Monday, June 08, 2009

The CCI: Spring 2006

The Campus Culture Initiative was among the most outrageous examples of the Duke administration’s response to the lacrosse case. Launched in the same message in which President Brodhead canceled the 2006 season (and on the same day in which he sent his guilt-presuming “letter” to the Duke community), the CCI functioned as a caricature of what’s wrong with higher education today.

To head up the initiative, President Brodhead turned to a politically correct administrator, Robert Thompson, and the member of his senior leadership most hostile to the lacrosse players, Larry Moneta. (Moneta already had remarked on tape that he didn’t believe the players were innocent, and his record of indifference to student rights he brought with him to Duke from Penn.) To chair three of the CCI’s four subcommittees, Thompson and Moneta then named figures who had distinguished themselves for their extremism in response to the case—Karla Holloway, Anne Allison, and Peter Wood.

Wood’s extremism ultimately proved too much even for Brodhead. The combination of intense opposition from students and alumni to the CCI’s agenda, coupled with the recommendation of Wood’s subcommittee for scheduling changes that would have forced Duke to withdraw from the ACC, led to Brodhead postpone implementation of the CCI’s proposals. That said, te internal record of the CCI reveals a committee whose leadership began with a preconceived agenda, excluded information that contradicted that agenda, and engaged in phony “outreach” whose sole goal was to develop “data” that would confirm the desired ends of the CCI’s leadership.

-------------

The opening line of Brodhead’s initial charge to the CCI, dated April 18, 2006, linked the initiative to the lacrosse case: “Allegations springing from the party held by the men’s lacrosse team have prompted strong feelings and much discussion about issues of race and gender, class and privilege, difference and respect, and campus and community”; therefore, the president continued, “we must use this occasion to take the measure of our campus culture.”

The next week, in two 90-minute sessions, the CCI task force got down to work.

Peter Wood set the tone. The History professor, who spent much of spring 2006 giving bash-the-lacrosse-players interviews to every media outlet in sight, rejoiced that the University had placed him “in a position to tip the balance for groups that are slightly disappointed in Duke, particularly those groups in the Humanities and the Social Sciences [i.e., the Group of 88 and their allies], and build up a strong center so that they are restored and empowered.”

Fellow CCI member Marie-Lynn Miranda got the message: “We fail to highlight the unique opportunities available at Duke (to study race, class, gender, culture, for example) because we’re too busy apologizing for being in the South.” Wood shared Miranda’s vision but didn’t like her tactics, sourly noting that “the South is also characterized by its hyper sports culture.”

Thompson agreed that the committee had a clear curricular charge. Building off the statement made a few days before by Mark Anthony (“Thugniggaintellectual”) Neal that faculty “activists” needed to exploit the case to push through a “progressive” curriculum, Thompson cited a need to “look at things such as course evaluations on courses . . . that deal with race, or ask how many courses we have that deal with issues like racism.”

In other words: Duke’s curriculum would be set not by academic standards, but to accommodate the CCI’s preferred ideological agenda.

Thompson also reminded his fellow CCI members that “events surrounding [the] lacrosse team activated a series of issues that shocked us in terms of our reactions and responses. How could we promote such a climate?” Moneta chimed in that “date rape has been and continues to be a big issue.” Of course, if no rape had occurred, no connection could exist between “date rape” and “events surrounding the lacrosse team.” But even as of this meeting (April 25, 2006), Moneta appears not to have considered such a possibility.

On another front, it was clear, even at this early stage, that the student body’s basically positive attitude toward Duke athletics would be a problem for the CCI.

The committee members conceded that “sports are recognized as one element of the campus community that bring people together.” How could this data be reconciled with the desire of a committee majority to downplay athletics? The CCI never really developed an answer to this question, although Moneta offered one possibility to achieve student solidarity without promoting athletics: more campus jazz concerts! Even the politically correct CCI majority didn’t seriously consider this suggestion.

As the first CCI meeting came to a close, a question hung over the room: “How counter-cultural are we willing to be”?

