Rasmusen Weblog

"The university should have looked at MEALAC five or ten years ago," says Richard Bulliet, a historian and colleague of Khalidi’s. "It’s become locked into a postmodernist, postcolonialist point of view, one that wasn’t necessarily well adapted to giving students instruction about the Middle East." He adds that politicizing a curriculum, or what some call "advocacy teaching," isn’t always a bad thing. "We’ve had advocacy in the classroom for a long time," he says. "But in the areas where it’s most visible, like black studies and women’s studies, the point of view tends to coincide with the outlook of the Columbia community--no one feels you have to give the slaveholder’s or male-chauvinist pig’s point of view." He pauses for emphasis. "But here," he concludes, "we have an area where no consensus exists. And that’s the problem."