more on The Academic Freedom Bill of Rights

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Alexander R. Cohen" <arc () arclights net>
Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2005 11:51:52 -0500
To: <dave () farber net>
Subject: Re: [IP] The Academic Freedom Bill of Rights

Prof. Farber:

You might consider in this context the controversy over Mideast studies
at Columbia. Students claim that certain pro-Palestinian professors
strive to intimidate pro-Israel students. I attended a forum on academic
freedom where the party line was: Israel is wrong, so any defense of
Israel is incompetent and therefore not protected by academic freedom;
students who are upset by this just don't like that professors challenge
beliefs they've never heard challenged before.

Or you might consider the controversy at Harvard over President Summers'
remarks concerning women: Are we really expected to believe that the
professors who want his head would tolerate a student's expression of
the same views?

Professors shouldn't be sued for refusing to teach Rush Limbaugh. It's
the professor's job to pick the texts, and that's part of his academic
freedom. But if you teach the leftist John Rawls in introductory
political philosophy, you should at least be open to a counterargument
based on (or resembling) anyone from Karl Marx to Ayn Rand. If a student
raises an argument that suggests he's inclined in a direction you
recognize, you should be willing to point him toward the authors who
work in that direction as well as your own. And while you're entitled to
teach about the family from a feminist perspective, you're not entitled
to show the door to students who want to argue for traditional family
values--just as professors who teach from a traditional perspective
aren't entitled to dismiss feminist students.

Daniel C. Dennett, the philosopher of evolution and mind, tells a story
in one of his books that when he was a student (an undergraduate, if I
recall correctly), he considered himself an anti-Quinian, so he went to
Prof. Quine and asked which of his critics he should be reading. Every
student should be comfortable enough to do likewise, and every professor
should be honest enough to give the best guidance he can to those who
disagree with him.

Alexander R. Cohen, J.D.
Doctoral student in philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
Adjunct assistant professor of government, John Jay College of Criminal
Justice

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