I'm sorry to post my message on XCMA twice (my mistake in forwarding) but
I'm glad that Tony finally joins the list where he belongs :-) Tony, see
guidelines how to join XMCA at
http://communication.ucsd.edu/MCA/Mail/index.html
Thanks for you bring the issue of "separate but equal" here. I think it is
very relevant for our discussion. BROWN v BD of ED has been cited several
times by the participants of the discussion.
Let me briefly address your concerns that you see in my approach to the Daly
case.
I think your reference to "separate but equal" in regard to my approach is
legitimate. My reading the history of BROWN v BD of ED (and I'm not very
knowledgeable about it) is that the "separate but equal" argument supporting
racial segregation in education did NOT pass the test of equality in access
for education. This is exactly my point.
One outcome of BROWN v BD of ED was to believe (in a wide US society) that
any segregation is a bad thing. It is historically a very understandable
reaction to the tragedy of racial segregation. However, I agree with Philip
who wrote,
> Paul mentioned the case of Brown vs. Board of education -
> and while
> laws legitimizing segregation were certainly struck down, other unexpected
> consequences occurred - the high rate of black students relegated to
> special education classes, tracked into low skill remediation classes, and
> high rates of suspensions and explusions. some black have lamented the
> passing of all black schools, noting that while those schools did suffer
> from a lack of resources, at least the life story of the children was
> honored. Ogbu's work demonstrating the demoralizing effects of belonging
> to a despised class of people within systems controlled by
> self-privileging groups certainly gives one pause to consider that laws
> espousing equality don't always lead to equality. in truth, many blacks
> did not benefit from the ruling that desegrated schools.
>
I think that segregation should be considered contextually, functionally,
and historically rather than in an universal way. Forced mixing of people
based on bureaucratic mechanical principle may do a lot of harm as well
(i.e., like segregation did). By the way, Delaware is a nice example. With
forced desegregation, Black college was destroyed.
Please, do not take me wrong -- I do not argue for going back in
establishing institutional segregation but for going forward in promoting
diversity of educational settings some of which allow forms of segregation
with equity in access.
I think in desire to strike the "bad guys" (e.g., racists, sexists,
religious and non-religious fanatics) there was too much an assault on human
freedom in regard to segregation. Official and unofficial, tacit or covered
segregation does exist in education (e.g., sport education). For example,
there are all-male and all-female basketball college teams. No big deal. If
somebody wants to create mixed gender basketball team -- fine. Some
segregation is very bad, some is OK, but some is very good for all the
participants. I think we, as a society, should learn how to manage
segregation institutionally in multiple ways rather than only outlaw it.
Unless I don't know (or understand) something , I do not see how Mary Daly
blocked the male student's access to education. I think this matter is
judging whether segregation in this specific case is good or bad thing.
Mary's justifications of her teaching method using segregation seem very
reasonable for me as well.
What do you think?
Eugene
PS I think Vivien Parley's book "You can't say you can't play" can be very
relevant for our discussion.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tony Whitson [mailto:twhitson@UDel.Edu]
> Sent: Monday, August 09, 1999 12:41 PM
> To: ematusov who-is-at UDel.Edu; XMCA
> Cc: Leda Echevers; Pablo Chavajay; Cathy Angelillo; Cindy (Lucinda)
> Pease-Alvarez; John St. Julien; Layne St. Julien; David Blacker; Renee
> Hayes
> Subject: Re: academic freedom
>
>
> First: Thank you, Eugene, for including me on this. Now that my summer
> classes are over and I've finally emancipated myself from PINE
> mail, I think
> it's time for me to join XMCA as a subscriber. Please let me
> know how to do
> this.