---------------------

The CCI next met on May 4, 2006. The intervening nine days had been unkind to the group’s agenda. First, Reade Seligmann’s attorney had released his client’s unimpeachable alibi, showing that even if the rape of which Moneta was so certain had occurred, Durham police had arrested an innocent Duke student. Second, that alibi filing included the statement of Kim Roberts, who admitted that she had made the 911 call from outside the captains’ house. And so it turned out that the conventional wisdom of the lacrosse players hurling racial epithets at two black women who had no connection to the party but just happened to be strolling down Buchanan Street was false. Perhaps, despite Brodhead’s previous apology to the “woman and her friend,” the lacrosse players weren’t all racists after all? Then, the Coleman Committee released its report, finding that the players drank much too much, but that they also were good students, with good records of community service, who most of their professors liked, and who had shown no tendencies toward sexist or racist behavior to Duke students or staff.

This clearly wasn’t the sort of information that most CCI members wanted to hear. So they simply chose not to listen to it. Wood, whose credibility had been destroyed by the Coleman Committee report (which found that even Wood’s TA couldn’t corroborate his after-the-fact remembrances of alleged misconduct by lacrosse players in his class) fumed that the committee’s “conclusions” were “premature.” He predicted that new evidence would emerge, since “other issues [were] buried in the report or missing.” The History professor told the CCI that an East Campus Residential Life person would demonstrate the fundamental indecency of the lacrosse players, and that this unnamed figure was ignored, for reasons unknown, by Coleman.

Wood’s scowling set the tone for the meeting. After a long and basically fruitless discussion of the problem posed by alcohol on campus, the CCI adjourned.

Most CCI members appeared to be sincere at least in assuming that they had an accurate picture of the Duke student body (most white male students were sexists and racists; African-American students were oppressed, etc.). And so, for its May 18, 2006 meeting, the CCI invited David Jamieson-Drake to report on surveys of first-year Duke students, which they obviously expected would confirm their preconceptions.

Instead, Jamieson-Drake reported that, in general, white, Asian-American, and Hispanic students were happy with their experiences at Duke, while satisfaction was lower for black students. The CCI ignored the obvious questions from these findings—namely, if the “dominant” university culture was a hotbed of discrimination against students of color, why didn’t Asian-American or Hispanic students seem to notice it?

Jamieson-Drake also addressed other student attitudes. He noted a widespread concern among undergraduates with security in and around campus. An unintentionally hilarious discussion ensued, showing just how out of touch most CCI members were with the day-to-day experiences of Duke undergraduates.

At a time when the local DA was breaking myriad rules to prosecute innocent Duke students, the local police department had established a “separate-but-equal” justice system in which Duke students were punished differently and more severely for various offenses than all other Durham residents, and even Moneta had sent around a campus-wide notice telling Duke students to be more on guard than usual, it would seem that any normal person would have found unsurprising Jamieson-Drake’s revelation that Duke students worried about security matters.

Not so the CCI. “These trends don’t make sense,” the minutes record CCI members exclaiming. Why? “Because Duke is not in a huge urban setting (or near any big metropolitan center) like a lot of top tier universities, so why would students be more anxious and concerned about security?”

In other words: data that failed to fit the predisposed outcome was dismissed. This pattern would occur again and again over the course of the CCI’s existence.

The meeting also spent a good deal of time on the various categories of students that Jamieson-Drake’s survey had detected. Lots of discussion ensued about the negative effects of a group Jamieson-Drake designated “hedonists”—“primarily white and Asian-American men” who liked to drink and party and were only average or below-average students. (Several committee members were confused: who, they wondered, would label themselves a “hedonist” in a student survey? Jamieson-Drake had to remind them about how he had already noted that the labels, including such obviously derogatory ones as “hedonist,” came from him, not from the students on the surveys.)

The Jamieson-Drake presentation prompted a CCI musing: “Why don’t we use this data to determine what type of students we want to admit?” The time had come, according to the CCI majority, to start exploring “what % of our students are unqualified because they are either athletes or legacies?” There was, of course, a third category of statistically unqualified or less qualified students (“diversity” admittees). But the CCI showed no interest in exploring their performance: some unqualified students, it seems, were perfectly acceptable. In the event, the CCI would turn much more attention to the admissions process in fall 2006.

