Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog

Jennifer Ruth, enemy of academic freedom

And she's now continuing her war on academic freedom (under the guise of protecting it) with Michael Berube in a very bad book reviewed here:

It’s Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy, and the Future of Academic Freedom...is a maddening book. It raises many important questions but is so chock-full of unresolved contradictions; gross misrepresentations; and wild, unjustified claims that it ultimately makes you wonder how the manuscript made it into print.

It's a serious embarrassment for the AAUP that Ruth is allowed anywhere near its committee on academic freedom.

Linguistic Society of America moves to adopt the Chicago Principles on Free Expression

Here.   Will the American Philosophical Association do so?  I'm skeptical, but let us see.

ADDENDUM:  Some of the comments that follow make clear that Linguistics is afflicted by the same mindless identity politics that afflicts philosophy:

An interview with Professor Santurri about St. Olaf's violation of his academic freedom rights

Here.

Florida man, taking advantage of new "parental rights" law, asks school libraries to remove the Bible

Exactly right:

"My objection to the Bible being in your public schools is based on the following seven points, offered for your learned consideration," Stevens wrote.

Stevens proceeded to question whether the Bible is age-appropriate, pointing to its "casual" references to murder, adultery, sexual immorality, and fornication. "Do we really want to teach our youth about drunken orgies?"

He also took issue with the many Biblical references to rape, bestiality, cannibalism and infanticide. "In the end, if Jimmy and Susie are curious about any of the above, they can do what everyone else does – get a room at the Motel Six and grab the Gideons," he wrote....

"If you want to teach morality and ethics, do you really want to turn to a book that wants you to dash babies against rocks?" he told NPR, pointing to Psalm 137:9.

FIRE on Professor Santurri's mistreatment by St. Olaf

Here.

PLF letter to California Community Colleges on the constitutional problems with proposed DEI requirements

This is a useful letter, which canvasses a number of constitutional problems.  (I disagree with some of the "diversity" arguments they make against the requirements, but I think the letter gets it right on the constitutional infirmities.)

AFA sends letter to St. Olaf College after it removes director of the center that invited Peter Singer

AFA letter here.  The event itself went off without a problem, despite protests and calls to boycott.  But the center's director, Professor Santurri, is now being punished for inviting Singer and other "controversial" speakers.  What a disgrace!

Florida's Gov. Viktor DeSantis strikes again!

This time it's the brazenly unconstitutional "Stop WOKE Act," described by F.I.R.E. here.  Fortunately, a law firm has already filed suit to enjoin it.

Attack on the universities and tenure in Florida accelerates...

...with Governor Viktor DeSantis (or is it Ron Orban, I get confused) leading the charge.

Another university confused about its purpose: Virginia Commonwealth University

Universities exist to educate students and contribute to knowledge.  Period.  That's it.  They have to comply with various laws (e.g., Title IX, equal opportunity etc.), but their purpose is to educate and contribute to knowledge.  Their purpose is not diversity; if diversity contributed to the pedagogical function, then it deserves some consideration, but it is not the purpose of the university to promote diversity. 

VCU seems to be the latest public university falling down the "diversity" rabbit hole, going so far (at least according to this document:  Download Quest 2028 One VCU April 2022 Faculty Senate (1)) as to insert "diversity" into hiring and promotion criteria.  If so, they are asking to be sued for unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination.

But quite apart from the legality of all this, what is depressing is the fundamental confusion, on the part of academic leaders, about why their institutions exist.

"Mob review" rather than "peer review"?

Last week the Twitter mob panned a book they hadn't read, and now we have this:

The blurb for the book “Bad and Boujee: Toward a Trap Feminist Theology” says that it “engages with the overlap of Black experience, hip-hop music, ethics and feminism to focus on a subsection known as ‘trap feminism.’”

But the book, written by Jennifer M. Buck, a white academic at a Christian university, was criticized by some authors and theologians as academically flawed, with deeply problematic passages, including repeated references to the ghetto. The project was also widely condemned on social media as poorly executed and as an example of cultural appropriation.

