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From: tato@midway.uchicago.EDU (Hector Ruben Cordero-Guzman)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: "64 cents!" (Was Re: The problem in academia)
Message-ID: <1991Apr26.045230.6765@midway.uchicago.edu>
Date: 26 Apr 91 14:52:03 GMT
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dgross@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Dave Gross) writes:

>Hillel's idea of affirmative action by income level rather than race
>seems to be picking up steam.

This is appealing but too simplistic. There is no doubt that
socio-economic class background determines (in the loose sense) access
to opportunities in the educational system and rewards in the labor
market.  However, there is also substantial evidence that race and
gender have an effect, independent of that of socio-economic class
alone, in shaping the structure of individual opportunities. To be
poor is one thing; to be poor and a woman is another; to be poor and
to be a woman and [sic] to be black is altogether different. I trust
you recognize the differences.

>Dinesh D'Souza has just released a very
>good book called "Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on
>Campus"

I did not like the book. It was badly researched, unneccesarily
rhetorical, and excessively anecdotal.

>which spends a lot of time analyzing how affirmative action
>has been used in university admission policies, and how this has led
>to a number of problems (one of the most critical of which is that
>people admitted with less academic preparation because their race was
>considered more important than their college prep GPA often fail
>academically when competing with peers who are more prepared).

I disagree. He does not analyze the admissions standards of all of the
colleges in the US, or a representative sample thereof, nor does he
analyze their affirmative action policies. He does interview one or
another administrator at one or another school. That is very weak
evidence.  It is, at best, a collection of plausible scenarios that
are, and should be, more closely examined and debated. This book,
though, is crude.

For example, D'Souza relates that in an interview with `two women
activists' from the university of Michigan he asked if either one knew
about Mill. Neither did. D'Souza infers that the fact that this women
took `Feminist Theory' instead of, say, `Brittish Political
Philosophy' and therefore were unaware of Mill, is evidence that they
are taking easier courses...

On the question of `failure' he offers no evidence. He does not show
that people admitted under `affirmative action programs' fail at a
rate higher than those who were not (partly because he does not have
any evidence on who was admitted under an `affirmative action program'
see above); nor does he prove that minorities and women who finish
college are `less prepared' (define that losely) than the comparison
group (white males?). BTW, do you know if students in IVY schools are
given preferential treatment if they are sons and daughters of alumni?

What D'Souza shows throughout the book is considerable disdain and
condecension towards blacks, latinos, homosexuals and women. Again, I
do recognize that socio-economic class is not only important but
central in determining who goes and who does not go to college and I
agree with those who suggest that we have to be vigorous in ensuring
that *everyone* has access to college. However it is also important to
keep in mind that women experience the gendered nature of the academy
and confront it in ways different than those of males.  the same thing
can be said abot the experiances of different racial groups. what is
important is the need to drecognize that each of this factors has a
particular effect which has to be taken into account and debated in
its own terms. Pursuing a vigorous policy against racism in no way
precludes pursuing a vigorous policy against harrasment. D'Souza
ignores both by shifting the debate to whether `these people' are
qualified to be in the academy in the first place. Its a nice trick
but I'm afraid it will not work.

>
>Anyway, in his brief conclusion, D'Souza proposes basically that we
>eliminate affirmative action on the basis of race and sex, and
>institute it where it makes more sense.  Specifically, for university
>admissions, recognize that getting an 'X' on the SAT verbal means one
>thing if the student went to a school in a wealthy district and had
>enough $$ to take "How to whiz the SAT" courses; and means another if
>the student had to work full time in high school, and went to an
>inner-city school in a poorer district.
>

This could be an argument for eliminating SAT's altogether. If the
best thing we learn from the SAT is the school that one went to, or
whether ones parents had money to buy one a computer, or whether one
goes to segregated inner-city schools; why bother with the test?  Why
don't we just go ahead, make the rich (disproportionately white and
disproportionately male) pay more taxes to hire more teachers, improve
the buildings, provide bilingual education, provide financial aid for
college, and make them points of light shine?  or do `we' need another
excuse to keep excluding black, latinos, women, and the
disproportionate number of poor among them from access to equal
opportunity?--after all if the test say `they' are not qualified to be
in college it has to be true...`they' must not be...

We have a fairly good idea of what the predictors of college
attainment are. Again, I agree that economic class is central but how
is that an argument or a policy to eliminate gender and racial
exclusion? Are you saying that SAT's are biased in terms of social
class (and by bias I mean that a given score does not predict the
performace of one group as well as that of another not that the
probability of getting one score versus another differs by group) but
not in terms of gender and race? Does D'Souza present any kind of
evidence to this effect? I might have missed it.

D'souza's argument is that women and latinos are not qualified and
their continued visibility in the campuses is evidence of the
deterioration of admissions standards. This is inane. His inferences
do not come from carefull research and they do not reflect the
available data. He trivializes what is a very complex problem (viz.
the interaction between gender, economic and racial stratification and
demographic changes in the composition of the student population) and
makes the sweeping suggestion that the observed inequality in outcomes
is more a function of what women, and persons of color, don't posses
(SAT's) rather than a function of a long standing and well entrenched
practice of subordination and exclusion of minorities and women from
`high places'. Affirmative Action, which is a policy about ensuring
access, not bending relvant standards, is attacked under the argument
that any possible way on actively ensuring access- by neccessity-
`bends standards'.

One can either question the capacity of blacks, latinos, and women to
fill a proportional number of positions in the academy or, in the
absence of proportionality, one can question whether it is the
criteria used to allocate people into positions in the labor market
that is itself suspect and should be more carefully examined.

C'mon, just look around:
University presidents, deans, tenured professors, graduate students.
Do you see the pattern, notice the predominance of a certain color and
a certain gender and a certain `class background'? is this pattern due
to the fact that blacks, latinos, and women are less qualified???
D'Souza answer is yes. I think otherwise.

>In any case, the book is a good read and has some fine critiques and
>ideas.
>

I disagree. The book a racist and sexist attack on the increasing
presence of women and minorities in the academy. Netters should read
for themselves.  Another one in the long history of apologetic books
put out by professional ideologues that confuse the interaction
between individual and society and end up blaming the victim while
attempting to appear victimized.

 "don't believe the hype"...

tato@ellis.uchicago.edu

The Gems of Western Thought I
(Aristotle teaches on power hierarchies with the aid of convoluted logic):

" Also, as regards male and female, the former is superior, the
latter is inferior; the male is ruler, the female is subject. "
			- Bk. I, ch. 4 1254b, lines 10-15
                          Aristotle's Poetics