-------------------

Brodhead’s personal appearance before the CCI came on May 12, 2006. Conditions had changed dramatically in the 37 days since he decided to—as the Chronicle later noted—stack “the CCI with critics of ‘white male privilege’” so as “to pacify countercultural professors.” The backlash against the Group of 88 had begun; student opinion had turned decisively in favor of the falsely accused players; and some alumni and donors had started to ask why the administration hadn’t demanded that local authorities respect the due process rights of Duke students. Brodhead told CCI members that he didn’t want to dictate their actions, but he cautioned against their employing “polarizing” language. The “activists” on the committee disagreed, since the “lack of explicit language, such as race, will be seen as a superficial attempt to discuss culture.”

Instead, in this, their final meeting of the spring 2006 term, the CCI membership considered the possibility of going more extreme. Thompson and Moneta already had decided to create four subcommittees (race; gender/sexuality; alcohol/student judicial system; and athletics). But the committee considered the possibility of a fifth subcommittee, focused on the issue of “prejudice.”

Committee members wondered whether “‘prejudice’ [should] be taken out of the Race category and be established as a separate one or not included at all.” For instance, “where do Jewish people fit in?” (Needless to say, the CCI never considered the disturbing problem of anti-Israel attitudes among the academic far left, including many members of the Group of 88.) The committee also wondered whether separate subcommittees were needed to address “LGBT folks,” or “religious minorities,” or “issues of class/affluence/privilege.” In the end, the CCI decided that it “may be OK to put ethnicities [except, it seems, Jews] under one umbrella for logistical purposes as long as everyone [except, again, Jews] is accounted for in the actual fieldwork.”

Over summer 2006, the CCI’s four subcommittees took center stage. Thursday’s post will explore their work.

28 comments:

No justice, no peace said...

Question: Which of the following quotes is NOT a CCI quote?:

1. “Allegations springing from the party held by the men’s lacrosse team have prompted strong feelings ... therefore, the president continued, “we must use this occasion to take the measure of our campus culture.” - Richard Brodhead


2, "...rejoiced that ...had placed him “in a position to tip the balance for groups that are slightly disappointed i... and build up a strong center so that they are restored and empowered.” - Peter Wood

3, "Building off the statement made ...by Mark Anthony Neal that ...“activists” needed to exploit the case to push through a “progressive” curriculum,..."

4, "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste," Rahm Emanuel, Mr. Obama's new chief of staff, told a Wall Street Journal conference of top corporate chief executives this week."

5. As the first CCI meeting came to a close, a question hung over the room: “How counter-cultural are we willing to be”?"

Answer: None of the above, these folks are all cut from the same cloth.

Debrah said...

The committee also wondered whether separate subcommittees were needed to address “LGBT folks,” or “religious minorities,” or “issues of class/affluence/privilege.” In the end, the CCI decided that it “may be OK to put ethnicities [except, it seems, Jews] under one umbrella for logistical purposes as long as everyone [except, again, Jews] is accounted for in the actual fieldwork.”
***************************

And this is the sum total and a brief comical look into how the Duke Gang of 88 and their ilk spend their time.

The most striking aspect of these "initiatives" which have become such a prominent feature of the academy is how every group is assigned a psychological and emotional space on the hierarchical ladder of victimhood.

As with every event, as was certainly the case with their conference back in March, everything is geared toward the black perspective, the black view of good and bad, the black view of right and wrong---which, by the way, is flexible and subject to change when needed---and the black view of how the rest of society "owes".

The other groups serve as mere filler because, after all, even people who spend every waking hour on the take using one concocted grievance after the next know that they must keep up the appearance of inclusiveness.

The requisite representatives of the Asian and Hispanic groups will show up; however, it's clear that this is a black-owned and black-led and black-approved enterprise.

It's bizarre to witness in the year 2009.

People like Sarah Deutsch are intelligent and surely see through this charade, yet they parrot the same things and appear to be mesmerized by the same old narratives that they, like most of us, grew up on.

During our conversation, I mentioned to Deutsch that the black community in Durham needed to engage in some tough introspection and how this one group actually runs the town.

