Month: August 2014

Hello There

by Freddie deBoer

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Hey guys, my name is Freddie deBoer, and I’m very happy to be filling in for Andrew this week.

For five years (exactly), I wrote a blog called L’Hote, which I named as a joke based on the fact that before I started blogging, I was a commenter on other people’s blogs. (L’hote, in French, means both the host and the guest.) For about a year or so now, I’ve been blogging under the title Interfaces of the Word at my professional website. I write about everything and anything, but I write a lot about education and education reform, professional writing and journalism as cultures, and artificial intelligence. I have also written for n+1, Jacobin, The New Inquiry, and a bunch of other places.

I’m an academic, from an academic family. My father was a professor and his father was a professor and his…. I’m currently a fourth year student and doctoral candidate at Purdue University, in the Rhetoric and Composition program. My academic work occupies the overlap between composition studies, applied linguistics, and education, with a focus on assessment and testing, second language learning, and program administration. If I’m pressed to name my field, I sometimes say educational linguistics, sometimes literacy education, and sometimes just composition. I’m not really caught up on labels. I care about writing, I care about language, and I care about teaching and researching both. That’s my field.

I consider myself a quantitative researcher, and a lot of my work involves corpus linguistics, computerized textual processing, and statistics. At the same time, I value qualitative, historical, and theoretical work as well. What I’ve gained from studying rhetoric and composition generally, and at Purdue’s program specifically, is freedom– immense freedom to define my own interests, my own methodologies, and my own path. I’m currently writing a dissertation on the Collegiate Learning Assessment+, a standardized test of college learning that is being adopted here at Purdue. My dissertation involves testing and assessment theory, empirical evaluation of piloting results, the history and rhetoric of the higher education assessment movement, and other issues, which suits my interdisciplinary interests very well. (I hope to write a post about the test for you guys this week.) I’m on track to graduate this coming May on a four year plan, and the academic job market is rushing up at me in the coming months.

I’m also a socialist, from a socialist family. In that, I mean that I believe in an economic system based on a societal obligation to secure basic material security for all of its people, and that this responsibility cannot be fulfilled by reforming capitalism. My personal preference is for the implementation of a system of market socialism through the vehicle of a universal basic income. What comes after that, I can’t say, but it should stem from the recognition that economic outcomes are the product of forces beyond the control of the individual, and that the market will never deliver moral outcomes unless it is forced to by society. I also reject the ideas of religion, intrinsic sexual identity, patriotism, and empire.

I have a cat, named Suavecito, and a dog, named Miles, who are both crazy in very different ways. You can see my neurotic dog and my sociopathic cat in the picture above.

I also have a reputation. Because I believe in being direct, and I like to fight, and more I believe it’s our democratic responsibility to fight. So when you think I’m wrong, write me an email, and let’s argue. I’m looking forward to it, and I’m grateful for the opportunity.

Email Of The Day

by Dish Staff

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A reader writes:

I am writing to say that I will miss Elizabeth Nolan Brown and Phoebe Maltz Bovy when their guest-blogging tenure is over. I am sure there are plenty of laments thrown your way about their female- and youthful-centric topics, but I have to say that the Dish has turned into a far more interesting version of Jezebel this week.

I am by no means a libertarian, save in one area: feminism. And as such, I have agreed with pretty much everything Ms Brown has written on the matter. I was bobbing my head throughout her piece on prostitution. And I loved how Ms Bovy takes a seemingly superficial topic like fashion and spins it toward an essay on cultural appropriation.

So thank you for inviting them this week, and you can be sure that I will seek out their blogs to read more of their writing.

It’s been a joy having them on the blog this week. And Phoebe will continue her role as a Dishtern, so you may see her writing again soon. For more on the two women, check out their intros. Read all of Phoebe’s posts here and all of Elizabeth’s posts here.