In response to the criticism, the book’s publisher, Wipf and Stock Publishers, decided on Wednesday that it would pull the title from circulation.

The incident touched on a larger debate in the world of publishing over when, how, and even whether, it is appropriate for authors to write about subjects outside their own culture....

There is actually a whole academic discipline in which authors write "about subjects outside their own culture":  it's called anthropology.

(Thanks to John Doris for the pointer.)

Close-minded intolerance on campus is largely a feature of elite U.S. colleges...

...and their well-to-do students, and not what goes on at most universities in the country.  Although I've made this point over the years, and while it's a good thing that the problem isn't widespread, that it exists at elite universities, which produce disproportionate numbers of ruling elites, is a bad thing.   Of course, none of this is as bad a thing as, inter alia, the crytpo-fascism of large swaths of the Republican Party; the continuing immiseration of the vast majority in the U.S.; the risk of nuclear war due to the mishandling of the Ukraine situation; etc. etc.

An open letter about calling attention to the open letter to OUP attacking an unread and unreleased book

A propos this (and see also), this response by philosopher Moti Gorin (Colorado State) is pretty funny:

By platforming this letter, which, unlike Lawford-Smith’s book, can be read — having been violently ripped from the realm of the merely possible to the realm of the actual — Weinberg promotes inaccurate stereotypes about unread books, such as the stereotype that they can be understood and assessed. Also, he may contribute to reality-oppressive practices, such as the possible creation of a journal dedicated to the review of unread books. The undersigned, as possible writers of possible books, are concerned, and call for a ban on such possible journals.

The possible risks are real. More troublingly, they are actually possible — some of the writers we like would go further and say the possible risks are immanent. Everyone we like agrees that possible risks can be much worse than actual harms of the sort for which evidence can be provided. This is because possible harms are very difficult to locate. They elude even the most intensive textual deconstruction, revealing themselves only in narratives of lived experience/diaries....

Moreover, criticism of as-yet unreleased and unread books is exactly like cancer: both are bad, both are violent, and both can spread. More specifically, such criticism can contribute to rhetorical violence (which we need not remind you is always-already there) against future, possible, unread books and their authors, or possible authors and publishers, or possible publishers....

And now the "open letters" attacking OUP begin

Yesterday's English professor who doesn't speak English is now apparently behind this letter, whose contribution to scholarly debate and free thinking is to ask OUP for,

[A] clear and detailed account of what measures have been taken to ensure the scholarly quality of this forthcoming publication (while being mindful of the need to maintain reviewers’ anonymity), and what further steps the Press is taking to make itself accountable for the consequences of its publication should the book go forward to print. Measures the press could undertake to offset the harm done by the publication of this work might include soliciting and publishing trans-affirming scholarship by transgender authors, updating the house style guidelines to include specific guidance on language around transgender rights, donating a portion of the book’s profits to supporting transgender rights organizations, and/or developing editorial guidelines for the submission of works that challenge the human rights of any marginalized group. We recommend that these steps for accountability be undertaken in consultation with transgender rights activists and transgender scholars. We hope that this process can help guide OUP in editorial directions that affirm trangender peoples’ humanity and rights.

Of course, it is quite normal to demand that an academic press account for the publication of a book that none of the critics have read.   I do hope OUP will ignore this little tantrum by the thought police.

University of Illinois requiring "diversity" statements for tenure and promotion

Biologist Jerry Coyne (Chicago) has details.  Some University of California campuses have similar requirements.  As with the "diversity" statements required for appointment, they are almost certainly unconstitutional.  If you teach at a state school, and have been denied tenure or promotion for failing to express the required views, I can put you in touch with a public interest attorney who is looking to mount a constitutional challenge to these illegal programs.

OUP publishing a book="organized violence"

Thus spake this English professor in Canada, who apparently doesn't know what words mean:

If only Hitler had realized that a book could constitute "organized violence," he could have just published his way to the Third Reich.   Naturally, the University of California professor who flagged this for me said,

I hate to have to add that, if you say anything about this on your blog, I’d be grateful if you didn’t mention my name. My husband is still working at [our UC campus], which, as you know, is a hotbed of Diversity etc. I am looking forward to his retiring so I can speak my mind about the [insert expletives here] mess we’re in with regard to gender and biological sex.