How corrupt it is and how so much crime and squalor are accepted without demands for responsibility.

I rattled off names of prominent and affluent people in the black community of Durham, asking her if she didn't think they knew better, but play the game because it's always been so lucrative.

I then mentioned the names of some of her colleagues and how ill-qualified for the academy many of them seem to be, and then asked if she really believed that they deserved to be teaching at Duke.

She had no response.

Just a blank look as if the questions were so alien to her.

And it is humorous that the Gang of 88 simply do not know what to do with the Jews!

LOL!!!

It's my sense that Jews, for the most part, generally like to work for what they have and produce something.

That must cause confusion for the Gang of 88.

William L. Anderson said...

As I have written elsewhere, the CCI took this as the opportunity to "storm the Winter Palace." Elsewhere, I also have likened the lacrosse situation to the Reichstag Fire, and we can see that the CCI members and Moneta saw this as an opportunity to grab power at Duke.

The most telling item to me is that for all of their railing against "injustice," they were grabbing onto a real injustice as a means of gaining power. Not only were they willfully blind to the injustice occurring in front of them, but I would bet that most of them supported Nifong with their November votes.

We forget the pathological hatred that these faculty members have for large groups of the very students in their midst. One cannot do what they were doing out of respect for the students and their families; indeed, one can do what they did only if they despise those people.

What they want Duke University to become is a place where entrance is decided solely upon one's ethic identity and where students of "improper" identity would be browbeaten in the classroom, in the dorm, and everywhere else on campus. If you want a parallel, think of the Cultural Revolution in China during Mao's reign there. The CCI wanted something akin to that at Duke and would be satisfied with nothing less.

No justice, no peace said...

"If men through fear, fraud or mistake, should in terms renounce and give up any essential natural right, the eternal law of reason and the great end of society, would absolutely vacate such renunciation; the right to freedom being the gift of God Almighty, it is not in the power of Man to alienate this gift, and voluntarily become a slave."

--John Adams, Rights of the Colonists, 1772

I'm certain unalienable rights were supposed to be a part of the CCI - a simple oversight.

Gary Packwood said...

I wonder if Peter Wood knew the ACC is a twelve member organizations along with a Student-Athlete Advisory Committee [SAAC] with the following guidelines:

The ACC SAAC will be guided by the following principles: ethics, integrity, fairness, and a respect for diversity, which shall include attention to gender, race, ethnicity and sport.

http://www.theacc.com/

http://www.theacc.com/saac/what-is-saac.html

There is also an ACC International Academic Collaborative:

The ACC International Academic Collaborative is a joint effort to expand study abroad opportunities and to realize the potential of global collaborations for research and service.

http://www.theacc.com/ot/acciac.html

Thus, there are levels and levels of scholarly, athletic, and cultural programming/collaboration between Duke and the all ACC member organizations.

A MULTI-Campus Cultural Initiative among and between all twelve members of the ACC.

If Wood's committee had recommending withdrawing from the ACC, the remaining eleven members of the ACC would have pulled the plug on Peter Wood and Richard Brodhead with just one well placed press release.
::
GP

Anonymous said...

Is Moneta a Communist?

Anonymous said...

http://www.wm.edu/so/remnant/current/022004/01lang.html

It's happened elsewhere, too...

From the February 2004 print edition of The Flat Hat (William and Mary college newspaper)

It Didn't Happen
What they don't want you to know about the justification for the ATF


By Kevin J. DeAnna
Editor-in-Chief

[After a false rape accusation]
with almost unseemly haste, a “task force” was commissioned to look into alcohol policies on campus. Frat boys everywhere were put on the defensive. Then, to provide an Emmanuel Goldstein for students to yell at, [the accused's] picture was posted on SIN so we could all behold the face of pure evil.

Garbage. All of it. The hysteria, the pronouncements, the Alcohol Task Force, the new rules - a monstrous edifice of nonsense built on a foundation of lies.

(snip)

We were ready to crucify this kid based on newspaper articles discussing eyewitnesses’ accounts and an extremely graphic story about what allegedly happened. The story was all over the internet and we can’t underestimate the kind of public pressure this put on the administration to do something, anything, to respond.