> As for your cogent thoughts on this topic,
> -- first, a quick note on your own response (#4 below): there's a problem
> with this idea that is especially salient to us in the US, since your
> response would ostensibly allow the "separate but equal" solution
> adopted by
> a number of states (including Delaware, as a matter of practice) until the
> US Supreme Court found in 1954 that in some situations -- particularly
> racial segregation in education -- "separate" would not be "equal" in
> reality, and would therefore violate the "Equal Protection" clause of the
> 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. (Before BROWN v BD of ED, a number
> of cases dealt with state schemes to provide "access" for minorities to
> separate courses in law, medicine, etc.) I think this suggests that the
> question of "access" may be more problematic than might appear from your
> proposal.
> -- second, a more general observation (please note that I have
> not seen the
> other posts in this thread, so I am commenting on the positions
> as described
> by Eugene, without commenting on the earlier posts or in Eugene's
> rendering
> of their positions):
> I see these positions as derived from 3 conceptions of social
> justice in
> general, without sufficient attention to what there is about pedagogy, in
> particular, that might be especially important in this case. Eugene's
> characterization of Jay's position refers to the "particularities of
> instructor-student interaction," but embraces the model of "voluntary
> contract" in terms that apply as well to any other voluntary association.
> Eugene also refers to Mary B.'s explanation that there are "good
> pedagogical
> reasons for having all-women classes," but again sees her
> position as one of
> "prioritizing access," or "extra favor" for members of oppressed groups,
> again in terms that could apply as well to health care, electoral
> representation, or any other element of social justice in general.
> Not that there's anything wrong with social justice in general, of
> course; but as long as we discuss the question in these terms it
> is unlikely
> that we will go beyond adding our voices in support or criticism of
> positions that have long been well-articulated by political philosophers,
> social activists, and others who are not especially attuned to the
> particular requirements and consequences of the pedagogical
> relationships at
> issue here.
> I'm not prepared just now to stake out my own position on the Mary Daly
> question, but I expect it would be one in which Mary B's "good pedagogical
> reasons" would play an essential part.
> The concern that I'm expressing here is not just one of looking for a
> dialectical role for educators & education theorists/scholars/researchers.
> I do believe, however, that I have seen over and over again that issues in
> education are debated publicly in terms of general social principles, and
> without regard to the principles of education, in particular, that are at
> stake. I have certainly seen this in judicial deliberation over First
> Amendment issues in curriculum, which is one of my own areas of
> scholarship.
> And so, it is what I find missing from the public discourse that
> leads me to
> care about the role that educators should be particularly qualified to
> perform, in gaining recognition for the crucial principles of
> education, in
> particular, that are at issue in these questions.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Eugene Matusov <ematusov who-is-at UDel.Edu>
> To: XMCA <xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu>
> Cc: Leda Echevers <ledita who-is-at UDel.Edu>; Pablo Chavajay <pacha@cats.ucsc.edu>;
> Cathy Angelillo <angelill who-is-at cats.ucsc.edu>; Cindy (Lucinda) Pease-Alvarez
> <Brainleft who-is-at aol.com>; John St. Julien <stjulien@UDel.Edu>; Tony Whitson
> <twhitson who-is-at UDel.Edu>; Layne St. Julien <laynestj@UDel.Edu>; David Blacker
> <blacker who-is-at UDel.Edu>; Renee Hayes <rhayes@UDel.Edu>
> Sent: Monday, August 09, 1999 1:36 PM
> Subject: RE: academic freedom
>
>
> > Hi everybody--
> >
> > Thanks for a very interesting discussion. I'm trying to make sense of
> > different approaches expressed on the list. So far, I could abstracted
> > three. I want to apologize for possible distortion of participants'
> > views -- my intention is not to caricature people's view to win
> a dispute
> > but to honestly make sense so feel free to correct me. In my
> view, in our
> > discussion we have a clash or particularities and universalities in
> dealing
> > with unfortunate events involving our colleague Mary Daly.
> >
> > 1. "Market, libertarian" approach. This is how I'd characterize Jay's
> > eloquently expressed approach prioritizing rights and
> interactions of the
> > instructor and student.
