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‘Tompkins told Duzer that Kunin’s course was “a direct attack on Black thought.” [Kunin] is a part of a tradition of “literary right-wingers’’ who want “to Make Aesthetics Great Again (MAGA) and who wish to ignore difference (race, etc.).’

A lengthy piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education features a Pomona College English professor who thinks an interest in aesthetics on the part of a literature professor is not merely racist, but just about the worst racism in America: Trump racism.

It’s a disgusting claim, but useful to mention here, since it goes to the mindless (j’accuse MAGA racists of considering the formal properties of Liberty Leading the People!) but sometimes effective bullying that exists in more than a few departments/administrations.

The real point of the bullying in the Pomona instance is simply intellectual turf-protection: One professor is outraged that another professor wants to teach a course that trespasses on territory she owns, you see.

After all, if this professor truly cares about the work of Ralph Ellison (the writer in question) being broadly taught to the largest number of students, she will welcome additional courses on him.

Margaret Soltan, August 23, 2024 7:20AM
Posted in: kind of a little weird

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3 Responses to “‘Tompkins told Duzer that Kunin’s course was “a direct attack on Black thought.” [Kunin] is a part of a tradition of “literary right-wingers’’ who want “to Make Aesthetics Great Again (MAGA) and who wish to ignore difference (race, etc.).’”

  1. Stephen Karlson Says:

    Field notes for a future academic novel, although it’s hackneyed to have the neurotics in the English Department.

    Dressing up the viciousness of the academic politics with the intersectional vocabulary does not conceal the smallness of the stakes.

  2. Margaret Soltan Says:

    Stephen: Not so small. Ridiculous ideologues like this woman make the world safe for Trump. As long as she’s gassing away, his attacks on the left very much hit their mark.

  3. Stephen Karlson Says:

    UD: Trump is the symptom. Did you catch any of RFK the younger’s announcement? His reservations about establishmentarian politicians and the legacy media align with mine. All that “ridiculous ideologue” had to do was a good job, and she didn’t. Does that sound familiar?

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