By Rodolfo F. Acuña
September 17, 2014
There has been a lot of talk as of
late about “civility.” Indeed there are academicians who are doing a thriving
business conducting workshops with the full support of administration and its
cheerleaders who equate the lack of civility to school yard bullying, mixing
the proverbial apples and oranges.
However, the meaning of civility
is much deeper; it involves much more than politeness. The intent of the
campaign is to silence dissent. The frivolous finger wagging distracts from the
important role of power in bullying and trivializes its viciousness and
seriousness.
Proponents rationalize that
politeness is necessary for collegial communication and to lay down the ground
rules for disagreeing in a civil matter. According to them, civility is
essential to finding common ground. This sounds great but it assumes that both
sides want to listen to each other as equals and that there is the possibility
of common ground. The truth be told, the hierarchical nature of academe makes
this sort of communication impossible.
After listening to the dialogue on
civility at California State University Northridge, I have come to the
conclusion that there is not very much analysis or thought on the topic and
that the narrative is being spun by administrators and partisans who do not
want to deal with criticism. A major issue at CSUN is a lack of racial
diversity on the faculty.
It is a crude effort at social
control – an attempt to regulate behavior and feed the ambitions of those at
the top. At its most basic level culture controls us; in turn popular opinion
defines what is right and wrong. The present campaign on civility is part of an
effort to impose conformity and silence dissent.
In order for civility to exist it
must begin from the bottom. If not the university becomes a caste system with
students subservient to professors, professors to the dean and up the line to
the president. At each step, power is controlled by those at the higher level
with students and professors, according to their category, on the bottom.
From my perspective, an analysis
of the term civility has to be examined in context. Like racism and sexism
civility depends on power. Moreover, we are supposed to be scholars and the
current debate ignores tons of literature on racism and sexism. Bandied around
by pseudo scholars it diminishes the moral authority and meaning of the word
civility.
Recently the issue surfaced at the
National Association of Chicana and Chicano Studies’ call for papers. The
conference theme was “Exploring Civility within the Chicana & Chicano
Studies Discipline.” The pushback came as a surprise to many members since
these conferences are usually innocuous.
Sandra K. Soto, an Associate
Professor of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Arizona wrote an
open letter to the leadership of NACCS in which she recounted her twenty-five
year involvement and attacked the theme of “Exploring Civility” –saying the
call made “clear that the theme is not only promoting civility, but that it is
blaming human suffering, greed, union busting, and other forms of oppression on
a general sense of incivility, rather than say…capitalism, imperialism,
colonialism, genocide… or say—in this historical moment—that ‘disrespect for
authority has decreased the ability of individuals to follow laws’ is to verge
into the terrain of anti-Blackness.’”
Professor Soto went on to re-call
the history of the lack of civility in NACCS and how the militant conduct of
the Lesbian contingent forced changes and the formation of the Lesbian Caucus
in the 1980s. If “we had been ‘well-behaved, cultured, refined, enlightened,
polite, and developed’ (ser educado)—we probably wouldn’t even have had the
audacity to be out lesbians much less angry Chicana dykes demanding of space.
Thankfully we didn’t give into that ideology then. And I certainly don’t want
to now.”
The tempest sent some members back
to redrafting their papers to include the lack of civility of the U.S.’s quest
for global domination and the privatization of public institutions here and in
Latin America. More important critics criticized the call’s distortion of
civility by defining it as “ser educado” “[that] in Spanish means being
well-behaved, cultured, refined, enlightened, polite, and developed” – which
has always been definition of gente de razón.
What concerned me was not the
tempest, but that an organization that was founded on the burning ashes of the
1960s would resurrect this Porfirian notion. As scholars, members have the
responsibility of putting definitions into context. Language underlies
socialization and it is rooted in culture, and based on our learned experiences
that form our social and cultural identity.
As Michel Foucault wrote, “Neither
power nor knowledge nor any other reality is anything but a mere linguistic
construct.” In order to define civility Chicana/o scholars must deconstruct the
academy and its motives when using those words. Like the old colonial Mexican
casta system civility fixes everyone in their place.
In academe everything is advisory
to the president – who for all intents and purposes owns the plantation. The
overseer is the provost; he and his/her staff run the plantation often using
pan or palo, but more often through benevolence. On Mexican haciendas the
overseer became compadre to the peones establishing a fictional relationship
with them. In academe control is based on this pecking order of associates,
deans and lackeys. The lowest rung is occupied by students who don’t have anyone
to peck down on.
Like on the plantation the
illusion exists that everyone is part of a family or team. Their limited power
is based on how many they can peck down on. Students have few illusions whereas
professors are called “doctor”. They can grieve but they lack the deep pockets
of an institutional remedy.
Even if you want a simple audience
with those above you, access is limited by the one on the top. Nevertheless,
faculty is under the illusion that they are part of a governance process.
Similarly student government is controlled by the administration; only about 5
percent of the students vote in student government elections. They routinely
vote for university projects rubber stamping the administration’s wishes. The
only hope of breaking this cycle is to be uncivil.
Wanting to maintain this control,
administrators red-bait dissidents and shut them out. For over six months we
have been trying to get our side of the UNAM argument in print only to be shut
out of the student newspaper and faculty forums.
I have been in the Civil Rights
Movement for some sixty years. The principle of civil disobedience is part of
my vernacular. For me, it is the cornerstone of democracy. Many faculty members
and students went to jail resisting civility and those controlling the
institution. One of the lessons we learned was that the lack of communication
produced frustration and forced dissidents to be uncivil. Our life experiences
inform us that change cannot come about without vigorous dissent.
Like they say on the street “no
justice no peace.” As long as there is injustice civil behavior will be
impossible. Civility only occurs when those on top listen to those with less
power. The hyperbole of the administration hides the fact that there is already
a procedure in place to deal with abusive conduct. However, charging someone
with unprofessional conduct would require the accusers to give the dissidents
due process instead of slandering or red-baiting them.
Photo by Jesús Manuel Mena Garza