> >
> > >There were two traditional academic freedoms in the German
> > >universities from which our notions of these matters ultimately derive:
> > >Lernfreiheit and Lehrfreiheit. The first was the right of students to
> take
> > >the courses they pleased, to avoid professors they disliked or did not
> > >respect. The second was the right of the teaching faculty to teach
> anything
> > >they chose and do so in any manner they chose, no matter how
> bizarre. The
> > >two freedoms were in balance. Some lecturers had virtually no students;
> > >some students attended virtually no lectures.
> >
> > I found myself very sympathetic with this approach because
> particularities
> > of instructor-student interaction is often ignored by educational
> > institutions running as big organizational machines. Jay describes a
> desired
> > state of the instructor-student relations as a voluntary contract. What
> > instructor and student would reject the situation when the student
> > voluntarily chose to be in class and the instructor voluntarily chose to
> > teach this student?! It is also very good for development of teaching
> > mastery in instructors. My observations in an innovative school in Utah
> > showed that it is extremely important for new inexperienced parent
> > volunteers to have right to choose to work with cooperative children and
> > avoid engaging in adversarial relations with kids with whom they can't
> work.
> > With time, successful working with cooperative kids makes
> parents more and
> > more skillful and comfortable to work with other kids.
> >
> > I called this approach "market" because it is contract-based between the
> > teacher and the student like on "free market" between the
> consumer and the
> > producer. Like in any "market" approach, dyad as the unit of
> analysis can
> > produce a negative, undesired global pattern. For example, a friend of
> mine
> > who is a freelance music teacher for young children told me
> recently that
> > many "serious" music teachers who prepare kids for professional music
> > carrier prefer to work with Chinese kids who are known for
> their diligence
> > and industry and whose parents are very supportive to the teacher's
> > directions. She told that the tendency is so strong that it becomes
> > difficult to find a "serious" music teacher for a musically gifted
> > non-Chinese child in some areas of the country.
> >
> > 2. "Give oppressed groups extra favor, leftist" approach. This is how I'
> > describe Mary B.'s approach prioritizing access to a socially valuable
> > practice for formerly/currently oppressed social groups,
> >
> > >My notion of a-a [Affirmative Action -- EM] is that an
> > >institution chooses to do something "special" and maybe ordinarily
> against
> > >the law for one group - on the basis of that group's
> established history
> of
> > >oppression. qua
> > >Mary Daly's pedagogy for women only is just such a strategy -
> to elect a
> > >context within which (research shows) girls and women learn
> better, that
> > >is, without males.
> >
> > Yesterday on NPR, I have heard news that in South Africa there have been
> > ordered to have hiring quotes for black athletes in some areas
> of sport to
> > break historical cycles of exclusivity. As one (white) football
> (soccer?)
> > coach said in an interview, hiring quotes are bad but racial exclusivity
> is
> > even worse. It is clear that sometimes cycles of oppression can
> be broken
> > only by breaking some rules and principles that otherwise should not be
> > broken. Temporary and small scale violence and injustice can
> be sometimes
> > necessary to stop bigger violence and injustice.
> >
> > Although I'm very sympathetic with the approach and agree that sometimes
> it
> > is the best one, I see at least two related issues with it.
> First, it can
> > easily ignore, neglect, and even sacrify human particularity
> for the sake
> of
> > abstract group historical justice. Second, it is left
> unbalanced: we have
> to
> > decide when "necessary" evil becomes just evil. Moreover, the problem is
> how
> > to make this decisions locally. Oppression is not only history but
> emergent
> > process.