(snip)

Bottom line - the police misled Miss Passaro and the rest of us. Let this be a lesson to hold back judgment in such cases until after the trial - or in this case, the lack thereof.

Without the kind of momentum these stories generated, we would not be dealing with the ATF.

(snip)

The second factor goes to the heart of the issue. Any good conservative believes in a kind of silent majority’ folk wisdom that is not going to be changed unless some extraordinary external catalyst forces it.

The alleged rape was this catalyst: it convinced or at least embarrassed people enough that they allowed the ATF to implement its suggestions without massive resistance. Without the sensational stories and the nauseating charges of “forcible object penetration,” there would have been no motivation to change the existing system so radically.

(snip)

Fraternity members and fraternities at large face increased administration pressure and moral outrage from the ‘community.’ The school currently finds its reputation trashed and its past policies criticized without justification.

(snip)

I call on President Timothy Sullivan to issue a new statement saying that the real tragedy here was that our College and our fraternities saw their reputation dragged through the mud for no reason at all.

(snip)

I have noticed that many of the stories detailing the ATF’s rule changes take a tone of either resignation or even support for the changes. The attitude seems to be that it could have been worse, or that somehow we deserved it. We did not deserve it. We were lied to and we should be very, very angry...

Most of all, spread the word. The ATF is trying to punish you for something that didn’t happen.
. .

Anonymous said...

Why did Moneta even bring up the question of date rape? Even if the allegation of rape had any truth to it (which it did not), it was not ever claimed to be a date rape. Crystal Mangum was hired to perform as an "exotic dancer" - she was never rung up for a date. While there was a claim (in one of her many versions of the story) that she had been slipped something in her drink (one of the mo's of a date rape), no evidence of that was ever discovered.

It would seem that Moneta was trying to further inflame those on the committee by making such a statement.
cks

a Nice NJ Guy said...

to the 9:42 -

Quasimodo ...
The link does not work; February 2004's "Flat Hat" (William & Mary's college newspaper) are not available on line ...

and I have no idea what you are talking about

Debrah said...

A must-read in The New Yorker.

An interview with William Bowen of the infamous Chambers and Bowen report discusses Sotomayor and the role of affirmative action and all things minority in today's academy.

Anonymous said...

To the 9:04

For the last time, Moneta is a monetarist.

Gary Packwood said...

cks 6/08/09 :: 11:19 AM said...

...
...It would seem that Moneta was trying to further inflame those in the committee by making such a statement. [Date Rape].
::
Date Rape was very much apart of the on-campus 'narrative' at Duke during 2006 along with what was said to be the Duke 'hook-up' culture. Both are 'hot-button' issue for grant funded programs originating with The Violence Against Women Act (Federal legislation and grant program). For example, Saturday Night: Untold Stories of Sexual Assault at Duke.

http://www.duke.edu/web/saturdaynight/index.html

There are two problems with advancing that line of fiction. First, undergraduate students at Duke are not an at-risk population for dating violence of any type and secondly, sexual assault is a public health problem that is tracked by public health officials, the recording of which would show up in the Duke campus security report for years 2005-2006. It doesn't.

With respect to your observation of inflaming the students, you are 'spot-on' for an extremely subtle reason.

If university undergraduate students are charged as a group with behavior that they consider to be truly absurd, they will make a joke of the allegations via statements they consider to be ironic or they will use sarcasm to communicate their disgust. That is particularly true if the charges reflect poorly on the parenting skills of their mothers.

Advertising a party on campus with the theme of Executives Sexually Assaulting their Secretaries [Sec's and Execs Party] was actually happened on campus as a statement of extreme irony...which, of course, was used as evidence by the Office of Student Affairs that the 'bad boys are at it again' ...with a copy of the flyer no doubt, sent to Mike Nifong's office. A number of us have a copy of that Sec's and Execs party flyer.

Inflaming the student body WAS the M.O. for the narrative and the reason why a campus cultural initiative got traction ...in the first place. The undergraduate students were being 'set-up' by those on the campus with an agenda.

Fantastic Lies as it were!

And, judging from what was said in the SI article, the kids had not yet figured out they were being 'set-up' for many weeks following the rape hoax charges.

