The Death of an Academic

Like most people working in higher ed, I was horrified by the treatment and death of Professor Jason Arday. It was naked racism, purely and obviously. As a white man, I don’t have the voice to speak to that pain, so here are some Black writers who put it more eloquently than I ever could.

Sneha Krishnan writing for Al Jazeera, correctly highlights the underlying motivation behind the campaign against Arday, saying “There was no ambiguity from the beginning that this so-called revelation of “plagiarism” was a cudgel: it was a way to make a point that equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) initiatives are supposedly academically dishonest.” She goes on to call out the media outlets who wilfully neglected their due diligence process, stating “for any media outlet that claims seriousness to fail to investigate the intensity of the pile-on that Arday experienced, and its origins within a eugenicist’s fantasy of ridding universities of Black professors and antiracist scholarship, is profoundly irresponsible.”

Paul Tiyambe Zeleza asks “Who killed Jason Arday?” and concludes that he “was killed by white liberal proponents of performative inclusion who propelled him, shrouding him with the aura of heroic exceptionalism”. That is Cambridge (and by extension, most of white liberal higher ed) likes to perform inclusion, but only to the extent that it reflects well on themselves. The “I have a lot of black friends and really like hip hop” defence. It’s not only not enough, but actually places people like Arday in the line of fire.

Writing in Inside Higher Ed, Shaun Harper points out that Arday’s treatment can be seen as part of a longer practice of “racialized punishment inequities” that begins in school. He cites research showing that “Black girls and boys in K–12 schools… are routinely suspended and expelled at exponentially higher rates than their white peers for the same misbehaviors”. What Arday’s case demonstrates is that there is no misdemeanour too trivial when it comes to ruining the life of a Black intellectual.

What I do have some experience to comment upon, if I may, are the allegations of Arday being a fantasist. Considering the intensity of the analysis he experienced, the claims here seem pretty thin. I wonder what that level of scrutiny would reveal about any of us. But what I do know is that in my field, educational technology, I could list several prominent “thought leaders” who have built an entire career out of being bullshitters. Exaggerating impact, claiming significant change, predicting revolution – not only are these actions not pilloried, they are in fact, rewarded with prestigious keynote invites. White Ed Tech Bullshit is labelled “visionary”.

Witnessing a lynch mob lessens all of us, even if we don’t participate in it or actively fight against it. The very existence of such an ugly act shreds a bit of our humanity. But I’m guilty here also, I didn’t blog about this while it was happening, and just moaning about it to people isn’t enough. We all need to be calling it out as it happens, to show that it is not “in the public interest”. Now the tragic outcome of this episode seems inevitable, and we need to ensure that inevitable is unacceptable.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International