Rather, the commitment to not hiring slavery apologists isn’t absolute. It should be treated like a real decision with costs and benefits, with the slavery apologetics considered a serious cost. If you could hire Bob or Steve, where Bob is politically “usual” and Steve is holocaust denialist, you should hire Steve only if he is a considerably better choice than Bob on “usual” grounds.
Edit: I would also add that hiring a slavery apologist when you already have one is a heavier cost still. These are not vacuum decisions. Similarly, if every one of your faculty has political views acceptable to either liberals or conservatives, you should reduce the “nasty cost” of hiring a fascist or a Stalinist.
“dominated by X” is not the same as “willing to hire X”
Most universities in my country would be perfectly OK to hire a Stalinist, as long as the person does not spend their whole day speaking about it. (Your country may be different.)
I certainly encountered at least one Stalin apologist in my college years, but that’s hardly evidence of an institutional permissiveness, particularly towards Stalinist, which would be somebody who supports Stalin’s tactics.
Anybody have any ideas on how to test the theory? Google seems utterly useless; all it comes up with is somebody named Grover Furr. Which may be proof that is can happen, but since AFAICT he was tenured -before- he caused controversy (in 2012), it’s at best weak evidence that universities would in fact -hire- a Stalinist. Additionally, I’m not sure his claim qualifies as Stalinism, per se, as it is, in effect, denying that -Stalin- was a Stalinist, but rather a Neo-Stalinist.
Who was almost universally recognized as a great historian and exactly the sort of person I would encourage universities to hire, despite his apologetics for Soviet communism.
I don’t think that his Sovietism damaged him proportionately to its awfulness, in case you’re wondering. The explanation for that comes from him being a humanities professor in England from the Orwellian era.
The question I have is, do you have any nominees for fascist or Jim Crow-defending historians on par with Hobsbawn?
But since you asked, I think you’ll find that historians are pretty diverse in their politics. I don’t think you get anything more than a group-local bump for being a Marxist, and I don’t think that being a Marxist would help you get hired or advanced at many universities. (In England, this wasn’t always true.)
Edit: I floated the idea of Solzhenitsyn and a few others that have been well-loved here, particularly since he’s a counterexample to the idea that Sovietism is at fault for Hobsbawm’s eulogies. But Solzhenitsyn wasn’t an English or American professor, and while he was a religious and ethnic bigot, he wasn’t a fascist either.
This would be a good question for somebody who is well-read enough to confidently give political labels to dozens or hundreds of prominent historians off the cuff. I am not that somebody. I happen to suspect that the answer is yes, since it’s pretty easy to find nasty views amongst lionized figures from all over our intellectual history. It’s not hard to find well-praised sexists, racists, and etc. in academic history. But we need more recent history, and what I can’t do is name a fascist historian on par with Hobsbawn off the top of my head.
I think what you are saying here is “We should not precommit to not hiring slavery apologists.” Is that right?
Rather, the commitment to not hiring slavery apologists isn’t absolute. It should be treated like a real decision with costs and benefits, with the slavery apologetics considered a serious cost. If you could hire Bob or Steve, where Bob is politically “usual” and Steve is holocaust denialist, you should hire Steve only if he is a considerably better choice than Bob on “usual” grounds.
Edit: I would also add that hiring a slavery apologist when you already have one is a heavier cost still. These are not vacuum decisions. Similarly, if every one of your faculty has political views acceptable to either liberals or conservatives, you should reduce the “nasty cost” of hiring a fascist or a Stalinist.
The thing is current universities are perfectly willing to hire Stalinists.
Yeah, current universities are dominated by Stalinism. Obviously.
“dominated by X” is not the same as “willing to hire X”
Most universities in my country would be perfectly OK to hire a Stalinist, as long as the person does not spend their whole day speaking about it. (Your country may be different.)
I know, Viliam. I was responding to the obvious implication. I’ve been seeing a lot of signs of the sketchy Right in here.
What is your evidence for this?
I certainly encountered at least one Stalin apologist in my college years, but that’s hardly evidence of an institutional permissiveness, particularly towards Stalinist, which would be somebody who supports Stalin’s tactics.
Anybody have any ideas on how to test the theory? Google seems utterly useless; all it comes up with is somebody named Grover Furr. Which may be proof that is can happen, but since AFAICT he was tenured -before- he caused controversy (in 2012), it’s at best weak evidence that universities would in fact -hire- a Stalinist. Additionally, I’m not sure his claim qualifies as Stalinism, per se, as it is, in effect, denying that -Stalin- was a Stalinist, but rather a Neo-Stalinist.
Well, not quite a Stalinist, but look at all the eulogies for Soviet apologeticist Eric Hobsbawm by “mainstream” papers and accademics.
Who was almost universally recognized as a great historian and exactly the sort of person I would encourage universities to hire, despite his apologetics for Soviet communism.
So do you think if he had instead been an apologist for facism or apartide or Jim Crow he would have gotten the same recognition?
I don’t think that his Sovietism damaged him proportionately to its awfulness, in case you’re wondering. The explanation for that comes from him being a humanities professor in England from the Orwellian era.
The question I have is, do you have any nominees for fascist or Jim Crow-defending historians on par with Hobsbawn?
But since you asked, I think you’ll find that historians are pretty diverse in their politics. I don’t think you get anything more than a group-local bump for being a Marxist, and I don’t think that being a Marxist would help you get hired or advanced at many universities. (In England, this wasn’t always true.)
Edit: I floated the idea of Solzhenitsyn and a few others that have been well-loved here, particularly since he’s a counterexample to the idea that Sovietism is at fault for Hobsbawm’s eulogies. But Solzhenitsyn wasn’t an English or American professor, and while he was a religious and ethnic bigot, he wasn’t a fascist either.
This would be a good question for somebody who is well-read enough to confidently give political labels to dozens or hundreds of prominent historians off the cuff. I am not that somebody. I happen to suspect that the answer is yes, since it’s pretty easy to find nasty views amongst lionized figures from all over our intellectual history. It’s not hard to find well-praised sexists, racists, and etc. in academic history. But we need more recent history, and what I can’t do is name a fascist historian on par with Hobsbawn off the top of my head.