The narrative and the inflaming had to be very well organized and coordinated.
::
GP

Jim in San Diego said...

It is interesting to ask, what would Duke be like today, if there HAD been a rape?

Every administrator would have been falling all over themselves supporting the most extreme of the CCI agenda initiatives.

Those who from the beginning were concerned the accused receive Due Process, GUILTY OR NOT, would have been overrun in the reach for the most extreme reaction.

We know this, because virtually no one within the Duke administration or faculty expressed any concern about "Due Process" at a time it was evident the accused Duke students were not getting it.

It is almost like large parts of the faculty and administration have no knowledge of what Due Process is, or why it is important in our law.

Duke Professor Karla Holloway's response to a question, whether she supported Due Process for the accused Duke Students, was "NO".

Huh?

This astonishing response by a supposedly responsible person with major responsibility for our childrens' lives deserved more attention than it got.

Due Process means "fair play". It means "notice" of an accusation, and "an opportunity to be heard". We have spent much blood and sweat weaving due process into our laws over several centuries.

But, Duke Professor Karla Holloway does not support fair play, notice, and an opportunity to be heard, for her OWN students? So far as I know, not a single Duke professor or admininstrator called Prof Holloway on this fantastic prejudice.

What the CCI should have concluded is something like the following:

(1) "The Duke Lacross Hoax demonstrates the need to make certain all student and faculty have at least the most basic education about our most fundamental legal rights.

(2) Therefore, all faculty and students will be require to take a course, we shall call it "Civics 101", and pass a basic literacy test on Civics.

(3) Those who cannot show a minimal standard of literacy shall be considered unworthy of the opportunity to study at Duke University. And, it goes without saying, no one unable to demonstrate a minimal understanding shall be allowed to have any responsibility for the lives of Duke students"

Lol for the chance this could ever happen at Duke, or elsewhere. Woe.

Jim Peterson

Debrah said...

It's worth noting that NC's former governor Mike Easley, who appointed Nifong to fill the Durham DA slot, and his wife Mary, might end up doing a night or two in jail as well.

Chris Halkides said...

To the Anon. at 9:42,

http://s1.zetaboards.com/Liestoppers_meeting/topic/813809/1/

http://s1.zetaboards.com/Liestoppers_meeting/topic/791685/1/

http://world-o-crap.com/blog/?p=25

http://www.dogstreetjournal.com/story/1693 (April 13, 2004)

http://www.dogstreetjournal.com/story/3253 (date uncertain)

http://www.dogstreetjournal.com/story/808 (October 2, 2003)

http://www.dogstreetjournal.com/story/854 (November 19, 2003)

flathat.wm.edu/2004-02-20/story.php?type=2&aid=15 (Google cache)

I have a few comments on the Kenneth Lang case at William and Mary. Based on the links above, it seems that this story was also kicked around at th liestoppers board. The author, Kevin DeAnna, was the editor of “The Remnant,” according to the world-o-crap site. This same site reported that Mr. Lang admitted to having sex with an underage girl and providing alcohol to a minor. The April 13, 2004 issue of the Dog Street Journal reported that Mr. Lang had been expelled and was sentenced to 30 days in jail. The same publication also noted that “The Remnant” was being sued, apparently by the accuser. The November 19 edition of the DSJ refers to an “assault” and a “sexual assault,” without the word alleged, and this story also discusses a college-sponsored “Task Force on Social Events Where the Use of Alcohol is Permitted.” I wonder if the article by Mr. DeAnna might have appeared in “The Remnant,” as opposed to the “Flat Hat,” unless Mr. DeAnna is also the editor-in-chief of the latter publication.

It sounds as if Mr. Lang was initially charged with more heinous behavior, but the evidence was flawed. I have so far been unable to find a description at Flat Hat, another student publication, or anywhere else. I did find a letter to the “Flat Hat” which disputed an opinion piece there, including the propriety of putting the photo of the accused (Google has cached the page with the letter). Perhaps further research could clarify whether or not the prosecutor was guilty of misconduct and what the role of the accuser was.

Chris

rabbit said...

