Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Middle East Studies Group Urges End to Suit Against U. of Minnesota

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Middle East Studies Group Urges End to Suit Against U. of Minnesota

    http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/01/19/qt


    INSIDE HIGHER ED


    Quick Takes
    January 19, 2011

    [...]


    Middle East Studies Group Urges End to Suit Against U. of Minnesota

    The Middle East Studies Association is urging the Turkish Coalition of
    America to withdraw a lawsuit against the University of Minnesota
    over
    materials, since removed from the university's genocide studies website,
    calling a website of the Turkish group an "unreliable" source for
    information about the Armenian genocide, which most scholars say
    happened, and which the Turkish group questions.

    In a letter to the coalition,

    the Middle East studies group said: "Your organization, and those who
    hold perspectives different from those expressed by scholars associated
    with the Center, certainly have the right to participate in open
    scholarly exchange on the history of the Armenians in the late Ottoman
    Empire or any other issue, by presenting their views at academic
    conferences, in the pages of peer-reviewed scholarly journals or by
    other means, thereby opening them up to debate and challenge. We are
    distressed that you instead chose to take legal action against the
    University of Minnesota and its Center for Holocaust and Genocide
    Studies, apparently for having at one point characterized views
    expressed on your website in a certain way. We fear that legal action of
    this kind may have a chilling effect on the ability of scholars and
    academic institutions to carry out their work freely and to have their
    work assessed on its merits, in conformity with standards and procedures
    long established in the world of scholarship. Your lawsuit may thus
    serve to stifle the free expression of ideas among scholars and academic
    institutions regarding the history of Armenians in the later Ottoman
    Empire, and thereby undermine the principles of academic freedom."

    Bruce Fein, one of the lawyers for those suing the University of
    Minnesota (a group that includes a student there), rejected the
    criticisms from the Middle East scholars. Via e-mail, Fein said that "it
    is obvious that the letter writers never bothered to read the
    complaint.... The complaint explicitly renounces what the misinformed
    letter authors assert: that we are challenging the right of professors
    to voice their opinions about the reliability of web or other
    information sources. The complaint questions the authority of a state
    school to de facto prohibit students from visiting websites solely
    because of the viewpoint expressed and not for any bona fide educational
    purpose. If I were a teacher, I would give an F grade to the letter for
    failure of the writers to do their homework and egregiously
    misrepresenting the facts without even contacting the opposing side."




    From: A. Papazian
Working...
X