Category: Op/Ed

Open Letter to Antioch students

Open Letter to Antioch students

I just returned from a weekend in YSO and attended the open forum session with the Board of Trustees. As an alum (class of ’77), I had not been on campus since the late 1990s when I tried to interest my daughter in attending. My experience this weekend reminded me of why I have always loved Antioch and why I stayed after the 1973 strike.

Everything I have ever accomplished of any significance is due to my years at Antioch College (parenting included). I’m often asked how I learned the skills of my profession and I always credit my years at Antioch College. (I own a healthcare consulting firm.) I explain that I learned active listening through participation in AdCil and long meetings held to debate whatever issue was the hot topic on campus (including the ’73 strike). My classes emphasized critical thinking and the synthesis of multiple theories and ideas. During my work study job in the WYSO newsroom, under the careful mentoring of Mark Mericle, I tested my communication and analytic skills. Finally, I gained confidence and independence through the coop program/AEA experiences in Mississippi, New Orleans, Washington DC, and Mexico.

So why did I become alienated from the College from which I loved and took so much?

In part, the complexities of life just took over. Fundamentally, however, my generation received unfair blame for the enrollment decline and financial chaos after the ’73 strike. Perhaps we were the first toxic generation. Many seemed to forget that the strikers, whether we agreed with their tactics or not, actually challenged Dixon’s funding priorities (expansion to over 20 campus locations) and predicted the College would eventually ultimately suffer (for which they were labeled as marginal and fatalistic thinkers). So, as a 1st year student who survived the strike, I distrusted the expansion and move towards a University system from the beginning. I endured the strike – thousands of pounds of garbage piled on the horseshoe in front of Antioch Hall (strikers picketed to prevent garbage pickup), the suspension of classes and meal service, and a deeply divided campus. Yet I stayed.

The first year students I drove to the Cincinnati Board meeting reminded me of myself and other entering students of 1972; excited, curious, inquisitive, polite, and eager to start their Antioch adventure. They sensed this year would provide a very special opportunity to participate in a collective effort to save Antioch College and to understand the dynamics that led us to where we are today.

I admire all of you, both entering and returning students, for making a decision to go down this unpredictable path. Please remember you have the support of staff, faculty, the village, and thousands of alumni who are working towards a common goal. We will not forget you are actually living through this uncertainty and intensity day after day. Believe me, you will not regret it!

In solidarity,

Susan Greene 1977

To the Antioch University Board of Trustees

Julian SharpMy name is Julian Sharp and I am a senior at Antioch College. Over the past three years my experience at Antioch has been rich. I have taken challenging courses, involved myself in shared governance, for those of you on the board who know what ComCil is, I at one time served as the chair, made life long friends and have traveled the world through co-op and Antioch Education Abroad. Continue reading To the Antioch University Board of Trustees

Letter from Jean Gregorek in response to Ralph Keyes

Jean Gregorek, Associate Professor of Literature, responds to Ralph Keyes’s “Present at the Demise” published in the Chronicle of Higher Education

Web Editors Note – Accessing Ralph’s letter at the Chronicle of Higher Education website requires a login but Ralph also recently posted this article here : ilfpost.org/?p=230 and this is the link provided above.

The comment thread on this article at the Chronicle is here: chronicle.com/forums/index.php/topic,39968.0.html

I would like to respond to Ralph Keyes’s essay “Present at the Demise,” which offers his observations on what has led the Antioch University Board of Trustees to announce the closing of Antioch College. I have been teaching literature full time at Antioch College since 1994. While Mr Keyes makes some comments that strike me as valid, on the whole my experience here has been quite different. Continue reading Letter from Jean Gregorek in response to Ralph Keyes

Op/Ed – A fag in a fagless community.

About two years ago when I was deciding on colleges one of the most important aspects that drew me to Antioch was the size of our queer community. When I came to Antioch I was assured by a friend that there is a large ratio of queers on campus. It was frustrating to find out upon arrival that there are only a handful of queer men on this campus. Continue reading Op/Ed – A fag in a fagless community.

I [Heart] Voltaire: a DeClassified for the Ages

By Marjorie Jensen 

“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it? –Evelyn Beatrice Hall, The Friends of Voltaire, 1906

Hall wrote this quote to summarize Voltaire’s attitude towards censorship. I’ll paraphrase one more time: I condemn what you are saying, but I will not let them decree what you can or cannot say just because I disagree. Yes, I am going to talk about censorship. Yes, this has been my theme for three terms now. Yes, I really do [heart] Voltaire. I can only hope that you’ll continue reading.

It could be said that the threat of censorship is what has motivated me to work for the Record. William Parke-Sutherland convinced me to go to my first Community Meeting by asking me if it was important to be able to keep writing what I wanted for The Record. As a writer, there are few things that I care more deeply about than freedom of speech.

I disagree with many of the texts that I encounter. Even if my ideals lie in complete opposition to what I am presented with, I find worth in deconstruction. I can strengthen my argument. Some works challenge me more than others, but I can at least laugh at the worst. I’d rather ask, ‘why would someone publish this,’ than ‘why did some one ban this or censor that.’ Given, controversy is one of the best things that can happen to a writer. If you want to increase readership, threaten censorship. However, I wouldn’t advocate for this method to increase notoriety. What is “unprintable? varies drastically over time. Not a dependable variable. It is a decree by someone in power who fears what is being said. This is only somewhat predictable. The irony of the threatening nature of a castration haiku to a male in power does point to some sort of obvious inevitability. Lacan possibly bumped his casket. This could be due to the patriarchy being deeply rooted in the symbolic power of the phallus. According to some feminist psychoanalytic perspectives, the loss of the phallus is directly related to the loss of power.

Therein, castration anxiety is a construct of a power structure that privileges men more than women. Being castrated, becoming more “feminine,? is threatening because women are afforded a lower social position. Is the administration’s latent response that becoming a woman is a put-down in a socio-political sense? Are they commenting on the male fear of the female “lack?? Who knows? Lacan’s not telling. Ironic latent motivations aside, the complaint could have been taken to the appropriate (existing) governing body and not been the rationale for threatening censorship in classic authoritarian style. Then again, I’m still dreaming this dream that our community governance system should be honored by the administration.

After reading something that leaves a bad taste in my mouth, I don’t think it should never be devoured again. Taste is subjective. When one decides on the basis of such a subjective standard what is “printable,? the outcome can only be unpleasant. Censorship is more unpalatable than any text. People have the right to decide for themselves what they find delicious. Have our admission policies become so lax that our student population isn’t considered capable to think for themselves? Unless someone puts a stamp of approval on the student-run newspaper, we will be unable to judge the material within it? In our much-criticized “culture of confrontation,? isn’t it likely that anyone who was “out of line? would get “called out? by the aggressive radicals?

It has been argued that our cognitive ability to write separates us from other species. While I think much of that ability lies in the evolution of opposable thumbs, there is some merit to the former point. Human complexity of thought is something that I value, despite my current existential crisis and postmodern hysterics. Voltaire, back me up here.

“We have a natural right to make use of our pens as of our tongue, at our peril, risk and hazard.? Despite the all too obvious connection that the pen carries power because of its phallic symbolism, the point remains that brains should come with warning labels: “operate at your own risk.? Let people say stupid things. Let people expound brilliant philosophies. Let them be at odds with one another. But above all, let people speak.