Testimonials
|
| |
Welcome to the Green Mountain State
|
|
<< Back
Racial slur launches Williams controversy
September 24th, 2004
WILLIAMSTOWN — The voicing of a racial slur in a Williams College art department meeting in May — an incident disclosed by college officials only last week — has launched swirls of controversy like acrid smoke in this college community, which prides itself on the diversity of a student body made up of more than 25 percent minorities.
The injured party in the incident, an African American professor, said she is pursuing internal action on the matter.
The “N “word used at that meeting last spring continues to hang in the air almost as visibly as graffiti scrawled across the picture-perfect buildings on campus.
While Williams College officials say the tenured woman professor who made the remark has received sanctions, no specific measures have been revealed.
The injured party is Laylah Ali, an African-American professor of studio art and a 1991 Williams graduate. She said in an e-mail yesterday that she had been so upset by the slur that she had left the meeting where it was voiced. Ali said she reported the incident to acting Dean of Faculty William Lenhart, as did others.
Lenhart sent a memo to the college community Sept. 10 outlining the incident, in which which a professor, not identified, “raised a concern about the status of her own field of professional work relative to the fields of the others. At one point, she made a heated statement to the effect that she did not want her field to be ‘used as a nigger.’”
In her e-mail, Ali said, “What is missing from the dean’s letter — and indeed the later discussion of this incident — is a sense of the malice with which the racist comment was delivered. The tone and manner of expression were so extreme that I felt forced to leave the meeting. It was extremely disruptive and upsetting.”
She added, “I do not believe that the college administration has responded properly to the gravity of this incident.”
But she said she is “refraining from more commentary at this time because I am currently involved in further internal action about this matter.”
In his memo, Lenhart wrote that he had concluded “ that the [unnamed] faculty member’s behavior warranted the serious step of imposing sanctions on her, which I have done. I believe that the statement made at the meeting was a use of racist language that was meant to provoke or hurt the African-American colleague who was present.”
Williams spokesman James G. Kolesar said he could not think of an instance of the college’s specifying what sanctions had been taken against any faculty.
“There are legal and ethical considerations about how much can be said about a situation,” Kolesar said.
According to college policy, “When the offender is a faculty or staff member, the disciplinary action may range from a reprimand to non-reappointment or the initiation of proceedings for dismissal for cause. They may also include warnings regarding the consequences of future misconduct, removal from certain teaching, advising or supervisory roles, job reassignment, and/or other restrictions of institutional role.”
But both the chairman of the African-American studies department and a co-chairman of the Black Students Union called upon the unidentified woman professor to step forward and attempt to justify her remark.
And both political science assistant professor Alex Willingham, the chairman of the African-American studies program, and Christopher Sewell, a senior and a co-chairman of the Black Students Union, questioned the length of time the administration took to act. They voiced concern that the incident might make it more difficult for the college to attract and retain black faculty.
“One of my concerns is that she might leave,” Willingham said of Ali. “That’s almost my Number One issue.”
He added, “I’m fairly pleased about the student recruitment, but the success in the one area generates the challenge in the other. The recruitment people have done their part.”
But, he said, the college must put into place strategies to retain minority faculty.
“We can’t offer the night life of New York City, but we can offer a good productive working environment. That’s part of the appeal for faculty looking at Williams. If we’ve got to start hedging, saying, ‘Oh, you know how those white people are,’ that makes it more difficult,” he said.
Willingham called on the unidentified professor to step forward and publicly acknowledge her action.
“I think that would be a major step towards clearing the air,” he said. “That kind of reconciliation would be a proactive step. There are a lot of racists we live with in this world, but a lot of people are growing and changing.”
Willingham was very critical about the college’s time lag in reporting the incident.
“My overall reaction is one of disappointment, to say the very least. I wish this had been dealt with in the time frame in which it occurred,” he said. “I’m less hung up on sanctions per se than the message sanctions send about the institution,”
Willingham, as did others, remarked that the incident in May happened at nearly the same time as a music department flyer had emblazoned KKK, an incident that distressed some minority students.
That flyer advertised “the Kechley Krazy Kookout,” hosted by music department Chairman David Kechley, who did not design the flyer.
Christopher Sewell, co-chairman of the college’s Black Students Union, said that group is coordinating with other groups to consider actions.
“I do believe that alumni and students are equally as outraged as black students,” Sewell said. “Now we need to work on the larger problem.”
He said the Black Student Union and others want to look beyond the departmental-meeting incident.
“Over the past year and a half, there have been several incidents, so this is not necessarily specific to what happen |
|
|
