[HN Gopher] Cornel West Releases Resignation Letter from Harvard
___________________________________________________________________
Cornel West Releases Resignation Letter from Harvard
Author : Black101
Score : 63 points
Date : 2021-07-13 19:47 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.npr.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org)
| Animats wrote:
| Harvard still has a divinity school? That's retro.
| neom wrote:
| Do you think the Department of Philosophy is retro as well?
| Theology has shaped humanity, wouldn't it be weird for a school
| as prestigious as Harvard to not have a school for it?
| Black101 wrote:
| Philosophy makes a lot more sense then Theology.
| Grakel wrote:
| Yes, philosophy was rendered irrelevant by the scientific
| method.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| I'm hoping this is sarcasm
| neom wrote:
| I presume it must be, here is a post from them
| philosophizing:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27789493
| hogFeast wrote:
| Most of the ideas within Theology are ideas that went on to
| become known as Philosophy (for proof: Christian theology
| came after Philosophy but Aristotle was regarded as the
| authority on basically everything for pre-Reformation
| theologians, despite him not being a Christian or having
| anything to with Christianity...this also occurred in Judaism
| and Islam).
|
| There are obviously topics that are fairly inseparable from
| religion, for example hermeneutics, but religion is just
| another frame of reference onto all the issues that are still
| important to humans today. Whether you believe that God
| exists or not is usually not particularly relevant, you just
| believe the eventual cause is different.
| neom wrote:
| There are many parallels between theology and philosophy,
| that's why I mentioned it... I still don't understand what
| that has to do with them being passe? There's nothing retro
| about studying divinity.
| pradn wrote:
| It's not necessarily about training seminarians; it's a school
| for research into historical and contemporary religions, and
| not just Christianity.
| brudgers wrote:
| Harvard was founded to train clergy. It is named for a
| clergyman.
| sha256kira wrote:
| And unlike every other Ivy League school it doesn't have a
| graduate fine are art dept. Even more retro.
| elefanten wrote:
| He's a celebrity public intellectual. He hasn't pioneered any
| ideas or theories. He builds departments and plays a ton of
| politics (both internally at academic institutions and publicly
| in the American media ecosystem.)
|
| He's a PR intellectual. He gets way too much air time for his
| contributions to humanity. A boring figure.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| I don't know about that. He's someone I disagree with on many
| points, but he still speaks in a way that I understand. I may
| still disagree, but I find myself thinking that many of his
| points are interesting and/or at least somewhat valid.
| elefanten wrote:
| Yeah I was over the top there. He's smart and prolific.
| Public intellectuals are important, it just feels like he's
| in that class that cares about spectacle over substance.
| robotastronaut wrote:
| There is a growing number of academics who might argue that
| the spectacle can be part of the substance. For quite a
| long time, spectacle (or even advocacy) has been regarded
| as problematic in academia, particularly in the sciences. I
| see a lot of what West does as making "good trouble" that
| gets really important philosophical issues added to the
| general discourse
| foobarian wrote:
| *Harvard Divinity School
| eric_b wrote:
| Yikes, the writing in that letter was not up to par for a
| professor who was seeking tenure at a prestigious university. The
| tone, word choice, layout, everything felt amateur and overly
| emotional. I haven't read many resignation letters but I'd have
| expected more polish and professionalism.
| handrous wrote:
| One takes a rather different tone in a pointed and deliberate
| "fuck you; strong letter to follow" than in a resignation
| letter that's mostly polite BS, as is typical.
| keel1o wrote:
| He's hardly a professor. He's contributed no meaningful
| research in his field and by my own recollection he only ever
| appears when he makes headlines for saving something extremely
| racist, or extremely harsh.
|
| He's a divisive figure and a celebrity "philosopher". A literal
| nobody. It comes to me, and anyone else with experience an
| academia, that such a washout would never make tenure. Even at
| a "woke" academic institution.
| endisneigh wrote:
| kind of ironic that cornel west releases his resignation
| letter and meanwhile we get some new account calling him a
| nobody. at least use your main account to say such things.
