Steller: Amid protests, UA leaders pick words too carefully

You can’t be too careful on college campuses these days: Choose your words wrong and you risk losing your livelihood.

At Yale University, a faculty member became the target of angry protests because she sent out an email that questioned the need for cultural-sensitivity guidelines in Halloween costumes. So far she’s survived with her job.

At Claremont-McKenna College the dean of students was forced to resign after writing in a sympathetic email to a Latina student: “We are working on how we can better serve students, especially those who don’t fit our CMC mold.” The implication that people of color don’t fit the mold cost Dean Mary Spellman her job.

These cases and the resignation of the University of Missouri’s president over his lack of responsiveness to racist incidents were on UA President Ann Weaver Hart’s mind when she and three other campus leaders sent out an email to all students, faculty and staff on Nov. 13. It was the same day the UA’s Black Student Union held a demonstration on campus in solidarity with Mizzou student protesters.

The email produced by Hart, faculty chair Lynn Nadel, student body president Manuel Felix and graduate student president Sarah Netherton is a classic in writing-by-committee that says a lot about the atmosphere on campuses this year. Here are excerpts, interspersed with my analysis:

Recent events at the University of Missouri and at other colleges and universities across the United States remind us that we can never take our freedoms or each other for granted.

They do? I thought they were about incidents of campus racism and overreactions to alleged acts of insensitivity.

They also remind us that we should not assume we know what others’ experiences are or have been and that we need to listen with an open mind when assessing the climate of respect and equity on our campus.

“Are or have been” — a typical detail of committee-written letters: One person writes in the first person, “are,” and the next one says, “But what about what they were?” And the outcome is a model of redundancy, since the present perfect tense (“have been”) includes the present.

The next paragraph is long and includes many lists. Lists are another feature of the committee-written letter. Every writer remembers a different group that must be included, lest the writers risk the wrath of that group. The paragraph begins:

At the University of Arizona, we value each and every individual, whether student, faculty, staff, alumnus/a or visitor.

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Yes, “alumnus/a” is necessary because it’s not as if you can just write “alumni.” That word is, formally at least, the plural of alumnus, the male noun, although it is often used for mixed groups as well. “Alumnae” is the plural of the female noun alumna, so if you used the plural instead of the singular, you’d still have to write “alumni/ae”, right? For inclusiveness.

The letter goes on to say the university won’t tolerate discrimination and is deeply committed to “the freedoms from discrimination on which we rely.” It goes on:

This commitment is a fundamental part of our culture of engagement, partnership and mutual support that transcends traditional definitions, categories and boundaries.

I think they forgot to mention that the UA’s culture also includes cooperation and collaboration and that it transcends meanings, groupings and borders, too!

It is not a license to censorship nor a denial of academic and other freedoms, but it is an insistence upon respect for the wide range of perspectives and experiences reflected in our multicultural environment.

That one is like playing Twister. I’d translate it this way: “You can still say and research whatever you want, but certain opinions, phrases and words could put your career at risk.”

We realize this commitment does not free us from constantly working to improve. The quality of our understanding of, and response to, the needs of our community and those whom we serve depends upon our ongoing ability to learn and change and the qualities to which we are all committed.

That, my friends, is a classic of committee-speak. You can almost hear the various writers interjecting: “and response to,” “and those whom we serve,” “and change,” “and the qualities to which we are all committed.” And, and, and.

We, as representatives of the university, faculty and undergraduate, graduate and professional students, affirm our commitment to these freedoms and our commitment to constant improvement. In the spirit of that commitment, we pledge to use these recent painful events at other institutions as an impetus for ongoing change and more dialogue here at home.

It’s unclear if the reference to “these recent painful events” is to the events that led to the protests or the loss of jobs. In any case, this letter should help prevent the latter — for now.