The intellectual and moral fraud that is “diversity” is on display in this job ad from the Chronicle of Higher Education. Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, is looking for a one-year sabbatical replacement in the history of the Islamic World.
One might expect such an ad to delineate desired academic and intellectual qualifications for the position: areas of specialization and sub-fields, language facility, and other professional achievements that would indicate competence in the field. The ad does note that Whitman prefers someone with teaching experience and a Ph.D.
But most of the ink is spilled on academese that, decoded, signals to the reader that this position is reserved for, or at least very favorably disposed toward, minority applicants:
Whitman College wishes to reinforce its commitment to enhance diversity, broadly defined, recognizing that to provide a diverse learning environment is to prepare students for personal and professional success in an increasingly multicultural and global society. In their application, candidates are strongly encouraged to address their potential contribution to the promotion of diversity, a core value of the Whitman College community.
Moreover, fulfilling the demands of the Whitman ad, particularly a candidate’s “potential contribution to the promotion of diversity,” can be spun as providing the intellectual diversity that critics often contend is missing from academe. This is achieved by taking stances that are at odds with those held by most Americans beyond the university: opposition to the war against Islamist terrorists, routine condemnation of American interests abroad, and a worldview that holds Israel responsible for the Middle East’s ills all give the academics who hold them a patina of rebelliousness, and hence of achieving the goal of intellectual diversity. That such poses ignore the stultifying orthodoxy within university departments is an inconvenient fact conveniently ignored by professors themselves. It’s also why the denizens of Whitman will almost certainly fill the advertised position with someone who will only reinforce the intellectual status quo.