Different Experiences Necessarily Inform Debate

To the editors:

As a student interested in intellectual growth and academic dialogue, I am particularly disheartened by Adam Kovacevich's "As an X, I feel Y" (Opinion, March 15). Kovacevich argues that the introduction of identity, particularly gender and ethnicity, into academic discourse "can be lethal to informed and penetrating scholarly inquiry." This criticism on the part of a white male, who can easily ignore his gender and ethnicity in all aspects of his daily life, to be a patronizing example of what Jean-Paul Sartre describes as "condescending liberalism."

Kovacevich's opinion is frighteningly misguided in its approach to scholarship. As academics we are engaged in a quest for understanding the world, reality and truth. To be sure, Kovacevich is not so nave as to think that his reality, his daily experiences, are the same as those of a black man or a Latina. But it is frighteningly nave for a government concentrator to assume that daily experiences have nothing to do with important academic investigations.

While I agree with the underlying idea that statements in the classroom must be contested and that timely liberalism is a respectable project, Kovacevich's "condescending liberal" attitude only ignores and at worst reinforces racism in society.

Until historically constructed and socio-economically damaging distinctions can be fully recognized and remedied, a blind faith in the noble "modern liberal tradition" will continue to do as much damage to minority rights and to the search for academic truth as it will contribute to the building of a better society.

David Edeli '99

March 16, 1999

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