Unless Brodhead is utterly brain dead, he must surely realize that he botched the Duke Lacrosse affair.

The CCI now only serves to remind Brodhead of that. He's probably racking his brain trying to think of ways to shut down the CCI without making himself look even worse. I'm guessing he wants the whole episode dead and buried so that he can pretend it never happened.

No jsutice, no peace said...

Will Higher Education Be the Next Bubble to Burst?

"...According to the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, over the past 25 years, average college tuition and fees have risen by 440 percent — more than four times the rate of inflation and almost twice the rate of medical care...

...There is a growing sense among the public that higher education might be overpriced and under-delivering..."

".. he proposes that state policy makers conduct cost-benefit studies to see what the universities that receive state support are actually accomplishing..."

What exactly are the race-bating hate-mongers in th race, gender, and class warfare studies accomplishing?

Unrelated it would be interesting to the student loan default rates among both students and faculty coming out of these worthless degree programs.

Anonymous said...

KC, I commend your unstinting work in the service of informing us, unmasking and analyzing these people. This first summary of the CCI is useful. But what on earth can possibly derail the pernicious influence and in some cases outright rule of the 88 and their allies?

I'm a part of Duke and in total despair about what has happened here and what is continuing to happen.

They seem to continue to gain rewards and benefits since their viciousness.

Grant Farred went to an even better job at Cornell.

Thavolia Glymph has a book out that just won a big history award, the Taft Prize.

Jan Radway and Laurie shannon have gone on to bigger and better jobs at Northwestern.

Diane Nelson just had another book published.

The non-book Lubiano just spent a year on paid leave in Prague.

Paula McClane just left the academic council chair after two years and after getting a blunch of her buddies into the council.

Priscilla Wald is editor of a very prestigious journal in American literary studies.

Mark "thuganigga" gangster Neal has been promoted to full professor.

The African American Studies department has hired a new chair from Harvard and is hiring new faculty.

Karla Holloway's daughter has been hired into the physics department this fall.

Srinivas Aravamudan is new humanities dean.

Charlie Piot and Anne Allison went on paid leave for a year.

The list goes on.

I just don't see punishments or even reprimands coming down the pike to them. Maybe your exposure of the CCI will make a difference, but I don't see how that happens because rot comes down from the top.

Maybe your work will find its influence and reward in its contribution to the bigger picture? What else can happen?

Dorothyf

Anonymous said...

I wonder what KC thinks of this essay, "On The Right In The Land Of The Tenured Left".

Anonymous said...

Slightly off topic, but which is the worse crime?

Using political pull to get an academic appointment (Mary Easley)?

Attempting to frame (and jail for potentially 20 years) three innocent students (CM)?

According to the powers that be, it's the first. Easley was fired today, while CM was graduated.

Duke Prof

Anonymous said...

Outstanding post. Breathtaking, really.

Anonymous said...

This is what the CCI members felt comfortable saying and writing in a semi-pulic arena, and it is outrageous in context. What they wrote to each other by email will be mind-boggling in my opinion. Here's to discovery! MOO! Gregory

Anonymous said...

Thanks, dorothyf at 8:00 PM, for reminding us of the rewards that the Academy has rained down on the 88.

I am so tired of some professors who comment here berating the legal system and promoting all sorts of "reforms" of it. Compare how the legal system has handled its malefactors in this case with the way the academic system has handled its own. As I have said, if the legal system was like the Academy, today Nifong would be the Attorney General of North Carolina (and on Obama's short list for the U.S. Supreme Court).

Professors, heal your own baliwick!

RRH

Anonymous said...

Well Dorothy makes a good point. She could have added the new building that African American Studies and Anthropology moved into courtesy of the Deans at the time, Chafe and Holloway who inked the deal prior to their leaving and identified who the tenants of the new building would be.

Speaking of Holloway, since the event she has become a James B. Duke Chair, the highest chair at the university. Since when did people change chairs to higher ones?

Speaking of Chafe, he only teaches half a year but gets full salary.

Yes. Aravamudan has become the dean (Holloway's old job). And his department chair, Ian Baucom with thanks for coddling the numerous 88 members in his department on his faculty got Aravamudan's job--the boondoggle of the John Hope Franklin Center.

