He’s written some very good and influential stuff, most of it to do with indigenous history and the perception of Native peoples. For example, his Fantasies of the Master Race has changed the way (very) allegedly pro-Native films like Black Robe and Dances with Wolves are presented in film classes. Kill the Indian, Save the Man is an excellent work on the cultural genocide inherent in 19th century Native boarding schools (Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, KS, where I live, is one such institution rescued from its past and now serves as a locus for preserving and teaching about Native history). The other two works of his that I’ve read, aside from Pacifism as Pathology which I also recommend, are Agents of Repression and The COINTELPRO Papers, both coauthored with Jim vander Wall. I’d recommend both of them, the former for a general history, and the latter for the documentary evidence. The authorship in that one is mainly confined to setting the context for the reproduced COINTELPRO memos, so reading Agents of Repression first would be best.

While talk about “privileging one narrative over another” parses out to so much gobbledygook in the end,

Well, consider it my way of euphemistically saying that everything prior to the mid-twentieth century in any historical-cultural field within the framework of Western scholarship–so far as I have sufficient background in to make a judgment (Arab history, the history and philosophy of science, etc.)–is arrant bullshit. ;-)

Wow, this is incoherent. Granted, it’s difficult to make sense of nonsense, which is what the original charges are, but charitably one could say that this conflates a lot of the charges while adding some which are simply false. So let’s break it down.

Actually, it was his academic writing which was the problem.

This is substantively false with respect to the plagiarism charge, which I was addressing (“The charges of ‘plagiarism’, as I understand it, stem from his non-academic writing…”). I have the greatest respect for Z Magazine, but I’m in no danger of confusing it with a scholarly journal as you are doing.

He wrote essays under different names.

He ghostwrote works under the names of fellow activists in the indigenous rights movement. This is not ‘plagiarism’ by any stretch of the imagination. It’s not even punishable by any reasonable set of scholarly standards, which is a good thing. This isn’t academic for me, because I’ve ghostwritten works before, in a more formal setting where my ghostwriting was contractually considered “work product” to which I had no rights, and furthermore I’m even barred from disclosing the names of the people for whom I did the ghostwriting. If this charge is allowed to stand in academia, then any manner of dishonesty could be imputed to me and I’d be completely unable to defend myself lest I get sued.

with faked data, then footnoted those essays as proof in his own works.

No, the data which he footnoted wasn’t faked. Sorry. The report cites two footnotes, one each in separate papers of 118 and 189 footnotes to the same paper, “The Demography of Native North America”. In both cases, this is simply used as a convenient citation to the size of the North American Native population. There is no thesis or even sub-thesis in either paper for which this demographic information is vital, so it cannot be adduced as “proof” of anything, and the data is entirely legitimate anyway.

What you are conflating with the issues of the footnotes, I would assume, are the four charges of “fabrication” surrounding such things as the Dawes Severalty Act. Unfortunately, the report itself (not just the summary you linked to) is chock full of errors of fact which, if given the uncharitable reading that Churchill’s work was subjected to, would be grounds for firing in itself.

For example: “The evidence indicates that during the allotment period, for a brief three-year window from 1917 to 1920, a half-blood quantum test was employed, albeit not for the purpose that Professor Churchill claims.”

The 1917 date was the date when the quantum test was specifically written into the law via an amendment. I’ll leave the last clause alone, because a panel which contains no experts in indigenous studies are in no position to assess what the purpose of the Dawes Severalty Act was in the first place (and it was supposedly beyond their scope as well–the fact that this was ignored shows the adversarial, kangaroo court nature of the proceedings).

However, it seems to be a basic issue of fact that the blood quantum test didn’t exist as part and parcel of the implementation of the Dawes Act. Is that accurate?

Sadly, no!