|
| anyway - addressing your comment itself. doesn't he now have
| tenure at UTS? Wasn't he also tenured previously at Princeton
| and Yale? hardly a nobody lmao
| keel1o wrote:
| He didn't hold tenure at any prestigious university he held
| professorship. There's a lot of nobodies who get associate
| at these institutions especially in the fields of
| philosophy and social science.
|
| UTS is an absolute nobody school. It's like graduating from
| ASU - no one will ever take you seriously. He's just an old
| bigot going home to roost.
| endisneigh wrote:
| idk why I'm even wasting my time responding to obviously
| wrong things - just go look it up, he's been tenured
| before. he was actually offered tenure in 1993 but left
| because he disagreed with Larry Summers, then president
| of Harvard, at the time.
| failwhaleshark wrote:
| Yep. Sigh.
|
| Haters gonna...
|
| Sigh.
|
| He's done a lot of good as a civically-involved public
| intellectual and debater than most academics do writing
| research papers few people read to "move the needle"
| towards where many things need to go. I sometimes say
| about sales and influence: You can build a viable fusion
| reactor, but if no one knows about it, it may as well not
| even exist.
| sha256kira wrote:
| Personally Im into Cornel West but I do agree that the
| phenomena of celebrity academics / philosophers needs to be
| discussed more openly and critically.
| eplanit wrote:
| The main reasons in his conclusion are: Harvard doesn't support
| Palestine, he's displeased by the level of sympathy he received
| at his mother's passing, and general issues with the underlying
| politics of the curriculum.
|
| It all seems a bit self-centered. Why publicize the letter, other
| than to signal and cue the outrage mob?
|
| The letter helps make the point of how absurd these heavily-
| endowed universities have become.
| whymauri wrote:
| >Harvard doesn't support Palestine
|
| I read this differently. Figured that his point is that Harvard
| is willing to block his career based on an academic
| disagreement surrounding Palestine. Instead of engaging with
| his perspective and providing, well, a collegial environment
| for this discourse, they've undermined his academic career
| (while still benefiting from his speeches, tutelage, and
| instruction).
| underseacables wrote:
| I think Harvard has wrapped itself in an echo chamber and views
| itself as, well, invincible. Nothing can hurt Harvard. Nothing
| can tarnish its reputation. It doesn't need anyone, with the
| money it has in the bank, and I think all of those billions has
| fulfilled the adage that power corrupts and absolute power
| corrupts absolutely.
| x86_64Ubuntu wrote:
| Did you read the resignation letter? It had pretty much nothing
| to do with "corruption" or absolute power.
| freshdonut wrote:
| Did _you_ read the resignation letter? I thought it was
| pretty obvious that corruption - maybe in a less sinister
| form - was the underlying reason for the issues he brought
| up.
| elefanten wrote:
| Given how wrapped the letter is in one-sided rhetoric and
| how full it is of sweeping, dismissive accusations such as
| "we all knew the mendacious reasons had nothing to do with
| academic standards"... how exactly do extract an "obvious"
| takeaway about the underlying events?
| x86_64Ubuntu wrote:
| He spoke about Palestine and not getting enough condolences
| for his mother's death. Neither of those subjects jump out
| as "corruption".
| dmos62 wrote:
| Apathy and politicaly-motivated administration is
| corruption of a collegial environment and academic
| responsibilities.
| lupire wrote:
| It is a bit strange to see a professor of divinity complaining
| about intellectual bankruptcy.
|
| (To be fair, his list of courses taught seem broader than
| "divinity". )
| gamesbrainiac wrote:
| I think some are focusing on his mother's death; it's the straw
| the broke the camel's back but the root cause is apathy towards
| him.
|
| They are however, ignoring the part where he was declined tenure
| for no good reason, and despite being a professor at other
| prestigious universities. He was also paid badly and was treated
| poorly when it came to sabbaticals.
|
| In other words he was sidelined for no good reason. This is sad.
|
| There are some questions though, why did he leave Princeton? I
| mean what difference does it make if you're at Princeton or
| Harvard, they are both great schools.
| smt88 wrote:
| > _I mean what difference does it make if you 're at Princeton
| or Harvard, they are both great schools._
|
| Why do we tell academics they have to stay in one place forever
| once they get tenure? Don't they want to move around as much as
| anyone else? Maybe his reason was just that he wanted a change.