The academy, or at least some campuses, are in a "mess" if faculty don't feel they can object in public to stark-raving idiocy like the tweet, above.

UPDATE:  An alert reader points out to me this extraordinary response on Twitter:

The latest U of Florida mess: English professor sues university for violating his First Amendment rights during Covid crisis

Story here.

A proposed academic freedom law in Quebec

This sounds like the right approach:

The Quebec government says university professors should be able to use any words they deem necessary in the classroom, provided those words are used in an academic context and meet standards of ethics and science.

(Thanks to David Zimmerman for the pointer.)

Sanction Russian institutions, not individuals

A statement from Russian academics at the Free University of Moscow.

More on the attack on academic freedom and intellectual standards at the Royal Society of New Zealand

A propos this incident from last fall, biologist Jerry Coyne (Chicago) has the latest.  It looks like sanity is gradually prevailing.

Academic freedom crisis continues at the University of Florida

Dr. Lapido, the Surgeon General for the crypto fascist Governor DeSantis, was appointed to the University of Florida medical school faculty through a rather dubious process:  Download UF Ladapo Final Report 3-30-22

AFA letter to Princeton regarding its continued attacks on its own faculty member, Prof. Katz in classics

Here.

The hosts of "Brain in a Vat" reflect on the Kershnar case and free expression

Here.

University of Montreal responds correctly to petition attacking professor for expressing "incorrect" views about Russia and Ukraine

Sometimes schools do get it right.

(Thanks to Stephen Rive for the pointer.)

Gillman & Chemerinsky: student hecklers are bad for free speech on campus, state legislatures quite a bit worse

Exactly right.  It's no surprise that the crypto-fascists in America ignore the Repug war on academic freedom and free speech; it's more disheartening when those on the putative "left" whitewash the bad behavior by students on campus (e.g.).  As Professors Gillman and Chemerinsky write:

The student protestors and their allies would undoubtedly make the case that they are opposing truly bad ideas while the Republican legislators are opposing important ideas. But that is not how censorship works. Once one grants that administrators and other officials should have the authority to censor and punish bad ideas, there is no predicting who will be the target of such repression.

Philosophy thought police, redux

Philosopher Raja Halwani (School of the Art Institute, Chicago) discusses the reaction he got from some of the usual suspects (plus some new would-be censors, like Alex Bryant [British Columbia]) when he decided to include an essay by philosopher Kathleen Stock in his well-known Philosophy of Sex anthology.  Professor Halwani provides an admirably patient dissection of the objections.

Iranian translator of Locke's "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" refuses award in Iran in protest of censorship

Story here; an excerpt:

An Iranian mathematician and philosoph[er]...has rejected his award for the country's book of the year "in protest at censorship" in Iran.

Kaave Lajevardi said in a post on his blog on March 15 that he informed officials of his decision after being named as the joint winner of the prize for his translation of John Locke's book "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding."

Lajevardi, who studied at the University of Toronto but returned to live in Tehran, said that while his book had not been subject to censorship, that "does not prevent me from seeing the terrible dominance of censorship in publishing" and "the violation of the civil rights of translators, authors and publishers."

"By my own decision, I do not accept this particular award in order to challenge more broadly than ever before the very common and completely irrational and possibly illegal censorship routine...of which the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance is one of the main custodians," he said in his post.

The publication of any artistic or cultural work in Iran, including books and films, is done only with the permission of the ministry or other government institutions.

(Thanks to Mousa Mohammadian for the pointer.)

