Posted on 08/23/2005 8:47:51 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
DENVER (AP) - The University of Colorado has dropped its investigation into the American Indian heritage of the professor who came under fire for likening Sept. 11 victims to an infamous Nazi, the professor himself says.
A letter from the university dated Friday said a faculty panel decided to drop the matter, Ward Churchill said Monday.
"There's no basis to proceed," Churchill quoted the letter as saying, later adding: "It should have never been an issue".
"It can be taken as that 'we're not functioning as boards of racial purity with a board of white guys that sit around and decide who's an Indian and who's not.'"
University spokeswoman Pauline Hale said the panel's work is confidential and declined to comment on the story, first reported by KUSA-TV. The subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Research Misconduct was close to finishing its work, Hale said.
Churchill, a tenured professor of ethnic studies, wrote an essay shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks comparing some World Trade Center victims to Adolf Eichmann, one of the Nazis who orchestrated the Holocaust. The essay drew scant attention until earlier this year, when Churchill was invited to speak at a college in upstate New York.
He has refused to retract the statement but said he wishes he had phrased it differently.
CU leaders said he couldn't be fired over the Sept. 11 statements because of First Amendment protections, but they ordered the faculty panel to review allegations of plagiarism and false claims of Indian background to give his research more credibility.
"You've got essentially, a gaggle of white guys out there trying to discredit me and the worst they can do is call me a white guy," he said in a phone interview with The Associated Press.
He also has said his mother and grandmother told him he was part Indian, and he thought of himself that way while growing up in Illinois.
In his response to the plagiarism allegations, Churchill's lawyer, David Lane, has said that in one instance the professor simply took articles written by other people and put them together for a chapter of one book, which Churchill did not take credit for.
In at least two other cases Lane has said Churchill wrote articles and gave them to others who took credit for them.
"You've got essentially, a gaggle of white guys out there trying to discredit me and the worst they can do is call me a white guy," he said in a phone interview with The Associated Press.
He also has said his mother and grandmother told him he was part Indian, and he thought of himself that way while growing up in Illinois.
Colorado caved as predicted.
anyone who leaves their kids enrolled at that place deserves the little mushheads they get on graduation day. :)
"Colorado caved as predicted."
Yep, I will never voluntarily set foot in that state.
In other words, the state of Colorado can offer his alleged heritage as a qualification which enhances his thin resume, but they refuse to investigate this falsification of his resume.
Catch 22 all over again.
Proof that tenure is a license to lie at taxpayers' expense.
Glad that's settled then.
Anyone who wants to be an Indian, can be. All you have to do is say so.
I'll remember this when my kids apply for college.
He's probably one-sixteenth, or some small percentage. That's what's so silly about racial qualifications.
Anyone remember that guy in True Romance? The guy with the dreadlocks?
He reminds me of Ward Churchill.
If this hate America first wingnut can claim Indian heritag...from now on I am checking African American on all forms(I'm white). Apparantly in this country we now ARE what we claim we are and facts do not enter in to it.
"Of course, race based admissions and race based scholarships shall continue as before. We may not be purists, but we sure aint crazy enough to stop the gravy train for non-whites."
... said the white guy who decided he was an Indian.
" I'll remember this when my kids apply for college."
Me too! I was born here. My ancestors for many generations(since the 1600's) were born here. When asked, I say I am a native American. Its funny, people bend over backward until they spot my sarcasm, then they get a little mad, feeling they have been had and that I am somehow unsensitive and not PC. I love it!
Any "school" that would grant tenure to Ward Churchill is not a serious research University. The University of Colorado will NEVER live this down.
Deep Hoop
AMDG
In that case, I'm an Indian. Doesn't matter if I look so white that I'm translucent, cuz nobody's going to sit in judgement of my racial purity. Get out of the way while I grade this site for my casino.
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