Why, at Duke are

the students so often the ones who seem reflective and informed, while a good number of Arts& Sciences Faculty are exploitive, self-indulgent, and, in some cases, even mendacious?

After the hoax first broke, the great majority of Duke undergrads were very concerned, but waited for more information before making up their minds.

But lack of information was no impediment to English Professor Houston Baker (now at Vanderbilt). Baker erupted with a public letter on March 29 that included :

Young, white, violent, drunken men among us - implicitly boasted by our athletic directors and administrators - have injured lives.

There is scarcely any shame more egregious than one that wraps itself in the pious sentimentalism of liberal rhetoric as though such a wrap really constituted moral and ethical action. (By “pious sentimentalism of liberal rhetoric,” Professor Baker means what most of us refer to “due process,” “innocent until proven guilty,” and “Constitutional rights.” - JinC) [...]

All of Duke athletics has now been drawn into the seamy domains of Colorado football and other college and university blind-eying of male athletes, veritably given license to rape, maraud, deploy hate speech, and feel proud of themselves in the bargain.

Professor Baker’s letter was widely praised by many of his A&S Faculty colleagues.

It was a faculty “group of 88” who published the now discredited “listening statement” which, among other things, thanked those circulating “vigilante posters” for “not waiting [to make] your voices heard.”

In contrast, a student group and its coaches, the Women’s lacrosse team, said: “Innocent.”

Now here’s the most recent pair of incidents that contrast student and professor behavior, with the contrast greatly in the student’s favor.

First, Women's Studies Professor Robyn Wiegman wrote the following letter to Duke’s student newspaper, The Chronicle :

I read with amazement Tuesday's Chronicle and the opinion by my colleague Steven Baldwin, who finds the faculty response to the Duke lacrosse scandal one that warrants their being "tarred and feathered, ridden out of town on a rail and removed from the academy." [Baldwin wasn’t speaking of all faculty; only some. I’ll get to that later. - JinC]

In a guest column in the same issue as a story about the panel at the law school last Friday, in which many participants proclaimed the over emphasis of media reportage of race, class, gender and privilege last spring, one can only wonder what symbolic world is being culled here and denied all at once?

Being tarred and feathered is the language of lynching, and the practice of lynching was rarely one that eventuated in a court case of any kind, let alone one in which the defendants claim 10 minutes on one of the most important television programs in the United States. My disappointment in Duke right now is that it wants to avoid the analysis of the language and history of race, instead of using this moment-in its broad social implications-to actually study it.

We can all have our opinions about the court case, but the time now is for engaging, as a university, the harder project of cultivating a community of actors who value and perform studied critical thought. Journalism can aspire to that as well.

Today at Duke New Sense, a student who blogs as Hayak responded to Professor Weigman. Here’s part of the post:

In response to Professor Steven Baldwin's excellent editorial in yesterday's Chronicle criticizing the Duke administration and faculty for its treatment of our student athletes, Professor Robyn Wiegman has a letter in the Chronicle today taking Baldwin to task for his use of the phrase "tar and feather":

Apparently knowledge of history isn't required in Wiegman's "community of critical thought," because if it were, she would know that the act of tarring and feathering someone has a long history largely separate from race. American colonists did it as a punishment and a deterrent to British Loyalists and officials, such as tax collectors; see here and here. The practice didn't stop with the colonial days, though; for example, an International Workers of the World (I.W.W. or "Wobblie") organizer was tarred and feathered in 1918.

I don't doubt that this form of harassment may have been used against blacks, but as I see it--and please, anyone with more knowledge of history should feel free to correct me--the term "tar and feather" has about as much of a racial overtone as "hanging" or "mob violence" do--that is, none. Moreover, Baldwin is obviously using the phrase as a metaphor for public censure. […]

It's ironic not only that a professor of literature doesn't understand metaphors, but also that someone urging "critical thought" fails to think critically, and prefers to make a silly ad hominem attack rather than actually respond to the substance of her colleague's arguments.

Making every little thing into a racial offense does not bring the issue out into the open and force us to confront something we may have been avoiding, as Wiegman ostensibly hopes it will.

Well said, Hayak. You did a nice job, metaphorically speaking, of tar and feathering Professor Wiegman.

Folks, what Hayak says about "tar and feathering" is consistent with what’s found in The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms:

"tar and feather"

Criticize severely, punish, as in The traditionalists often want to tar and feather those who don't conform. This expression alludes to a former brutal punishment in which a person was smeared with tar and covered with feathers, which then stuck. It was first used as a punishment for theft in the English navy, recorded in the Ordinance of Richard I in 1189, and by the mid-1700s had become mob practice. The figurative usage dates from the mid-1800s.

I’ve just sent the following email to Professor Wiegman
__________________________________________________________
Robyn Wiegman
Margaret Taylor Smith Director Women's Studies
Professor, Women's Studies and Literature

Dear Professor Wiegman:

I hold two degrees from the university and blog as www.johnincarolina.com

In your Chronicle letter of Oct. 25 you write: “[M]y colleague Steven Baldwin …finds the faculty response to the Duke lacrosse scandal one that warrants their being ‘tarred and feathered, ridden out of town on a rail and removed from the academy.’”(bold mine)

But that’s not true, Professor Wiegman.

Baldwin didn’t say anything about "the faculty response." He spoke about responses by some individual faculty members who engaged in certain despicable conduct which he described.

Read Baldwin’s words:

I do not believe that a faculty member publicly describing any student in pejorative terms is ever justified. To do so is mean-spirited, petty and unprofessional, at the very least. The faculty who publicly savaged the character and reputations of specific men's lacrosse players last spring should be ashamed of themselves.

They should be tarred and feathered, ridden out of town on a rail and removed from the academy. Their comments were despicable. I suspect they were also slanderous, but we'll hear more about that later.

Surely you didn't miss the fact that Baldwin's remarks concerned only certain faculty whose conduct he described. Not all faculty, thankfully, engaged in such despicable conduct.

Why did you fail to acknowledge that, and instead say: "Baldwin ...finds the faculty response ...?"

You'll find enlightening the following information from The American Heritage Dictionary of Idions:
"tar and feather"

Criticize severely, punish, as in The traditionalists often want to tar and feather those who don't conform. This expression alludes to a former brutal punishment in which a person was smeared with tar and covered with feathers, which then stuck. It was first used as a punishment for theft in the English navy, recorded in the Ordinance of Richard I in 1189, and by the mid-1700s had become mob practice. The figurative usage dates from the mid-1800s.

On another matter, I'm told that Women's Studies has made no statement condemning the threats of physical violence and death threats hurled by racists on May 18 at Reade Seligmann, both outside the courthouse and within the courtroom before the judge entered.

Is that true?

I'm also told Women's Studies has no plans to honor a group of outstanding women who constitute the only large Duke group who to date publicly acknowledge it was a hoax and have spoken out on behalf of the three wrongly indicted innocent students.

Is it true Women's Studies has no plans to honor the Women's lacrosse team and its coaches?

I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

John
www.johnincarolina.com