Heterodox at USC Newsletter #9

Reporting back from the recent Heterodox Academy conference in Chicago.

A panel discussion with university presidents on the loss of public trust in the university. You can watch the panel here.

Members of the Heterodox at USC group recently attended the Heterodox Academy conference in Chicago, thanks to generous funding from a donor. It was productive and inspiring and we were able to connect with lots of colleagues, including some from Occidental, UC Riverside and CSU San Bernardino. We’re hoping to host an informal gathering for SoCal HxA members at some point soon.

There seems to be increasing momentum and enthusiasm for the HxA way of thinking. HxA membership has grown by 47% since 2022 and the organization now has over 6,000 members.

We’re in the process of applying to form an official Heterodox Academy campus chapter at USC this summer. If you’re interested in joining this effort, please reach out to us at heterodox.usc@gmail.com. It’s helpful for our application if we have more faculty and staff as official members of HxA. If you’re a newsletter reader and a USC faculty or staff member, but not yet a member, please join HxA (it’s free!).

Below, you’ll find an assortment of resources, ideas and takeaways from the conference which we hope you’ll find helpful.

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Photo by Christin Hume on Unsplash

Writing for the Public

Sociologist and prolific writer Musa al-Gharbi led a helpful workshop on on writing for a general audience, which is very different than writing for fellow scholars and requires a different set of skills.

We need more heterodox scholars out there writing for the public, to help push back against one-sided or nonfactual op-eds and articles produced en masse by many others in the academy. This writing does not even need to focus necessarily on culture war topics. Cogent, intelligent writing by academics that is not ideological in nature, and which demonstrates viewpoint diversity to the public, could be one way to help correct the trend of rapidly rising mistrust in the academy.

A few takeaways:

• Keep the length to 700 to max 1,200 words. It’s unlikely an editor will take anything longer. You can always cut up longer essays and rework them into two or three different pieces, to be pitched separately.

• Think of your audience as an intelligent, undergraduate reader. Dense scholarly language is off-putting for an editor, but they also expect academics to be writing for a slightly more educated audience than a standard reader.

• Read what’s already been written in major publications on your given topic before submitting a pitch.

• Rather than writing to respond to the news, try writing a bit “off-cycle”. Editors get a hundred pitches around trending topics.

• Put whatever point you’re trying to make at the very top. Each paragraph of the article should then add on to that point. Most editors (and readers) do not read all the way to the bottom, so you need to hook them early.

• Rejection is the standard, and is not an indication that your article isn’t good. Have plans A,B,C and D for where else to pitch something.

All of al-Gharbi’s tips can be found here»

Want to get started writing for the public? Our newsletter takes submissions! The Heterodox Academy also has a blog open for submissions from its members.

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Photo by Shelagh Murphy on Unsplash

Encouraging Debate and Constructive Disagreement

Various panels discussed the importance of civil disagreement, how to instill tolerance for dissenting opinions in students, and how to conduct debates and discussions around challenging issues in productive ways.

Reacting to the Past: In these immersive, semester-long role-playing games, students assume the roles of historical characters to practice critical thinking, primary source analysis, and written and oral argument skills.

There’s many game topics to choose from, like the Council of Nicaea, the French Revolution and the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Students are sometimes required to assume roles they may personally disagree with (anti-Catholic or pro-slavery for example), but the leaders of this workshop stated they’d so far not had a student refuse to take on a given role.

These can be used in first year GE classes, honors classes, and in a regular lecture class. This website contains lost of information on how to start this sort of lesson plan. There is also a Facebook lounge for faculty interested in the games. They host an annual conference, coming up this year in July in Kansas.

Citizen Deliberation: Martin Carcasson leads The Center for Public Deliberation at Colorado State University. He helps communities host civil and informative discussions on controversial topics such as land use decisions and city budgets. You can see resources on his approach and methodology in this Google Doc.

If your department or center is looking to work through decisions which involve many stakeholders, give these resources a read for some guidance on doing it well.

More tips:

• One professor mentioned the importance of recognizing and praising students who exhibit intellectual humility--i.e., those who admit they don't know, aren't certain, or change their minds.

• Another professor presented evidence that exposure to different ideas and the evidence for them improves LSAT scores even though the ideas aren't related to material on that particular exam. He also encourages students to draw out their arguments--and others--as a way to engage cognitively. There's even software for it!

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Photo by Scott Graham on Unsplash

How to Replace Diversity Statements with Service Statements

Diversity statements have long been a parody of “performative dishonesty” but getting your department to stop requiring them can be hard. Two panelists discussed their success at getting their university to abandon these statements in favor of “service statements.”

These invite applicants to explain how they’ve contributed meaningful service hours to their previous institution, encompassing a much broader range of activities. It also showcases something which actually counts towards tenure. This sort of statement can still allow candidates to highlight DEI related work, if they wish.

You can read about their work in more detail here. A few tips:

1. Conduct one-on-one discussions with individual colleagues to understand their concerns and feel out how you might accommodate them, before asking for a vote.

2. Don’t give up. The first vote over their proposed policy change did not pass. The second one did, after these one-on-one discussions.

3. Although not mentioned in their article, an anonymous voting system might be easier at collecting the support you need. Peer pressure can deter many from voting the way they actually wish.

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Photo by Clem Onojeghuo on Unsplash

Resisting Ideological Takeover on Campus:

A number of panels discussed successes in pushing back against discriminatory hiring practices and ideological takeovers within the academy. Here are some takeaways for what they’ve found to be effective:

• Just forming an official Heterodox Academy Chapter (We’re working on it!) and making the university aware of dissenting voices can help it from drifting too far into absurdity.

• Concerned faculty should show up at every university-wide meeting and town hall event, prepared to ask questions, and offer dissenting opinions.

• Review and submit comments on all policy documents created by the university.

• Befriend lawyers who can help review DEI policies and documents for legality. (Any lawyers in the audience want to volunteer??)

• Familiarize yourself with county, state and federal legislation regarding DEI and academic freedom rules. Raise concerns when things pushed by the university violate these rules.

• Be consistent with messaging. Speak out against all incursions into academic freedom on campus, even if you disagree with the censured message.

• Keep everything in writing.

We’re looking for more helpers on all of the above for this upcoming academic year. If you’re interested in helping out, please contact us at heterodox.usc@gmail.com.

Book Suggestions:

A few book suggestions from panelists and conversations with fellow attendees:

Against Empathy: The Case for Radical Compassion by Paul Bloom

The Great American University: Its Rise to Preeminence, Its Indispensable National Role, Why It Must Be Protected by Jonathan R. Cole

Academic Freedom and the Modern University: The Experience of the University of Chicago by John Boyer

Hate Speech and Academic Freedom by Cary Nelson

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If you have suggestions for things you’d like us to cover, feedback on our newsletter, or want to get more involved with Heterodox at USC please contact us at heterodox.usc@gmail.com. Fight On!