WHY IN GOD’S NAME WOULD YOU WANT TO KEEP YOUR READING LISTS SECRET ANYWAY? Duke warns professors about emails from someone claiming to be a student, seeking information about their courses — many in fields criticized by some on the right.
Duke University professors took to social media on Tuesday to see if they could trust emails from someone claiming to be a student, seeking information about reading lists in their courses for the coming semester.
It is unclear how many Duke professors received the emails, and this is a time of year that some faculty members aren’t checking email regularly. But those who went public with the emails noticed that the courses about which the so-called student was seeking information all happened to be the types of classes that some right-wing bloggers like to criticize. The person sending the email sought information, for example, on courses called “Money, Sex and Power,” “Energy and Environmental Justice” and “Religion and Mass Incarceration.” The email messages, which did not come from a Duke email account, were very similar in asking for a reading list so the alleged student “could get a better idea of if the class is right for me.”
Professors who shared their emails said that they would try to answer such questions from a Duke student, but didn’t want to inadvertently help someone trying to attack either higher education generally or certain fields of study. Many cited the mood in academe in a time when new groups like Professor Watchlist are appearing. The list is for people to name faculty members who “promote anti-American values and advance leftist propaganda in the classroom.”
On the other hand, if the Gender Studies reading list is overwhelmingly anti-male, it might support a “hostile educational environment” claim on behalf of male students, I suppose. But anyone can just visit the bookstore and photograph the reading lists with their phone. So if people are trying to hide something, they’re not doing a very good job.
Plus, from the comments: “If not wanting ‘to inadvertently help someone trying to attack either higher education generally or certain fields of study’ means not letting them know the content of your course, you’re either admitting that what you are teaching merits attack or that you are afraid of public debate.”
Yeah, all this stuff should really be online anyway. Public or private, these institutions are all supported by taxpayer money to a substantial degree.