The uproar about Lee Bebout’s course, English 401, “U.S. Race Theory & the Problem of Whiteness” at Arizona State University, provides the rationale for that course and, I hope, many more like it. Bebout’s course comes, after all, as white people in the United States are, perhaps, finally looking seriously at something they have long turned away from:…
Whenever someone starts by saying that the problems with something or other are well known, watch out. That person is certain to follow with enumeration of ill-understood issues and solutions showing little knowledge of the complexities of the situation—and all human situations are complex. The phrase, “The problems with… are well known,” is little more…
Lee Bebout, an Assistant Professor at Arizona State University, is teaching a Topics in Critical Theory course this semester. From what I can tell, it’s one of those courses passed around from professor to professor based on a proposed theme for the semester, one generally approved by a departmental committee. Bebout’s theme is “U.S. Race…
On February 6th, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst released a statement of a policy change headlined “UMass Amherst Procedures on Admission of Iranian Students.” It ends with this: We recognize that these decisions create difficulties for our students from Iran and regard this as unfortunate. Furthermore, the exclusion of a class of students from…
Here’s a headline from today’s New York Times: “Wisconsin Sees Presidential Ploy in Walker’s Push for University Cuts.” Only to be expected, of course: to his critics, Mr. Walker, in both his proposed cuts and his aborted effort to overhaul the Wisconsin Idea, is trying to capitalize on a view that is popular among many conservatives: that…
“Brian Williams Admits He Wasn’t on Copter Shot Down in Iraq,” says the headline in The New York Times. The newscaster “apologized Wednesday for mistakenly claiming he had been on a helicopter that was shot down.” A decade-and-a-half ago, Pulitzer Prize winner Joseph Ellis apologized for having claimed in his classrooms to have served in…
After my mother died, in cleaning out her house I went through my father’s old books, pulling out the ones that I might find of use in my own writing and teaching. Among those was a dusty paperback of Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner’s 1969 Teaching as a Subversive Activity. I returned to it recently, remembering it from…
Twice a day, a stopped clock is right, right? Sometimes I even find something laudable in what David Brooks writes. Today, for example, I agree with his conclusion–but his argument is so bizarre that I can only surmise he got to a truth through the turning of the earth. As I wrote yesterday, I am moving…