At that link, you’ll see that the card is marked as being a card used in the Dawes’ Roll, which was used to implement the Dawes Severalty Act (“The rolls were needed to assign the allotments and to provide an equitable division of all monies obtained.”), that it dates from 1903, fourteen years before the date claimed by the committee, and that it has a blood quantum test as part of its form. The man is a 1/4 Cherokee, his wife is “I.W.”–intermarried white–and the three children are therefore 1/8 Cherokee.

Documentary evidence like this would have caused honest scholars to say that Churchill was brilliantly vindicated, or caused a more abashed scholar to simply shut up and slink away, but they ignored this readily available data and lied instead because they had an agenda to serve.

The other charges are of the same calibre. For example, in the Fort Clark discussion, they accuse him of citing footnotes which do not prove his case when they were introduced in a context where they were serving as general background information, not as proof of any case. Which is, again, something that could be used of any scholar. Take for example, from my field, your average peer reviewed research paper. The research paper will introduce conclusions whose empirical basis are not the papers being footnoted. Why is that? Because the research data forms the basis for the conclusions, and the footnotes are there to establish the ‘sides’ of any controversy if it exists and provide general background for the experiment. Again, if this is allowed to stand, I too could be accused of “fabrication” simply by following the standard approach to research papers in my discipline.

Sorry, but THAT is worth being fired.

Not only is it not worth being fired for, the tendentiousness of the criticism shows how careful a scholar Churchill actually is. With a publication record like his, a genuinely sloppy approach to scholarship should yield dozens of malefactions. Just compare to the crap peddled by Michael Behe, another tenured professor, as a for instance. Or any of the names I mentioned in my previous post, all of whom commit far more egregious sins against scholarship than Churchill has even been accused of.

Well, he wasn’t fired for saying something controversial.

Point 1 – It wasn’t about his speech. What happened was that he was asked to speak at some college nobody ever heard of, and someone there dredged up the fact that he published a paper SEVERAL MONTHS PRIOR in some journal that nobody ever reads where he WROTE something controversial.

Point 2 – he was fired for supposedly committing fraudulent research and plagarism. Would he have been investigated had he not been focused on because of point ? Probably not. However, if he really was doing this, its worth losing tenure for.

Point 3 – As Jillian points out Academic freedom has done a fairly good job of holding its own these last seven years, unlike every other abstract value this country supposedly held near and dear. Even with this black eye, it’s still doing better than, say, rule of law or innocent until proven guilty. If his academic peers followed the university’s due process and made this decision legitimately, I’m cool with it. Think of the hue and cry that happens all the time – see: Anita Hill – and university administrations hold fast and support the faculty member. Just like it isw ith the Rep. Jeffersons of the world, I am not interested in defending the bad apples who happen to be on our side.

“ward, have you seen the beaver?”

I think it makes you a little eichmann…

mikey

Look, do you want to marry a box turtle or don’t you?

http://www.colorado.edu/news/reports/churchill/download/ChurchillStandingCmteReport.pdf

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=1429470#1432194

But they got their scalp, and I hope they’re happy with it. Academic freedom has done a fairly good job of holding its own these last seven years, unlike every other abstract value this country supposedly held near and dear. Even with this black eye, it’s still doing better than, say, rule of law or innocent until proven guilty. It’s going to be interesting to see what foundational values remain in even a skeletal form come 2009, and how many of them we’ll be able to revive.

I’m not optimistic, and this is overall a bad sign.

Start with Pacificism as Pathology. It’s a teeny little book,it’ll give you a little peek into what he writes. Genocide and ethnic studies/histories are mostly his thing.

The essay the wingnuts lost their shit over is in the book On The Justice of Roosting Chickens(there’s subtitles to all this books,look ‘em up on Amazon)

Very true Mikey. An even more taboo subject is USA State terrorism, such as Nicaragua.

As long as understanding the cause is not permitted, no solution will ever be offered, so we might as well blunder around the planet in heavily armed stealthy armored weapons systems, methodically wrecking one country after the next because, hell, what other range of responses are even available to us???

mikey