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DearProfessorMoglenAnOpenLetter 30 - 10 Apr 2010 - Main.DanKarmel
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| | Dear Professor Moglen,
I am writing this letter because I think you provide a vital voice to the Columbia Law School community, and because the time you devote to students in office hours and the work you do on the wiki is more than commendable and should be more common. However, though you are one of the most engaging and dedicated professors I have encountered at CLS thus far, its not all just peachy. | | | | |
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> | At the risk of appearing to backtrack, to say that I wish you were different is to interpret my post stronger than it was intended. I have never been personally offended by your in-class demeanor - I actually find it fairly enjoyable. I was just weighing in on a couple issues that are important to many in our class, and considering out loud whether the particular balance you have chosen is the most effective means to what I believe are your goals. The most important part of my post, and what several others have touched on, is that it's obvious to me that you care about your students, and that your objective is to help us grow as lawyers and as people. And I certainly don't think the best way to further that objective is to take it easy on us and tell us how wonderful we are no matter what. That said, there certainly are people in the class who do get personally offended, and I know at least one student who would have taken the class but for the fear of being publicly edited in scary red text. Again, I'm not saying your approach is improper or that it should change. But, like anything else, it's worth acknowledging considerations in every direction which inform our attempt to find the ideal balance.
That you are sometimes dismissive of students' arguments is a separate issue, where the admitted value of blunt and honest feedback doesn't appear to offer the same justification. However, given what I believe your objectives to be, I am open to and attempted to explore reasons why you may believe this is sometimes the best approach. One idea I suggested was that it forces us to confront the issues personally and for a longer period of time. Another possible argument is that you have 75 students in a class for less than 3 hours a week, and that requires you to be somewhat selective about where you allow our class discussions to go. If there is something we really want to talk about, we can always bring it up in one of our papers. I was not in class the first day because I switched from a different elective, but if you offered your own explanation for why you sometimes cut students off, as opposed to giving them a blunt and honest rebuttal, I would be interested in hearing what you have to say about it.
And my comment about 'jejune' was intended to be lighthearted, I hope it came across as such. It's often hard to convey such nuances in text, scary or otherwise.
-- DanKarmel - 10 Apr 2010 | | | I think a useful frame for understanding Eben’s pedagogy is hacking. No, I don’t mean with a machete, or even necessarily just computer stuff. I mean it in the broadest sense, of solving problems by manipulating systems to produce unexpected results.
In his teaching, Eben performs a counternarrative to the dominant narrative Jessica and others discuss above. I think part of what some have reacted to negatively is this: Eben’s “tough love” radical counternarrative ironically can sometimes feel similar to the traditional narrative of law school: pointed criticism from a charismatic, impeccably credentialed sage on the stage. I don’t think Eben is going for that effect, but the parallels and the social valence remain nonetheless. |
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