Posted on 06/22/2006 9:05:13 AM PDT by JSedreporter
The majority of the University of Colorado committee investigating ethnic studies professor Ward Churchill recommended firing him for academic misconduct on June 13. Churchill is most famous for calling the victims of terrorist attacks upon the World Trade Center “Little Eichmanns.”
The committee investigated seven separate allegations concerning Churchill’s academic misconduct: Misrepresentation of General Allotment Act of 1887 (A), Misrepresentation of the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 (B), Captain John Smith and Smallpox in New England (C), Smallpox Epidemic at Fort Clark and Beyond (D), Plagiarism of a Pamphlet by the Dam the Dams Group (E), Plagiarism of Professor Rebecca Robbins (F) and Plagiarism of Professor Fay G. Cohen (G).
The committee found Churchill guilty on all accounts, except for the plagiarism of Professor Rebecca Robbins. In the report, Churchill says that he is the original author of the work published as that of Rebecca Robbins and that he often publishes written work under “pseudonyms,” which sometimes are the names of living people, as is so in this case. Though he managed to avoid a plagiarism accusation in this instance, his behavior qualifies as a form of academic misconduct because he failed “to comply with established standards regarding author names on publications.”
Such patterns of academic misconduct were found to be commonplace among Churchill’s work by the committee. In Allegation A, Professor John P. LaVelle from the University of New Mexico Law School alleged that Churchill misrepresented the contents of the General Allotment Act of 1887 (“Dawes Act”). The claims that Churchill made about the act were found “literally incorrect” and his labeling of “the General Allotment Act of 1887 as a federal ‘eugenics code’ falsely implies enforced legal racial separation, while the entire history of the [act] demonstrates that its point and purpose was to fully integrate and assimilate American Indians into non-Indian society, often against their will.” Even with the supporting evidence against Churchill’s false claims about the General Allotment Act of 1887, he remained steadfast and attempted to defend them to the committee, according to the May 9 report.
Churchill misrepresents another act in Allegation B, this time claiming that there is an Indian “blood quantum” requirement specified in the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990. “Moreover, Churchill has again compounded this misrepresentation by citing his own writings as if they were independent third-party sources written by others,” the committee concluded in the report. “This misrepresentation was not scholarly error but serious research misconduct and part of a general pattern of such misconduct in support of his political views.”
Allegation C disproves Churchill’s claim that Europeans, namely John Smith, “intentionally introduced the smallpox virus to Native American tribes as part of a larger effort that [he] contends should be called ‘genocide.’” The committee found that “there is no clear evidence about the exact nature of the epidemic and nothing that points specifically to smallpox” or to John Smith.
Allegation D also concerns the deliberate spread of smallpox, but more specifically, that the U.S. Army spread the disease to Mandan Indians living near Fort Clark in 1837, using infected blankets taken from a military infirmary in St. Louis. Churchill repeatedly misrepresents his sources to support his false claims about the smallpox epidemic among the Mandan Indians and frequently provides no references for these claims.
Katherine Duncan is an intern with Accuracy in Academia.
I see they didn't investigate his plagiarism of artwork. I guess he is a cheat and liar both professionally and personally.
So when are they going to fire his a**?
Has he been fired yet, or has it just been recommended? If he's still there, it isn't closure.
I have not seen any (although there may be) REAL Indian tribes or representatives condemn Churchill for trying to pass himself off as a Indian. In effect, he is STEALING their identity. The position he occupies was, whether you agree with the policy or not, supposed to be reserved for a REAL Indian academic. Thus, he is stealing form the Indians twice. Where is the outrage? Where is the media to point out his blatant hypocrisy? Why have no students, liberal or conservative, demonstarted against this "injustice" to the native American peoples?.........................
I think the amazaing part is how far he got as a cheat and a liar. The guy was guaranteed a job for life. He was easily making over $65k a year as a tenued professor. He would have been easily in the $80k point by the time he retired. His pension from the state would have been easily $30k per year. All the idiot had to do is just keep pumping out bogus reports and making speeches...and never make really stupid comments in public. Most people would beg for a chance like that.
So what will become of the dude? I think he probably spent his income as it came into the pocket and the guy probably has less than $20k in his savings. He probably has found a wonderful lawyer who will take this case on and help him lose that $20k over two years...and never win. Churchill will likely end up in southern Mississippi one day at some community college that has classes at some prison...where he will teach inmates probably. It'll pay ok, and no one is going to remember this dude in five years.
"...Ward Churchill would do himself some good to express a profound apology to people he has offended and misled.
He should also come clean about his appropriated American Indian identity. "
http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096410293
He was making over $100,000 with full benefits, every holiday and the summer off and paid, plus...
when he was the department chair.
The conclusion one must draw from such examples isn't that every institution has its bad apples but rather that, at least in the liberal arts in America, moral turpitude and political hucksterism pervades higher education.
Radical criminals with questionable academic credentials flourish in a milieu that bristles with hostility toward real scholars who don't toe the party line—witness the case of former Harvard President Lawrence Summers.
Individuals with prison records or FBI rap sheets don't get into major educational institutions because they fudge their resumes.
They get in because they share the political dogmas of those who hire them—and they flourish for the same reason.
http://www.pirateballerina.com/blog/entry.php?id=397
moral turpitude and political hucksterism pervades higher education.
Tune in for Dan Rather at Harvard - "Churchill, the Sequel"
Can you just imagine how much time and money has been spent to get rid of this idiot and all by people who will consider themselves intellegent above all others . Wow !!!
The other Tenured Professors took out large newspaper ads and marched in support of Ward !
So? They're afraid to fire his sorry ass.
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