(Photos: Phoebe on the left, Elizabeth on the right)

A Poem For Sunday

by Alice Quinn

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“The House on the Hill” by Anne MacKay:

A house for summer with lawns and porches,
Edwardian books, adventure stories, the smell of musty closets,
thin mattress over metal springs, blankets with holes,
a cabinet of arrowheads and stones, forbidden
dumb-waiter creaking, they said it was too old,
odor of attics with discarded bureaus, portraits.

I lived with relics of children already aunts and uncles—
a doll’s house, college scrapbook on the shelf,
baseball bats and gloves forgotten in the window seat.

Nothing could change in the days of salt air filling
the garden, storm winds rattling the big windows,
Mother and Grandmother reading in small circles of light,
now ghosts whispering. The house a lost arm aching in the night.

(From Sailing the Edge © 2003 by Anne MacKay. Used by permission of the Estate of Anne MacKay, 2014. Photo by Brian Stocks)

What Can Prevent Campus Rape? Ctd

by Elizabeth Nolan Brown

A reader writes:

I have been involved in student affairs at a college campus in some capacity for over twenty years.  I have some, not a lot of, experience with sexual assault investigations.  Police should always be notified, and it is their job to conduct investigations according to their established procedures.  These types of investigations are not the purview of academic institutions.  On this we agree.

However, to suggest that academic institutions have no role is mistaken.  All colleges have their policies regarding sexual assault and, while the police may not have enough evidence to bring charges, they can determine that a policy has been violated and that this violation merits sanction.  Just because the police may not be able to gather the necessary evidence does not mean that institution cannot address the matter for common good of the college community.

You make a persuasive case for the limited impact (if at all) of abstinence programs of many sorts.  However, simply providing the instruction about how to have sex is not enough.  Young people also need to learn and understand how the male and female bodies work.  For males it is often easy to attain physical pleasure.  For females it is often not easy.  Failure to understand this important difference risks contributing negatively to the emotional dimension of sexual relationships that we too often refuse to discuss.

Another expert on the subject:

I am a college student affairs administrator and work at a private university in the US.  I have worked directly for about a decade with the issues you brought up in your recent post on sexual assault on college campuses.  In my current role, I serve as a “Deputy Title IX Coordinator” (a title that is becoming more frequent on campuses nationwide) where I have the responsibility of overseeing our investigations into reports of sexual assault (in addition to sexual harassment, partner violence and stalking, which all fall under the same policies and regulations) as well as the staff that are responsible for investigations and adjudicating cases, should they get to that point.  As I am at a smaller, private institution, this is just one of the hats I wear as part of my position (which also include oversight of all student conduct issues and other student affairs initiatives).

There are a few points that you brought up that I’d like to respond to.  Obviously, I can only speak from my own experience, but I have issues with the perceived assumption that colleges are acting in bad faith.

Speaking as a student affairs professional, those of us in this line of work are doing it precisely because we enjoy working with students.  We see them at their best and at their worst, after exceptional achievements and after terrible traumas.  In any sexual assault allegation, I have been tasked with investigating, adjudicating or overseeing, and my first concern has been student welfare (of all parties). And the professionals I work with conduct their duties to the best of their abilities.  Incidents are not “kept quiet” for PR purposes, as we have an obligation to the parties to protect their privacy (though there are exceptions which may trigger community notification of an incident).

Also, unless the victim has requested it, universities cannot involve law enforcement outside limited exceptions.  I don’t see why we’d want to change this.  It’s important to keep that decision with the victim and give them the opportunity to make their own decision.

In situations I’ve been involved with, none of the students who have been dismissed/expelled for sexual assault have ever been charged with crime.  This fact in no way shakes my confidence that the university did the right thing in each situation.  Our campuses were safer without those students, something I say unapologetically. What I don’t understand is why people are shocked that these disparities happen.  In conversations with colleagues at my current institution, they can go back almost 20 years and note that not a single sexual assault allegation a student has brought to the local police has resulted in a charge, never mind a conviction (we do not have a sworn police department on my campus and rely on the local PD when an arrest has to be made).  Yet people are surprised when the university is asked to take steps, or why a victim feels more comfortable discussing these issues with a college administrator or counselor who will actually listen and provide options, as opposed to getting poor treatment at the local PD (of which I have plenty of stories).

