Paula McClain and the 'Duke 88'

I admit that I didn't follow the Duke rape case all that closely back in the day. I was just getting started as a blogger, feeling my way around the 'sphere, and being careful as far as my own reputation and relationships go. (I used to read Betsy's Page a lot at the time - a great blogger who had the story down cold.) I don't worry about that as much now, the rep thing, although I'm sure being a partisan blogger steps on a few toes here and there.

Having said that, I'd rather be honest and forthright than shameful. And, sorry to have to say it, but it looks like that's what happened with Paula McClain, who is Professor of Political Science Professor of Political Science and Public Policy, and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Gender at Duke. In 1999, for my upper division course in Black Politics, I assigned chapters from McClain's book, Can We All Get Along?" Racial and Ethnic Minorities in American Politics.

Anyway, I mention all of this after reading John Hinderaker's essay from last night, "What ever happened to the "Duke 88?" (Via Memeorandum.) It turns out that none of the 88 Duke University faculty have apologized for their roles in the 2006 Duke University lacrosse case. And as Hinderaker notes, regarding the Duke 88's unfounded ad campaign:

The ad appeared almost four years ago. Stuart Taylor takes a look at what has happened since to some of the 88 thoroughly wrongheaded professors who signed it.

First, according to Taylor, no member of the "Duke 88" has publicly apologized. Many have expressed pride in their rush to judgment.

Second, sigining the ad seems to have been a pretty good career move. In 2007, one member of the group -- Paula McClain -- became head of Duke's Academic Council, the highest elected position for a faculty member ....

The Stuart Taylor piece is here, "The Rot At Duke -- And Beyond: Much of academia appears to have a disregard of due process and a bias against white males." It notes there:

Among the most prominent signers of both the ad and the letter were Karla Holloway, an English professor, and Paula McClain, a political science professor. They also slimed the lacrosse players in opaquely worded, academic-jargon-filled individual statements full of innuendo.

The ad is here, "What Does a Social Disaster Sound Like?" The letter is here, "An Open Letter to the Duke Community."

In May last year, my professional association, the American Political Science Association, released this press release, "APSA Bunche Institute Director McClain Receives NSF Grant -- Dr. Paula D. McClain, Director of the APSA Ralph Bunche Summer Institute, Receives NSF Grant." And Duke's Provost, Professor Peter Lange, is quoted there:

Duke University is pleased and honored to be home to the APSA Ralph Bunche Summer Institute. We are also pleased to have faculty leaders such as Paula McClain and her colleagues, who are willing to put in the enormous time and energy to bring the Institute here and to lead in the teaching and mentoring of its participants. Diversity and inclusion are central to building a strong, vibrant academic community and to the development of scholars who can teach and do research that enhance the disciplines and professions. Duke is enriched by our contribution to this effort in Political Science.

Dr. Lange is also a Professor of Political Science at Duke. He gave a research colloquium at UCSB in the 1990s, when I was completing my graduate training there.

To his credit, at least initially, Dr. Lange refused to join the Duke lynchmob in 2006. As Provost he responded to English Professor Houston Baker (who is cited by Hinderaker as a most "execrable" members of the Duke 88, now on the faculty at Vanderbilt University). Lange writes there, for example:

I cannot tell you how disappointed, saddened and appalled I was to receive this letter from you. A form of prejudice - one felt so often by minorities whether they be African American, Jewish or other - is the act of prejudgment: to presume that one knows something "must" have been done by or done to someone because of his or her race, religion or other characteristic. In the United States our sad racial history is laced with such incidents, only fully brought to light in the recent past and undoubtedly there are uncounted numbers of such incidents not yet, or ever to be, known.

I don't know enough of Dr. Lange's later leadership at the university to say one way or the other, but considering how things developed (as told in the Taylor essay), it certainly appears not all that good.

There's more at Taylor's piece, and I've said enough. Folks can see why, though, when it comes to academics and race, I'm often embarrassed as a professional. The standards of excellence in my field, at least on this score, have sunk low.