| NtochkaNzvanova wrote:
| > _Why do we tell academics they have to stay in one place
| forever once they get tenure?_
|
| We don't tell them that. Tenured academics do move between
| universities, and rarely if ever have to regain tenure --
| because they negotiate with the new university to immediately
| be at the same status they had at the old university.
|
| If West couldn't swing that, that's on him. West definitely
| seems to be more interested in playing the outspoken
| celebrity intellectual / activist than being a serious
| academic, and Harvard probably didn't want to risk a replay
| of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornel_West#Dispute_with_Law
| re....
| whymauri wrote:
| Exactly. At nearly 20 years of membership and collective
| service to the Divinity School and Harvard College, he's been a
| fixture (from undergrad, to postdoc, to lecturer, to professor,
| to joint appointee, to commencement speaker) for nearly as long
| as I have been alive, and certainly for longer than current
| undergrads have been alive.
|
| If I devoted half that amount of time to an institution and
| received this treatment in return, I would struggle to contain
| my composure. I think the letter insinuates that his service to
| Harvard stems from a love/appreciation for what the institution
| stood for 20, 30, perhaps even 40-50 years ago. Who here
| doesn't feel similarly about their undergrad? Of those who feel
| that way, who else would feel irate if they were treated this
| way in return?
| endisneigh wrote:
| To add to this, ironically the only reason he even went back
| to Harvard (IIRC) is because he has strong feelings for
| Harvard. He was actually tenured at Princeton when he went to
| Harvard. So I can't blame him lol
| chadash wrote:
| > "he was declined tenure for no good reason"
|
| Usually you _get_ tenure for a good reason. Plenty of very
| talented people are denied it for no good reason. I 'm not
| saying that his accusations are untrue, but denial of tenure
| happens all of the time, so the onus is really on him to say
| why he should have gotten it.
|
| I feel like i'm missing some pieces of this story though. Why
| did a previously tenured academic well into his career agree to
| take a poorly paid job without tenure in the first place?
| okareaman wrote:
| Some people are less interested in money and status than they
| are in discovering something original about the Universe. If
| not original, a new take on it. Dr West strikes me as such a
| person. I focused on the part of the letter that says he
| wanted to explore philosophy but they miscategorized his
| endeavors as Afro-Studies. I'd get frustrated and quit too.
| mark_l_watson wrote:
| I am really sorry he was not treated well. He is one of those
| people who I am grateful to have in the world because they push
| back against untrue "accepted narratives." There is so much
| bullshit in the world, from corporations, governments, and almost
| all news media. I look to West, Chomsky, Tulsa Gabbard and a few
| others who I think really say and do what is right.
|
| I have never seen Cornel West talk live - I need to fix that.
| propter_hoc wrote:
| Condolences for his loss, that's always terrible to deal with.
| robotresearcher wrote:
| 'no possible summer salary'
|
| Summer salaries are usually paid for by research funding raised
| by the professor from outside sources. Typically you make sure
| your students are supported, then travel and operating costs for
| your group, then if any funding is left over, you can pay
| yourself summer salary.
|
| Is the university preventing him from raising funds? If he is not
| raising funds, then the expenses above could be unmet. It's hard
| to get tenure without covering your costs.
| derbOac wrote:
| Where I was at, in an entirely different field, it wasn't
| uncommon for faculty to obtain summer salary through summer
| teaching. Usually that was reserved for graduate students, but
| it was a normal thing for some faculty to have.
| robotresearcher wrote:
| backgrounder:
|
| It's not obvious to outsiders that being a successful
| researcher is expensive, and the university does not pay for it
| after a short startup period. Harvard is unusual in that they
| have much more internal student scholarship money than most,
| which helps a lot. That subsidy, and the Harvard brand, means
| that Harvard faculty have a good advantage over the field when
| raising money.
|
| On the other hand, a lot is expected of them. The university is
| considering the opportunity cost, and the opportunity is very
| valuable.