Which leads to another area of disagreement: the belief that if something is a crime, then it should only be dealt with by law enforcement.  Putting aside the assumption of law enforcement expertise in incidents of sexual violence that I do not share, colleges and universities deal with students who commit crimes all the time.  Underage alcohol possession is a crime.  Two roommates who get into a fistfight is a crime.  Someone stealing a video game from a residence hall room is a crime.  Giving alcohol to minors is a crime.

The list goes on an on, and universities have been dealing with these issues for decades and longer.  What makes sexual assault different?  Is it the discomfort for all involved?  I know plenty of universities, especially “elite” universities, would like to get out of the sexual assault response business because it’s unpleasant, but why would a university provide all sots of services and assurances of a safe community but just stop at sexual assault?  Keep in mind that this obligation to address student behavior is not a new thing, and has been supported by state and federal courts for decades.  There is even a professional association for student affairs professionals who do this work, the Association for Student Conduct Administration.  I’d like to direct you to an oft-cited federal court opinion from the 1960s that other courts cite as a foundation for this obligation, the General Order on Judicial Standards of Procedure and Substance in Review of Student Discipline in Tax Supported Institutions of Higher Education.  It says in particular:

The discipline of students in the educational community is, in all but the cases of irrevocable expulsion, a part of the teaching process.  In the case of irrevocable expulsion for misconduct, the process is not punitive or deterrent in the criminal law sense, but the process is rather the determination that the student is unqualified to continue as a member of the educational community.  Even then, the disciplinary process is not the equivalent to the criminal law process of federal or state criminal law.  For, while the expelled student may suffer damaging effects, sometimes irreparable, to his educational, social, and economic future, he or she may not be imprisoned, fined, disenfranchised, or subjected to probationary supervision.  The attempted analogy of student discipline to criminal proceedings against adults and juveniles is not sound.

I can agree, however, that the web of regulations is becoming incredibly difficult to navigate, particularly at smaller institutions that do not have separate offices that handle diversity and equity, regulatory compliance, etc.  I have become the de facto compliance officer on my campus, because I have a good knowledge of our obligations, speak about them effectively, and my pre-higher education background.  While you listed many of the federal mandates universities are dealing with (Title IX, VAWA, the Clery Act, FERPA, etc.) and one that may come our way if it makes it through the legislative meat grinder (CASA), keep in mind that several states have individiually enacted their own laws (for many of the same political reasons your post assigned to the feds).  At least four states that I know of have either enacted or are looking to enact their own legislation (CA, CT, NJ, and NY).  This, plus proposed increased enforcement, makes our jobs much more difficult.  I’ve been involved in an OCR investigation.  It’s an incredibly difficult experience, and when OCR sets up shop, it makes it almost impossible to do your actual job, because of the amount of time and amount of data they demand.

Sorry for the long-winded response, but while I cannot write from the perspective of a survivor or an accused student, I can definitely write from the perspective of someone who is part of this issue, and being asked to administer it.  Thank you and Andrew.  As a long-time reader, this provides a good reminder to renew my subscription.

The Politics Of Self-Congratulation

by Dish Staff

Thomas Frank bemoans the tendency of his fellow liberals to yuck it up over Jon Stewart’s jokes about conservatives, congratulating themselves on their enlightenment, while missing “a substantial chunk of political reality ourselves.” He points to the example of a recent Russell Sage Foundation study that median household wealth in the United States fell by 36 percent in the 10-year period ending last year:

Now, you can blame the risible, Ayn Rand-reading Tea Party types for this if you like, and you can also blame the George W. Bush Administration. They both deserve it. But sooner or later you will also have to acknowledge that there are two parties in this country, not just one; that the Democrats held significant power during the period in question, including (for much of it) the presidency itself; and that even when they are not in the White House, these Democrats nevertheless retain the capacity to persuade and to organize. For a party of the left, dreadful news like this should be rocket fuel. For the Dems, however, it hasn’t been. Why is that?

