When viewpoints clash

At St. Olaf's College, it was a professor's rapid-reaction criticism of the Bush administration that set things off. At Yale University, a faculty panel was accused of blaming the victims. And at California State University at Chico, a political science professor received a flood of hate mail after highly critical comments about US foreign policy.

Across the United States, the standard fall fare of homecoming and football is being eclipsed by campus discussions of war and foreign policy. Students and professors have been gathering in classrooms and at teach-ins to sort through events that have galvanized their communities in ways not seen since the Vietnam War.

But the discussion has been anything but easy.

In a setting often chided for its political correctness, liberal and often critical speech is suddenly butting up against flag-waving patriotism. At a number of institutions, intellectuals have had their knuckles publicly rapped by students, administrators, and commentators for sounding unsupportive of their country.

The increasingly sharp edges of the exchange are raising questions about whether free speech and broad intellectual inquiry into the root causes of Sept. 11 will be tolerated on campus. In some cases, "my-country-love-it-or-leave-it" fervor is dominating. In others, a "peace first" stance threatens to prevent substantive discussion of opposing views.

With emotions running high on and off campus, faculty with reasoned but controversial views may simply keep those views to themselves. And that, observers warn, would mean a dangerous abdication of higher education's traditional role of questioning the unquestioned - and ensuring that students are exposed to a broad range of perspectives.

"We know there have been times in the history of this country when public affairs - national crises - have led to an atmosphere of repression and fear," says Richard Freeland, president of Northeastern University in Boston. An expert on the history of higher education, he points to the "red scare" of the 1950s, when scores of academics lost their jobs.

"My hope as a historian is that we can learn from our past mistakes," he adds. "I think we can weather this crisis. I hope so."

Henry Jenkins, professor of literature at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a participant in several recent teach-ins, has similar concerns.

"It would be a real corruption of the university if we were to assume that mass-producing patriots is its primary function," he says.

"If you look at the way other institutions in the society have worked to shut down the exploration of ideas in response to this tragedy, it's clear the universities have a critical role," he continues. "We want intelligent assessments of policy in order to have a reasonable chance of success."

George Wright, a political science professor at California State University at Chico, got a firsthand look at what controversial views could yield when he spoke out in the wake of the attacks.

Standing among about 400 assembled at the Free Speech Area on campus, the veteran political science professor - a specialist in third-world political systems, including Marxism - stepped forward.

First, he called the Sept. 11 attacks a "crime against humanity" - to audience approval. But then he castigated United States foreign policy - an area he has written about for three decades.

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