| klyrs wrote:
| June 30th, 2021
|
| I hope and pray you and your family are well! This summer is a
| scorcher! Here is my brief and candid letter of resignation: "How
| sad it is to see our beloved Harvard Divinity School in such
| decline and decay. The disarray of a scattered curriculum, the
| disenchantment of talented yet deferential faculty, and the
| disorientation of precious students loom large. When I arrived
| four years ago - with a salary less than what I received 15 years
| earlier and with no tenure status after being a University
| Professor at Harvard and Princeton - I oped and prayed I could
| still end my career with some semblance of intellectual intensity
| and personal respect. How wrong I was! With a few glorious and
| glaring exceptions, the shadow of Jim Crow was cast in its new
| glittering form expressed in the language of superficial
| diversity: all my courses were subsumed under Afro-American
| Religious Studies, including those on Existentialism, American
| Democracy, and the Conduct of Life, no possible summer salary
| alongside the lowest increase possible every year. Yet I
| delivered two convocation addresses and one commencement speech
| in four years. I was promised a year sabbatical but could only
| take one semester in practice. And to witness a faculty
| enthusiastically support a candidate for tenure then timidly
| defer to a rejection based on the Harvard administration's
| hostility to the Palestinian cause was disgusting. We all new the
| mendacious reasons given had nothing to do with academic
| standards. When my committee recommended a tenure review - also
| rejected by the Harvard administration - I knew my academic
| achievements and student teaching meant far less than their
| political prejudices. Even my good friends in the Afro-American
| and African Studies Department were paralyzed, given their close
| relations to the administration. And after teaching extra
| courses, including five courses in one year, this silence
| continued. When the announcement of the death of my beloved
| Mother appeared in the regular newsletter, I received two public
| replies (just as that of my colleague Dr. Jacqueline Olga Cooke-
| Rivers who received none when her blessed Mother died). Any
| ordinary announcement about a lecture, award or professional
| advancement received about twenty replies! This kind of
| narcissistic academic professionalism, cowardly deference to the
| anti-Palestinian prejudices of the Harvard administration, and
| indifference to my Mother's death constitute an intellectual and
| spiritual bankruptcy of deep depths. In my case, a serious
| commitment to Veritas requires resignation - with precious
| memories but absolutely no regrets!"
|
| Cornel West
| pmoriarty wrote:
| Does anyone have a direct link to the text of the letter?
| whymauri wrote:
| is an image OK?
|
| https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E6JB3QqWQAMCsyC?format=jpg&name=...
| enlyth wrote:
| OCR of your image https://pastebin.com/raw/66mAzqyL
| whymauri wrote:
| Pleasantly surprised by the quality and turnaround -- thank
| you for Pastebinning the letter!
| stevecalifornia wrote:
| His resignation letter chastises the school for not giving enough
| attention to his mother's death-- he only got two condolences.
| Does this strike anyone else as a really strange thing to bring
| up a tally of condolences in a resignation letter?
| yellow_lead wrote:
| Yes. I was wondering if I was misunderstanding what he meant by
| "public replies."
| pradn wrote:
| He means that his colleagues at the Divinity School don't seem
| to care enough about him to send him a condolence for his
| mother's death. It's about the apathetic work environment at
| the school. That would be a problem for me, too, at my company
| if I chose to disclose that via a public email. Hell, I have
| several colleagues that wish me well when I have a cold.
| darkerside wrote:
| He specified public condolences. I don't think it's uncommon
| for people to share those types of messages privately.
| whymauri wrote:
| Especially for a Divinity School, his point is that it marks
| a fundamental departure from the spirituality and community
| that made the school special at some point.
| threatofrain wrote:
| What does it mean to send condolences to a colleague when
| you don't know much about their mother? That carries the
| intimacy of sending someone a life event message because FB
| told you so.
|
| I really don't see that as "spiritually bankrupt".
| ashtonkem wrote:
| I mean, I got more than two condolences from my team when
| I mentioned that my cat was sick, and I think my team is
| smaller than the Harvard Divinity School.
|
| Spiritually bankrupt? Not sure. It's not great though.
| chrismcb wrote:
| It has nothing to do with the mother. You would be
| sending condolences to him. If it's about his loss.
| Presumably his colleagues know something about him.
| fidesomnes wrote:
| Comedy gold right here.