Well, for one thing, because a good number of those Democrats have not really objected to the economic policies that have worked these awful changes over the years. They may believe in the theory of evolution—hell, they may savor the same Jon Stewart jokes that you do —but a lot of them also believe in the conventional economic wisdom of the day. They don’t really care that union power has evaporated and that Wall Street got itself de-supervised and that oligopolies now dominate the economy. But they do care—ever so much!—about deficits and being fiscally responsible.

Bring up this obvious point, however, and you will quickly discover what a dose of chloroform the partisan style can be. There’s a political war on, you will be told; one side is markedly better than the other; and no criticism of the leadership can be tolerated. Instead, let’s get back to laughing along with our favorite politicized comedians, and to smacking that Rick Santorum punching bag.

Quote For The Day

by Matthew Sitman

“For me … it’s part of a larger question, which is ‘Why are things the way they are?’ That’s what we scientists try to find out, in terms of deep laws. We don’t yet have what I call a final theory. When we do, it might shed some light on the question of why there is anything at all. The laws of nature might dictate that there has to be something. For example, those laws might not allow for empty space as a stable state. But that wouldn’t take away the wonder. You’d still have to ask, ‘Why are the laws that way, rather than some other way?’ I think we’re permanently doomed to that sense of mystery. And I don’t think belief in God helps. I’ve said it before and I’ll repeat it. If by ‘God’ you have something definite in mind – a being that is loving, or jealous or whatever – then you’re faced with the question of why God’s that way and not another way. And if you don’t have anything very definite in mind when you talk about ‘God’ being behind the existence of the universe, then why even use the word? So I think religion doesn’t help. It’s part of the human tragedy: we’re faced with a mystery we can’t understand,” – physicist Steven Weinberg, responding to the eponymous question of Jim Holt’s Why Does the World Exist? An Existential Detective Story.

Fighting For A Higher Power

by Dish Staff

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The above film, Nahkon Pathom, Thailand, is among the winners of the Smithsonian’s 2014 In Motion video contest. A description of the short documentary:

Women in Thailand cannot become officially ordained buddhist monks; Chatsumarn Kabilsingh, age 68, is determined to reverse this tradition. Biel Calderon’s video details Kabilsingh’s spiritual journey after leaving her job as a professor at a renowned Thai university in 2000, being ordained a full bhikkhuni (the word for female Buddhist monks) in Sri Lanka, and returning to her home country to improve the position of Thai women in religion.

Keeping The Faith Through College

by Dish Staff

Emma Green looks at a study indicating that, unlike in previous generations, a college education no longer correlates with less religiosity:

“The core finding is that the association between graduating from college and religious disaffiliation has changed drastically across generations,” said Philip Schwadel, the study’s author and a professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. For people who were born in the 1920s and ’30s, the godless-college-grad stereotype is somewhat true: They were twice as likely as their uneducated peers to be religionless, not identifying with a particular church or synagogue or other religious institution.

But over time, that trend changed. “For those people who were born in the 1960s, there’s really no difference between the college-educated and the non-college-educated in terms of their likelihood of disaffiliating from religion,” Schwadel said. “And for those born in the 1970s, it’s actually the non-college-educated who are relatively likely to disaffiliate.”

This may have happened for a few reasons, Schwadel said. “The growth in college education may have led to a different population of people going to college.” In the 1920s, only elites attended universities; especially at a time when religiosity was almost uniformly part of American life, it makes sense that this very small group of top intellectuals were the most likely to reject religion. Now that higher education has gotten somewhat more economically diverse and a lot more widespread, though, it seems natural that intellectual diversity at the university level has grown, too.

