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[kedves]

Wasn't his tenure process more unusual than his being hired at all?  If this were an untenured professor, would the case be the same?

[larryc]

Churchill lacked a PhD and even a respectable MA, but he had a body of work and a national reputation in his field when he was hired.

Major universities typically require the terminal degree in a field before hiring someone into a TT position in that field.  Part of the reason for this is that there is then (in principle, at least) a full vetting of the person's academic abilities.  Obviously there are many examples in many schools where exceptions are made, but I do think that the school shares the blame when such a hire turns sour. - DvF

Fair enough--I would have hired him, you would not have hired him, and you would have been proven right in the end. It was not some outrageous and incompetent decision at the time, but it did turn out to be the wrong decision.

Can I still assign a couple of his essays? I don't think I can anymore.

[systeme_d_]

Can I still assign a couple of his essays? I don't think I can anymore.

This is a really good question.  I've been wrestling with it myself.  I think I still will, but only in a particular upper-level class wherein we examine the history of the study of Native American Religions.  In that context, we attend to issues of each author's positionality, etc.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Fair enough--I would have hired him, you would not have hired him, and you would have been proven right in the end. It was not some outrageous and incompetent decision at the time, but it did turn out to be the wrong decision.

Can I still assign a couple of his essays? I don't think I can anymore.

I'm not sure I wouldn't have hired him; as I say, there are exceptions to the "terminal degree in the field" rule, normally for exceptionally accomplished people in the field.  I don't know enough about Ethnic Studies to know whether he was that accomplished (or even what that would mean in that field).  My point was simply that if an institution does make such an exception, they have to take responsibility and accept their fair share of the blame if it goes wrong.  They don't get the usual cover that following correct process provides.

As for his essays, why not?  Just make sure attribution is correct, and that you include the same ethical background that you would include with essays from any other sleazebag. - DvF

[parispundit]

Controversial? Yes.  Scholar? No.

Surely he had to engage in scholarship to find all the right text to copy. 

You've got to be kidding. If a student who plagiarized told you that, would you accept it?

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Controversial? Yes.  Scholar? No.

Surely he had to engage in scholarship to find all the right text to copy. 

You've got to be kidding. If a student who plagiarized told you that, would you accept it?

Would I accept what, exactly?

Churchill is more complex than malbeerc's easy dismissal allows.  The fact that he evidently engaged in massive academic fraud does not negate the skills he does have. 

If an athlete uses performance-enhancing drugs to become a superstar contrary to his sport's rules, he should be thrown out of competition, and obviously isn't and wasn't not the superstar he was made out to be, but that doesn't mean he wasn't an athlete to begin with. - DvF

[parispundit]

Controversial? Yes.  Scholar? No.

Surely he had to engage in scholarship to find all the right text to copy. 

You've got to be kidding. If a student who plagiarized told you that, would you accept it?

Would I accept what, exactly?

oh, professor, I don't deserve to get an F on this paper. Sure, I plagiarized it all, but I had to spend a lot of time and work to get all that stuff. It didn't just come from one place, you know!" By me, what you said above is exactly the equivalent of that excellent excuse, and your analogy with steroids doesn't strengthen your case at all.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Controversial? Yes.  Scholar? No.

Surely he had to engage in scholarship to find all the right text to copy. 

You've got to be kidding. If a student who plagiarized told you that, would you accept it?

Would I accept what, exactly?

oh, professor, I don't deserve to get an F on this paper. Sure, I plagiarized it all, but I had to spend a lot of time and work to get all that stuff. It didn't just come from one place, you know!" By me, what you said above is exactly the equivalent of that excellent excuse, and your analogy with steroids doesn't strengthen your case at all.

They are not equivalent at all.  The student in question deserves an F, as he didn't do the assignment.

Churchill deserves to have his position revoked, as long as the revocation is clearly for the academic malfeasance and not for his subsequent speech.

As for my analogy, I can offer it to you, but I can't understand it for you.  - DvF

[parispundit]

Controversial? Yes.  Scholar? No.

Surely he had to engage in scholarship to find all the right text to copy. 

You've got to be kidding. If a student who plagiarized told you that, would you accept it?

Would I accept what, exactly?

oh, professor, I don't deserve to get an F on this paper. Sure, I plagiarized it all, but I had to spend a lot of time and work to get all that stuff. It didn't just come from one place, you know!" By me, what you said above is exactly the equivalent of that excellent excuse, and your analogy with steroids doesn't strengthen your case at all.

They are not equivalent at all.  The student in question deserves an F, as he didn't do the assignment.

Churchill deserves to have his position revoked, as long as the revocation is clearly for the academic malfeasance and not for his subsequent speech.

As for my analogy, I can offer it to you, but I can't understand it for you.  - DvF

Then let me explain it to you. Once you know an athlete has taken steroids, you never know, really, when she/he started. In other words, you will never know if they ever had any real athletic ability to begin with, although your post argues that they must have. The same goes for plagiarizing scholars and students.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Then let me explain it to you. Once you know an athlete has taken steroids, you never know, really, when she/he started. In other words, you will never know if they ever had any real athletic ability to begin with

Ah, now I understand.  You imagine there have been athletic superstars who had no athletic abilities before taking their performance-enhancing drugs. Do you have any examples? - DvF

[parispundit]

Baseball middle-relief pitchers, who got to be middle-relievers by taking steroids. There were about a dozen or more of these, Scott Schoenweis comes to mind. No serious athletic ability without cheating.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

No serious athletic ability without cheating.

You must be a better baseball player than I am.  In my book, being a  college All-American (Schoenweis) already indicates "serious athletic ability", and I would guess that few if any of the pitchers you mention were doing drugs before making it onto at least a minor league team. - DvF

[parispundit]

No serious athletic ability without cheating.

You must be a better baseball player than I am.  In my book, being a  college All-American (Schoenweis) already indicates "serious athletic ability", and I would guess that few if any of the pitchers you mention were doing drugs before making it onto at least a minor league team. - DvF

If you believe that about college players, I have a bridge to sell. I forget who wrote a book about steroids and high school weight lifters and wrestlers

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Have it your way then: many middle relief pitchers were sunken-chested D&D-playing wimps with no athletic ability before they started taking steroids in high school, after which they catapulted to pro stardom.  This sounds implaudible to me, but if you want to go with that, then so be it.

Churchill has "authored" over a dozen books and scads of essays.  We now know that a fair fraction of these works were copied from somewhere else or simply falsified.  The CU investigators described his work as "synthesis and reinterpretation, drawing upon studies by other scholars, not monographs describing new research based on primary sources."  I don't think that you can carry out academic fraud at this level without having fairly strong scholarly talent. 

Even if only 10% of his work was original, that would be enough in isolation for tenure at many universities (perhaps not R1s).  That doesn't mean that the rest of what he did doesn't completely negate any claim he might have for suitability as a university professor, but I think it is simplistic to say that he wasn't a scholar. - DvF

[euro_trash]

Churchill is an idiot and scapegoat.