Heard of it before? It is the center created by Cathy Davidson and Holloway who maneuvered their pals into the jobs they used to have. You can bet he wouldn't be there without their approval, they still run the place. Cozy, ain't it?

Speaking of apologist Davidson, she has two titles, deVarney Professor of English and John Hope Franklin Center Professor. I guess one is just not enough.

It gets better.

Speaking of Aravamudan, his wife is Ranji Khanna, the new chair of Women's Studies (who now reports to her husband?) after tar and feather Robin Weigman created the newest marxist/feminist department on campus.

And just for the new generation of "scholars"...

Who chaired the committee that hired the 'partners' Sharon Brody and Jennifer Holland away from Northwestern so that the 'partners' Shannon and Radway could take their place? Well, Holloway and Wallace (her former student, now professor of English at Duke) were co chairs of the hiring committee.

And the new chair of African American studies, Matory, comes with such a high salary the Board of Trustees had to approve it.

You can't make this up.

ID
"Inside Duke"

Anonymous said...

RRH
looks like the professors have indeed been looking out for themselves, and the university has helped them along.

Not too shabby a result for these folks according to Dorthy's post.

And as for depositions--well, for the record, don't think it's going to happen here.

But KC will keep at this. For the sake of those who care, he's hooked. And we can all say Amen to his addiction!

Anonymous said...

To Dorothy's and ID's hall of shame, I'll add:

Phil Morgan, the G88 sympathizer who was instrumental in bringing the creature Eduardo ("Amerika") Bonilla-Silva to campus. Morgan is now director of the "Social Science Research Institute." (An institute is a big deal at Duke.)

Sally (Sarah) Deutsch, dean of Social Sciences who, I believe, is returning as chair of history.

Lee Baker is Dean of Social Sciences.

Leave it to Duke to punish the innocent (students and lacrosse coach) and reward the guilty (faculty and administrators).

Dorothy asks: "But what on earth can possibly derail the pernicious influence and in some cases outright rule of the 88 and their allies?"

Speak out in whatever forum you have. The only antidote to bad ideas is good ones. Write letters to the development office, the Board of Trustees, alumni, major donors.

Start an ad hoc committee along the lines of: "Dukies for Quality (non-PC) Education."

Lobby alumni to contribute $.88 per year. Tell Duke that the amount won't increase until there's serious evidence that the PC gang has been de-fanged, and that real scholar/teachers have been hired.

The Catholic Church did not face its abuse crisis until there was serious public pressure, it was losing its moral authority, and was bleeding red ink.

The same lessons apply here.

Duke Prof

Anonymous said...

Dickie Brodhead's style as a neophyte, bumbbling CEO is to overact and inappropriately re-act because he has no managerial skills or experience at all. The CCI is another example of his inept decision-making. Without the oversized ego of Bobby Steel(I am the Chair and I can do whatever I want to do), Brodhead would still be attempting to teach ever dwindling numbers of students and spending hours and hours trimming his "man-patch".

What Professor Johnson describes is a dangerous virus that has infected quite a few college campuses . The carriers of this virulent disease are the G88, their students and counterparts who cannot understand why their guilt-based doctrines are not drawing standing room only crowds of cheering students. So, to create attention,every issue becomes, one of race, gender, and/ equity and the TRUTH is anirrelevant anecdote.

Those faculty who would deny adfmission to athlete, talented musicians and/or legacies and espouse the admission of only students who believe, as they do, that America NEEDS a class war between those of wealth and those who want wealth are frightening to say the least.

If "DukeProf" is correct and Dickie Brodhead is causing or allowing nepotism to occur especially among the G88, Duke University is doomed. There is no hope unless Dickie and Larry and their mob are sent packing.

Anonymous said...

Italy's version of the lacrosse case?? A MUST-READ:

http://egan.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/an-innocent-abroad/?ref=opinion

An allegedly misbehaving prosecutor, DNA doesn't connect the murder to the accused (a young American female college student) even though it would have been virtually impossible for her to have taken part without some transfer . . . and she even faces the same penalty -- thirty years -- as RCD were looking at!


Ken Duke