The "moral hyperthermia" of the academy (with special reference to anthropology)

Some good points in this CHE essay by an anthropologist (although I could have lived witihout the references to Luhmann and Sloterdijk):

For the last decade or so, we have witnessed a period of renewed moral activism — think Occupy Wall Street, the Black Lives Matter movement, and #MeToo, to say nothing of student demands for safe spaces and a heightened sensitivity to potentially offensive expression. Campus monuments honoring slave owners, perpetrators of genocide, colonialists, and racists are removed; department buildings and ethnographic film festivals are renamed. My own field of anthropology has been in no way immune from the generalized sense of renewed moral exigency. In 2020, the American Anthropological Association officially institutionalized its members’ morals by prioritizing proposals for executive sessions that promote anti-imperialism, anti-ableism, anti-transphobia, etc. American cultural anthropology is now a moral-political project invested in promoting the values of progressives in the United States rather than in observing and reflecting on human life in a less ethnocentric fashion....

The backlash to U Mass/Boston's proposal to cease being a university in favor of becoming an "anti-racist" institution

We noted this embarrassment previously (here and here), and now CHE has an article:

An early draft of the statement, which would commit the university to becoming “an anti-racist and health-promoting institution that honors and uplifts the cultural wealth of our students,” has drawn sharp criticism both on and off campus, even as some applaud the effort.

As of March 11, some 75 faculty members at the university had signed an open letter of opposition written by some colleagues from the College of Science and Mathematics, which called the draft statement “deeply flawed in content, direction, and representation.” The letter argues that “the fundamental role of the public university can neither be political nor ideological activism.” A growing number of supporters from other colleges have also signed the letter of opposition online. A Boston Globe column characterizing the draft as reeking of “woke indoctrination,” has added fuel to the conflict.

An "open letter" from Professor Corlett at San Diego State regarding the allegations about his teaching

Professor Corlett kindly shared this letter regarding the events that led San Diego State University to violate his academic freedom:  Download Corlett Open Letter

Yale's "diversity and inclusion" initiative

It's really quite dramatic in its scope, and while some of the initiatives are probably just public relations, and some are probably salutary, some others look like they may affect academic freedom. 

For example, the plan for Yale Arts & Sciences includes an initiative to "increase curricular breadth for addressing racism and supporting DEI and belonging."   Race and racism are scholarly topics in many fields, but each discipline needs to decide, according to its disciplinary standards, whether "race" and "racism" are suitable units of analysis, and, if they are, whether faculty have any interest in teaching and research in those areas.  Will this initiative respect those essential elements of academic freedom, or will there be an expectation that every department must "increase curricular breadth for addresing racism"?

University of Missouri finds new way to undermine tenure: claims authority to cut salaries of tenured faculty by up to 25%...

...based on productivity or enrollments.   This will end badly.

AFA letter to San Diego State University regarding its violation of Professor Corlett's contractual and constitutionall rights

Excellent letter, as usual.  It's impressive how quickly the AFA got this letter out, since they only learned of this incident yesterday.   Having an efficient academic freedom watchdog is more important than ever in the United States, and those of us in the academy are all indebted to the work of the Academic Freedom Alliance.

More on the violation of Professor Corlett's academic freedom at San Diego State University

Regarding the story earlier today, a reader points out that just last month, Professor Corlett was (correctly) outspoken in opposition to a proposal to mandate that all faculty include an acknokwledgment of native peoples on their syllabi:

In 2019, the Senate approved a resolution that created a land-acknowledgement statement recognizing that the university’s campus exists on the ancestral land of the Kumeyaay. The next year, the Senate voted to require faculty members to include the land statement in their course syllabi....

The acknowledgment takes two forms, an abbreviated statement and a full version. The abbreviated version reads: “For millennia, the Kumeyaay people have been a part of this land. This land has nourished, healed, protected and embraced them for many generations in a relationship of balance and harmony. As members of the San Diego State University community we acknowledge this legacy. We promote this balance and harmony. We find inspiration from this land; the land of the Kumeyaay"....

J. Angelo Corlett, a professor of philosophy and ethics, was at the Senate meetings where the land acknowledgment and syllabi policy were discussed. He says Senate policy is very clear in stating faculty members are entitled to their own beliefs and shouldn’t be forced to include anything in their course syllabi.

San Diego State University violates academic freedom of philosophy professor for mentioning racial epithets in a course on racism!

This is remarkable:

The...incident involves J. Angelo Corlett, a tenured philosophy professor who last week was relieved of his duties teaching two courses, one on critical thinking, the other on race and racism.