Somerset Maugham’s Path To Salvation

by Matthew Sitman

I hadn’t realized that one of my favorite novels, Somerset Maugham’s The Razor’s Edge, turned 70 this year. It’s not a very hip book to love these days, but it charms me in so many different ways – Maugham’s sketches of life in Paris, the knowing observations and incorrigible social climbing of Elliott Templeton, and, above all, the spiritual pilgrimage of protagonist Larry Darrell. In the novel, Larry is a military pilot whose jarring and scarring experiences during the Great War set him on a search for meaning – he comes back from Europe refusing to hold a conventional job or settle down and marry, instead pursuing a peripatetic, bohemian life of voracious reading and wide traveling, including to India, where, not to give too much away, he finds enlightenment. It’s a convincing account of how someone becomes a saint, how a “conversion” can happen. Mick Brown, noting the novel’s anniversary, offers some background on its writing:

Maugham may have been successful, but he was far from happy. The jaundiced tone that infects his work reflected his view of the human condition. His time as a young doctor in the slums of London had disabused him of a belief in God. But behind the carapace of cynicism, the search for faith, or meaning without faith, would be a recurring theme in his life and work. “It may be that my heart, having found rest nowhere, had some deep ancestral craving for God and immortality which my reason would have no truck with,” he wrote in his memoir Summing Up.

When in December 1937 Maugham set off for India, on the journey that would plant the seed of The Razor’s Edge, he was furnished with introductions to wealthy maharajas from his Riviera neighbour the Aga Khan, but his steamer trunk was also laden with books on Hindu philosophy and L D Barnett’s translation of the Upanishads. He was in search of more than just material.

Readers and critics have long speculated about whom Larry was based on, with Christopher Isherwood – another novelist who turned to the East for wisdom – usually being mentioned. I’m fairly certain that’s not right; Isherwood denies it, and Maugham, to my knowledge, never indicated that was the case, though the two did know each other. Instead, Brown makes a convincing argument that, in part, Larry was based on an experience Maugham had on his trip to India described above, where he met Alan Chadwick, a British disciple of the guru Ramana Maharshi:

Chadwick told Maugham that he considered Ramana to be the greatest spiritual figure since Christ, and described how he passed his days in the ashram. He spent many hours sitting in the hall with the Maharshi, though he seldom spoke more than a few words to him in a week. The rest of his time was spent reading, riding his bicycle and in meditation. He told Maugham he was trying “to realise the self in him in communion with the universal self, to separate the I that thinks from the self, for that, he said, is the infinite”. Maugham was bemused. “I had thought to discover something of the truth about him from what he looked like and from what he said,” he wrote, “but I came away completely puzzled.”

Maugham and Chadwick had been talking for some time when something curious happened: Maugham fainted.

He was carried into Chadwick’s hut and laid on a pallet bed. At length he recovered consciousness, but felt too unwell to move. Ramana had been told what happened and that Maugham was not well enough to see him. Instead, Ramana came to the writer. “His mien was cheerful, smiling, polite,” Maugham remembered. “He did not give the impression of a scholar, but rather of a sweet-natured old peasant.” For a few minutes, Ramana gazed with a “gentle benignity” at Maugham, then shifted his gaze, and sat in motionless silence for perhaps a quarter of an hour, before asking whether Maugham wished to ask any questions. Maugham replied that he felt too unwell to say anything, whereupon Ramana smiled and said “silence is also conversation”.

You should read Brown’s wonderful short essay, and then turn to The Razor’s Edge itself. And if you still want more, read Isherwood’s terrific article that describes why Maugham’s book is so successful as an account of the religious search, “The Problem of the Religious Novel,” which can be found in his collection The Wishing Tree: Christopher Isherwood on Mystical Religion. I recommend them especially because, like many Americans today, Maugham and Isherwood had reacted against institutional Christianity, yet still hungered for meaning, still searched for God. And they managed to find in variants of Hinduism an alternate spirituality – non-dualistic, less moralizing, and more concerned with practices like meditation – that gave them what they needed. The spiritual life of both men, especially Isherwood, totally fascinates me, because they side-step the tropes and dead ends of so many American religious debates. They offer an account of the religious life that seems new and fresh, reminding those of us who have well-worn arguments about Christianity ingrained in our psyches to see, as if for the first time, why the path to sainthood is one worth treading and what it might look like.