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| What struck me about his letter was not only that
| specifically about the death of his mother, but he also
| referenced the death of his colleague's mother, Dr. Cooke-
| Rivers, received no public condolences.
|
| Whether that is Spiritual Bankruptcy, or merely
| Indifference, I know not, but it definitely reflects a
| culture problem of sorts.
|
| The best workplaces do not involve parking your humanity or
| caring at the door.
| duxup wrote:
| He might think it is apathy, but it's not like we know their
| motivations.
| duxup wrote:
| I don't know Cornel West, but I often find academia and some
| who inhabit it ... sort of impenetrable to understand.
|
| My theory:
|
| Many of them are passionate, and it makes them good at their
| job, but their personalities and their job and the
| relationships with their peers seem almost inseparable...
| resulting in the sort of mish mash of professional and personal
| life that seem inseparable. For some almost everything can be
| personal to some extent... and in some cases I would find it
| inappropriate to mix all that up in the way some (not all) of
| them do at times.
|
| It doesn't make them wrong, but it makes it really hard to
| understand. Such things happen outside of academia too, but it
| seems particularly prevalent there in my experience.
|
| At least that's how I explain it to myself when I bump into
| such things.
| handrous wrote:
| I took it as an example of how fake and political their
| communication has become, and/or how disconnected a "community"
| they are. Course announcement that's easy to comment on, 20
| pointless "that's great!" replies. Something serious and
| personal, 0 or 2 (there are two cases mentioned, not just his)
| because it's a channel for obligatory, performative engagement
| with strangers, not sincere communication with close
| colleagues.
|
| It's probably intended to land best with people who are
| familiar with how communication works in that
| school/department, and the general atmosphere there, I'd
| expect.
| lupire wrote:
| a tweet eulogy seems like an easy peformative act.
|
| likely he suspects that colleagues are afraid to publicly
| associate with him because he is too left wing /
| unapologetically Black / hot topic for Harvard.
| [deleted]
| handrous wrote:
| Maybe, and maybe the other person with a similar experience
| is also to be understood as similarly _persona non grata_ ,
| for those with more insight into the circumstances.
|
| This is definitely one of those "could be full of shit,
| _or_ might barely even be scratching the surface and is
| actually quite restrained " kind of letters. It's hard to
| tell without more info.
| germinalphrase wrote:
| Perhaps, he expects colleagues in a _divinity school_ would be
| more aware and responsive to such a large life event.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Maybe religious people are less likely to offer condolences
| because they think the deceased are in "a better place"?
| klyrs wrote:
| No, the death of a parent (depending on one's relationship) can
| be incredibly devastating. It is certainly appropriate to bring
| that to work, because it will almost always impact one's
| performance.
|
| Is it strange for folks to talk about a newborn child, or
| marriage at work? Conversely, what about infant death or
| divorce? Can you bring your "whole self" or just the good news?
| war1025 wrote:
| > Conversely, what about infant death
|
| Now that I have kids, I think back every now and again to
| when I was in high school and my math teacher's wife
| miscarried fairly far along into the pregnancy. Looking back,
| I'm sure that was absolutely devastating for him, but as a
| class I don't think we gave it a second thought.
|
| I feel bad about that. Kids just have no concept of how big a
| loss that is. Hopefully the staff was more sympathetic about
| it.
| lmilcin wrote:
| I think it is one thing to "bring that to work" and another
| to _expect_ condolences.
|
| Weren't there truly any better reasons to resign? If no, then
| I think Harvard is really a good place to work.
| handrous wrote:
| I don't know if _anything_ in the letter is true or
| accurate, of course, but that anecdote seemed to be
| illustrating a subtle point for people with better insight
| into his school than most of us have, and was definitely
| not the only reason cited (or else it really is just a
| weird thing to mention, which is possible, but, regardless,
| it 's far from the only complaint)
| benjaminjosephw wrote:
| For an academic in a Divinity school, an uncaring but
| professional environment is a dead canary. It means
| something much worse than the lack of sympathy in that
| moment.
|
| But, if that doesn't make sense to you, how about being
| systematically passed over for a promotion because of your
| political views?