Corlett told the San Diego Union-Tribune he used an informational slide in both classes that listed 10 to 12 epithets that have been used against Black, Hispanic, Latino, Asian and white people.

"You have to mention the words in order to explain why they are racist and should not be used," said Corlett, a 63 year-old Latino. "Some students are confused about what counts as racism. And some are more concerned about being offended than learning about the logic and science of language...."

AFA letter to Concordia U in Wisconsin over possible sanction of philosophy professor...

...for criticizing the university.

Major violation of academic freedom at the University of Washington

A major donor to the University of Washington has withdrawn an endowment supporting a chair and program in Israel studies because the current holder criticized Israel!  Some details:

The University of Washington has put its five-year-old Israel Studies Program on hold after a major donor, angry about a professor’s criticism of Israel, took her money back.

Becky Benaroya, a prominent Seattle philanthropist, gave $5 million in 2016 to create the program. But after a professor who held the Jack and Rebecca Benaroya Endowed Chair in Israel Studies was among hundreds of Jewish studies and Israel studies professors to sign a widely circulated statement criticizing Israel last year, Benaroya became concerned about what was happening in the program she had funded.

She requested months of meetings with the professor, Liora Halperin, and university officials to discuss her views on the program’s direction. Those meetings — which also included a representative of the pro-Israel advocacy group StandWithUs, according to a person familiar with them — culminated in the university returning the entire endowment to Benaroya earlier this year.

 

Recalling the McCarthy Era attacks on academic freedom and the First Amendment

Philosopher Benjamin Mitchell-Yellin (Sam Houston State) recalls his grandfather's experience, which recent developments in Texas make worth remembering.

U.S. Free Speech Union on events at the University of Florida

Here, including a discussion of the devastating federal court opinion.   We saw this pattern in the Title IX context too:  judges are generally mystified by what passes for "process" at universities!

More on U Mass/Boston's proposed "mission statement"

Philosopher Steven Levine (U Mass/Boston) comments on Twitter on the proposal we noted previously:

The first line of my University's proposed mission is "to becoming an anti-racist and health-promoting institution." Not as side effects of our mission to pursue research and teach students, but as the mission itself.

The mission also involves the fact that we will—and I quote—"hold ourselves and each other accountable to ensure these values drive all decision-making in research, pedagogical innovations, resource allocation, and the development of policies and practices."

Those who work on purely theoretical issues in the sciences and elsewhere have been defined out of the mission. According to this passage, they will, in not directly forwarding these values in their work, be held 'accountable' for this.

We will, I think, deeply regret the social instrumentalization of the University. Many faculty think they are forwarding justice and pluralism by supporting this mission, when what they are really advancing is administrative and intellectual centralization.

U Mass/Boston adopts new "mission statement"

The shorter version:  "We are no longer a university."

AFA Statement on the attack on tenure and academic freedom in Texas

Here.

More thoughts on academic freedom and offensive speech by faculty

Georgetown law professor Paul Butler calls for a newly hired colleague, Ilya Shapiro, to be fired for an offensive tweet, but offers no account of academic freedom or its limits.  (A faculty letter organized by F.I.R.E. correctly noted that it would violate AAUP academic freedom rules to fire Shapiro. See also.)  As mathematician Craig Larson (Virginia Commonwealth) wrote to me,

[Butler] thinks his colleague should be fired over a tweet. He never states any principle that might be discussed, but implies something like: "If you tweet something that is offensive to some group of students, making it *impossible* to teach that group of students, then you should be fired".

That he hasn't thought this through is easy to see: the principle could equally be applied to evolutionary biologists who ever say that the bible account of creation is false, to cartesian physcists who are offended by those upstart newtonians, to Peter Singer, etc, etc.

Anyone with a different view from a professor might claim that it is *impossible* to learn from some professor. Maybe Butler thinks professors shouldn't have any extra-mural opinions?

