrongs he’s committed.
I was wondering what that strange swooshing noise was throughout various parts of the country.
It was the sound of “stupid” being sucked into Chicago over the last few days.
The MLA is a living fallacy of authority. Language is conventional. Get over it, MLA bluster bombs.
While we’re at it, I need to vent about an American verbs and mass nouns. When I say ‘The MLS is…’ I mean the organization as a whole. When I say ‘The MLA are…’ I mean the people comprising the MLS considered as individuals. Our American usage introduces a tendency to the fallacy of composition. British usage is much better in this respect.
I call to order the Hyper-modern Objectively Obvious Premises Language Association (HOOPLA) to fix this dreadful problem…
When this needs to be said something has gone very wrong.
Act the First Part: HOOPLA hereby condemns the phrase “facts on the ground” as spurious. Facts are never ‘on the ground.’ One never stumbles upon them, although some people tread upon them. We refuse to give in to the totalitarian, Wittgensteinian metaphysics necessary to make “facts in the ground” coherent. Instead of “facts on the ground,” we mandate “interpretations of facts” which properly establishes the relationship of speaker and World. So be it enacted.
“all points of view” = “no standards” = “decreasingly camouflaged radical left-wing indoctrination”.
Remember, these academics are people who can’t bring themselves to disagree with one single theme in Osama bin Laden’s audio communiques.
Oh. That’s a good point.
Sanity Inspector, too true. To us science folks, the humanities appear to have no standards whatsoever. We can’t figure out how they grade papers, much less evaluate “research.” ‘Academic freedom’ seems to be a catch-all adjective for people who want to get government grants for political partisanship.
Let’s see if my comment shows up.
And when it can be uttered in all seriousness by someone who supports “hate speech” laws and the exclusion from the campus of one of the largest (and currently best-respected) “minorities” in America[1], it means, among other things, that irony is not only dead, its grave has been plowed under and incorporated into a “fuel crop” plantation.
Regards,
Ric
[1]Oh, you say the prof’s institution does permit military recruiters on campus? My bad. BUUUUUUUUWAHAHAHA!
That’s well said too. Also ironic I think is the emphasis on the consensus of MLA-type conclaves when academic freedom is by definition not really a team sport.
“After one vote that his side lost, Grover Furr, a Radical Caucus leader who teaches at New Jersey’s Montclair State University, called the meeting “a perversion of parliamentary procedures.â€Â
I wonder if he was wearing his Question Authority lapel pin when he said that.
Grover Furr…
That’s too cute.
What a maelstorm of meaninglessness they engage in. Is there a pocket-plane they can be sent to until they reach agreement?
Maybe we need to have a platoon of IDF soldiers rape Ward Churchill.
A straight white male cannot be raped. Check the rule book. It’s impossible.
As a user of yacc and antlr, I’m happy to say thanks very much for the theory. That said, things seem to have gone a bit downhill in the last thirty-or-so years.
On that ReGenesis show that hates America they had a straight white male get raped in juvie and he really didn’t seem all that shook up about it, but it did sort of tip the balance in favor of him electing to undergo a risky brain-invasive surgery.
Yes, Chomsky’s theories work well for analyzing and designing computer languages. For natural languages, not so much.
It’s amusing that so many “intellectuals” fall for Chomsky’s classic argumentum ad verecundiam. It’s exactly the same process by which Hulk Hogan or Michael Jordan get hired to tout breakfast cereal.
Warning: Spoiler.
It really is amusing how they try to play catch-up and wave their hands around, trying to get attention “We’re the authority! This is how language is to be used! PAY ATTENTION! We ARE relevant!”
And people go on speaking and molding language without a care to the self-important poseurs at the convention. Seriously, someone should pay for them to convention 24/7/52 and put forth their postion papers and committee resolutions until they die. It would be more merciful than letting them know that they are utterly irrelevant.
#16 – nicely tied together!
Patrick Carroll wrote, “yacc and antlr”
I see you don’t like left-recursion. Well, we don’t like lefties around here either, mister. So there!
None of those radically pompous idiots actually read the report on Churchill. Not only did they find him liable for 5 seperate instances of either plaigerism or cooking the data but they went out of their way to describe the arrogant, non responsive attitude he took during the investigation. His 9/11 writings are nowhere to be found in the report.
But, then again, why let facts get in the way of shouting The Narrative™?
Ivory Tower Idiots.
To us science folks, the humanities appear to have no standards whatsoever.
Good observation, science guy. They’ve pretty much stopped trying to define anything as “good” and are more interested in that which is “transgressive.” It’s much more fun to laud the naked emperors than point out their nudity (which is rude!)
We can’t figure out how they grade papers,
Not too many obvious mistakes = A
A few typos = A–
Obviously slapped together at 3:00am while still sloshed = B+
Overt plagiarism = A, because you shouldn’t judge students/it’s a “creative”/transgressive way to get a grade
much less evaluate “research.”
What’s this thing you call “evaluation”? They just look to see that you’ve cited the hippest, most transgressive articles published in the last decade, then call it good. Er, transgressive.
‘Academic freedom’ seems to be a catch-all adjective for people who want to get government grants for political partisanship.
That’s part of it, especially in paleoclimatology (oh wait, that’s not humanities?). “Academic freedom” really means that I get to say what I want without being criticized or even disagreed with, whereas you have to shut up and get re-educated, you racist/sexist/homophobe.