Intellectual Distress

After a winter of discontent, the snapping point came while Ms. Venkatesan was lecturing on "ecofeminism," which holds, in part, that scientific advancements benefit the patriarchy but leave women out. One student took issue, and reasonably so "“ actually, empirically so. But "these weren't thoughtful statements," Ms. Venkatesan protests. "They were irrational." The class thought otherwise. Following what she calls the student's "diatribe," several of his classmates applauded.

Ms. Venkatesan informed her pupils that their behavior was "fascist demagoguery." Then, after consulting a physician about "intellectual distress," she cancelled classes for a week. Thus the pending litigation.

HERE

HT: UD

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7 Responses to “Intellectual Distress”

Bradford Says:
May 9th, 2008 at 9:38 pm
Intellectual distress

Oh the pain these types feel when anyone has the nerve to dispute their orthodoxy.

And "fascist demagoguery." Sounds like a phrase out of the USSR's Pravda. But the article ended on this hopeful note:

The remarkable thing about the Venkatesan affair, to me, is that her students cared enough to argue. Normally they would express their boredom with the material by answering emails on their laptops or falling asleep. But here they staged a rebellion, a French Counter-Revolution against Professor Defarge. Maybe, despite the professor's best efforts, there's life in American colleges yet.

Comment by Bradford — May 9, 2008 @ 9:38 pm

MikeGene Says:
May 9th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
I like this one:

As a general rule, I have found that serving students with legal complaints or subpoenas tends to undermine the teacher/student relationship.

Comment by MikeGene — May 9, 2008 @ 9:52 pm

Joy Says:
May 9th, 2008 at 10:58 pm
LOL!!! I had a sociology teacher in high school, 4th hour (lunch interrupted the class period). She cried every single day, whole semester. The kids didn't like her, she moaned.

I felt sorry for her and tried to keep the jocks in line, but it was no use. She made a target of herself and they exploited it. Still, I got an 'A' (she never gave a test) because I tried.

Psychology teacher was a whole other case. He was the track coach, didn't know anything about anything but chewing tobacco and being a jerk. Passed out a textbook written in 1942 (no kidding), said the weekly test was at the end of each chapter, don't ask any questions.

What we learned about psychology was what we learned about this guy. Got fired at the end of the term for trying to molest one of the teens on the track team. Nobody was surprised.

Comment by Joy — May 9, 2008 @ 10:58 pm

nobody Says:
May 9th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
That said, even at "“ or especially at "“ putatively superior schools, students are spoiled for choice when it comes to professors who share ideologies like Ms. Venkatesan's. The main result is to make coursework pathetically easy. Like filling in a Mad Libs, just patch something together about "interrogating heteronormativity," or whatever, and wait for the returns to start rolling in.

I once wrote a term paper for a lit-crit course where I "deconstructed" the MTV program "Pimp My Ride." A typical passage: "Each episode is a text of inescapable complexity . . . Our received notions of what constitutes a ride are constantly subverted and undermined." It received an A.

No comment needed.

Comment by nobody — May 9, 2008 @ 11:28 pm

The Pixie Says:
May 10th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
Incredible

Comment by The Pixie — May 10, 2008 @ 12:12 pm

Rock Says:
May 10th, 2008 at 6:16 pm
"Normally [students] would express their boredom with the material by answering emails on their laptops or falling asleep.

Maybe her students should sue her for "intellectual distress." It appears as if her lectures interrupted their sleep and personal lives. But I think the author has misinterpreted the students' "rebellion" as any form of intellectual engagement. When I was in school it was purely a matter of principle to antagonize and the frustrate the teacher out of pure boredom and juvenile frustration.

Comment by Rock — May 10, 2008 @ 6:16 pm

Aagcobb Says:
May 12th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
Ms. Venkatesan's scholarly specialty is "science studies," which, as she wrote in a journal article last year, "teaches that scientific knowledge has suspect access to truth." She continues: "Scientific facts do not correspond to a natural reality but conform to a social construct."

The agenda of Ms. Venkatesan's seminar, then, was to "problematize" technology and the life sciences.

I do believe that she is eminently qualified for a position with the Discovery Institute!

Comment by Aagcobb — May 12, 2008 @ 6:36 pm

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Intellectual Distress

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