Former Vice-Provost at Penn supports violation of AAUP academic freedom principles

Anita Allen (Penn) is a distinguished legal scholar and philosopher, whom I greatly respect, which makes her remarks here all the more shocking.  She is clear that she is expressing only her "own opinion," but given that she was a highly-regarded Vice Provost at Penn for many years, one can only worry about the future of academic freedom at Penn if the university and its Faculty Senate embrace her views.

Although Professor Allen notes that Penn is committed to the AAUP academic freedom principles, what she proposes is a clear violation of those principles, in particular, the principle that "[w]hen [faculty] speak or write as citizens, they should be free from institutional censorship or discipline."  By contrast, Professor Allen proposes that faculty can be sanctioned (perhaps even terminated) for speech that:

(1)  "poses a significant hazard to the interests of [the academic] community or its express academici and moral values" (around 13 minutes);

(2)  poses "a significant hazard to the community or its core values, such as equity, inclusion, and diversity" (around 19:30)

(3)  "ha[s] a negative impact on recruitment and retention of diverse faculty, students and staff" (around 21:30)

(4)  "repeatedly requires onerous extra, highly stressful work by administrators due to students', parents', colleagues', staff's, alums' and others concerns and complaints" (around 21:30).

She also states that while "dissent" is "rarely sufficient grounds for termination" (rarely?), dissenting views that are "highly offensive and hurtful to students, colleagues or staff," as well as racist, sexist, homophobic, and discriminatory speech may be sufficient (around 26 minutes).

Fascist Lt. Governor of Texas Dan Patrick wants to end tenure, and ban teaching of "Critical Race Theory" in higher education

This really is becoming the McCarthy Era all over again, except that there is no foreign power committed to the CRT bogeyman:

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick is proposing to end tenure for new hires at Texas public universities and making the teaching of critical race theory a cause for tenure revocation. He said tenure should also be reviewed annually.

Currently state law says tenured faculty are subject to a performance evaluation “no more often than once every year, but no less often than once every six years.”

The goal is to eliminate tenure at all public universities in Texas, Patrick said during a Friday news conference. The issue will be a “top priority” and a subject of interim hearings as lawmakers prepare for the 88th Legislative Session that starts in January.

Peter Singer event at St. Olaf College goes off successfully

Professor Edmund Santurri, the Director of the College's Institute for Freedom and Community (which hosted the event), kindly shared the link for the event, for those interested.  (Earlier coverage.)

A good refutation of a rather feeble piece on universities and free speech...

...by philosopher Michael Veber (East Carolina U) in CHE.  Discovery of truth is central to the justification of academic freedom and free speech in universities.

(Thanks to Andrew Beck for the pointer.)

Philosopher in Belarus on hunger strike after being imprisoned for his views

Belarus, ruled by an authoritarian gangster, has imprisoned philosopher Uladzimir Matsekavich.  PEN international has issued a strong statement in support, and there is also a petition in his support.  We are dealing here with gangsters, of course, so only worldwide condemnation might embarrass the Belarusian authorities. 

(Thanks to Peter Singer for the pointer.)

Here we go again: St. Olaf students protest Peter Singer's virtual talk at their college

At least they only want the talk "boycotted" rather than cancelled, although they also want a commitment that the college will not invite speakers with incorrect views again.  (The misuse of the category "hate speech" is particularly remarkable:  nothing they quote from Singer would qualify as "hate speech" in any democracy with actual "hate speech" laws.)

(Thanks to Justin Garson for the pointer.)

"Philosophers at risk" visiting scholar opportunity at Cornell

Details here:  

The visiting position is for a duration of 2–4 months, anytime during the academic year at Cornell. The fellowship provides air-travel expenses; a stipend of $7,000–$9,000 (depending on duration of stay); assistance with US visa application; full access to library and other scholarly resources at Cornell; and other, informal, academic assistance as may be needed. The visiting fellow will be hosted by the Sage School of Philosophy at Cornell....

Eligible applicants include those "at serious risk of political, ethnic, or religious harassment or persecution in their country of residence," among other eligibility requirements.  U.S. residents are not eligible (even if, like Professor Kershnar at Fredonia, they are targets of political persecution for their research).