> >
> > 3. "The same rights as guarantee of equality, Enlightenment"
> approach. I
> > refer this approach to Paul who wrote,
> >
> > >Dr. Mary Bryson's message implied that the BC action occurred in an
> > >"anti-affirmative action" climate, that BC seized upon this climate to
> > carry
> > >out pest control. I'm confused. Mary Daly was engaged in an
> > >anti-affirmative action teaching practice by definition and law. The
> only
> > >difference being that the persons being discriminated against in this
> case
> > >happened to be male and not the other way around. But the definition
> > >doesn't specify equal access for females or any other particular group;
> to
> > >the contrary, it specifies that no particular group shall be the basis
> for
> > >exclusion.
> > >
> > >The law specifically doesn't protect the rights of any -ism but rather
> > >groups of individuals defined on the basis of a variety of cultural and
> > >genetic properties.
> > >
> > >Isn't the logic of claiming that BC's action partakes of (an
> by inference
> > >thereby is a part of) an anti-affirmative action climate a
> prime example
> of
> > >what George Orwell termed "double-think"?
> >
> > This approach prioritizes having the same rights under law for
> all people.
> > This is a blueprint for an ideal just society -- having the same rights
> > would preclude from discrimination, exclusivity, and injustice. There is
> > also belief that justice is rooted in institutionalized relations
> regulated
> > by the law. If these relations are bended even locally, then a
> cancer of
> > injustice will soon spread over the whole society.
> >
> > Despite its attractiveness because of its appeal to an ideal
> society, this
> > approach ignores history of injustice and particularity of human
> relations.
> > The same rights, as applied to local and specific conditions, may mean
> > different institutional relations. The same may mean different may mean
> the
> > same under some local and/or historical circumstances. Forced
> mixing all
> > social groups together may have different meaning and
> consequences for the
> > groups and their participants and may not led to justice but to
> different
> > type of oppression.
> >
> > 4. "Freedom with regulations, typical liberal" approach. As
> you may guess
> I
> > found sympathy to all the described approaches but can't
> subscribe to any
> of
> > them. Here is my own approach for your judgment. I'd prioritize access
> to
> > socially valuable practices to all the participants (formerly/currently
> > oppressed and not oppressed). Here I treat "access" not as a law or a
> right
> > for social group but as a meaningful way for participation captured in
> Jay's
> > approach. I agree with Jay that both students and instructors
> should have
> > right to choose with whom they want to work. However, these
> rights should
> > be limited by concerns of access. For example, in case of Mary Daly, I
> > think that if the male student had an opportunity to take a class on
> Women's
> > Studies from another professor or in some other way (e.g., as Mary Daly
> > suggested, to teach him one-on-one) then I do not see any problem with
> Mary
> > D. having all-women class (or anybody else having all-white
> males class).
> > As Mary B. eloquently explained, there is very good pedagogical reasons
> for
> > having all-women classes. However, the problem might have arisen if the
> male
> > student had not had an opportunity to study Women's Study because of the
> > all-women class arrangement (which was not the case). Thus, I don't
> believe
> > in "one size fits all" organizational approaches but in a regulated
> > contextual negotiation of local meanings. Of course, my approach has
> > probably many unforeseen negative consequences (e.g., it is
> complex), but
> so
> > far I can't find better one. I think we should promote pedagogical
> > diversification and experimentation in higher education (and not only
> > higher) while taking care about access to education for all students
> (which
> > I believe was in the case of Mary Daly).
> >
> > I have read about the Mary Daly's case in the Chronicle of Higher
> Education
> > and was "back-and-forward" about my own position on the event.
> Thanks to
> > the XMCA discussion, I found a position that, at least now, I feel
> > comfortable. Thanks all the participants. I believe that all the
> > participants of the discussion strive for social justice and expressed
> very
> > real concerns even if we may passionately disagree with each other.
> >
> > What do you think?
> >
> > Eugene
> >
> >
> > ----------------------
> > Eugene Matusov
> > School of Education
> > University of Delaware
> > Newark, DE 19716
> > Office (302) 831-1266
> > Fax (302) 831-4445
> > email ematusov who-is-at udel.edu
> > Website http://ematusov.soe.udel.edu/
> > -------------------------
>
>
>