|
| It's hard not to see this as being a crappy place to work
| if you put yourself in his shoes.
| [deleted]
| stevecalifornia wrote:
| You are right, I didn't write out my intention clearly.
| People should bring life experiences like that to work--
| probably shouldn't keep a scorecard though.
| Black101 wrote:
| I didn't take it that way, but the news was published in the
| newsletter.
| rdiddly wrote:
| Yeah it's odd. Especially for those of us whose moms weren't
| such wonderful blessed martyrs (eyeroll). Doesn't really
| bolster any particular point either, unless maybe it's about
| careerism in the department, but otherwise seems petty: "My
| mom's death didn't get enough likes." Would've been good to
| expand on the theme maybe. Although that would've incurred
| costs to the current brevity.
| LatteLazy wrote:
| It's pretty standard for West, I remember him complaining the
| Summers (president of harvard) didn't send him a get well soon
| card quickly enough when he got cancer.
| block_dagger wrote:
| I thought the exact same
| failwhaleshark wrote:
| No. It's a signal of the lack of the Golden Rule /
| interpersonal, real reciprocity. I worked at a STEM department
| in Pac12/Ivy that was very family-like. I think that's what he
| felt was missing and turned him off because he's a touchy-feely
| (not John Key-style), warm guy who's a free-love hippie like
| George Clinton.
| throw7 wrote:
| He's playing dispirited that only 2 colleagues made public
| replies while he'd get many replies for a "narcissistic
| academic achievement".
|
| One wonders if he had gotten tenure and received much beloved
| public replies he would resign thereafter.
| iammisc wrote:
| I'm not a fan of West's politics (look up my comment history,
| because it's pretty clear what my politics are), but the comments
| here making light of West's objections seem completely off the
| mark.
|
| Reading the letter I see a few extremely salient complaints:
|
| 1. His first complaint is that he was a token diversity hire.
| Instead of his courses being placed in the general coursework
| section, his courses were put under 'African American' religious
| studies. As many minorities know, this is a way of discounting
| minority viewpoints. No one would dare dream put a history class
| taught by a white professor under the 'European American studies'
| portion. If he's teaching a course supposedly on American
| democracy, then surely it should go under history or social
| sciences, not 'black people social sciences'.
|
| 2. Failure to compensate an appropriate amount given West's
| celebrity status. Again, I don't particularly like West's
| politics, but he is clearly quite the celebrity. It seems he was
| not compensated appropriately, despite Harvard being happy to use
| his celebrity status to further their own reputation. Pretty
| standard employee complaint.
|
| 3. His tenure application was denied despite Harvard asking him
| to leave an existing tenured professorship. He believes his
| application was denied not due to his teaching but because
| Harvard disagreed with one of his political views. Again, as much
| as I disagree with West's politics, it seems incredibly
| disingenuous to profit off of a new employee's celebrit, tempt
| him to join you from a stable job with promises of future
| stability, and then to deny him tenureship because he has
| differing opinions on some random issue.
|
| 4. Despite supposedly wanting a close faculty, no one in the
| faculty would stand up for him when his tenure was denied. The
| fact of his mother's death not soliciting any response was not
| brought up in isolation as other comments claim (current top
| comment does). It was brought up in reference to the fact that no
| one on faculty would dare speak up to the administration on his
| behalf and it seemed like, after tenure was denied for his
| beliefs on Palestine, he was ostracized from his department. Many
| academics know that being ostracized in your department is not
| good.
|
| 5. Furthermore, it seemed that Harvard has a problem in not
| focusing on the whole person. Instead, it's developed into a
| technocratic institution (which I know from personal knowledge,
| West decries).
|
| So yeah, all the people saying this is only about his mother or
| because of palestine are either being incredibly dense or
| purposely deceitful.
|
| Again, I disagree with basically everything West stands for, but
| I agree with him that he shouldn't essentially be exploited and
| then canceled. That goes against every shred of common decency.
| commandlinefan wrote:
| > No one would dare dream put a history class taught by a white
| professor under the 'European American studies'
|
| ... that's because no one would dare dream to have a 'European
| American studies' program in the first place.
| iammisc wrote:
| That's because it's as pointless as african american studies.
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