Hawkins as Position(ed)

To the editors:

Presently many contestating discourses concerning Professor Hawkin’s denied tenure are in circulation. I wish to briefly intervene in this debate and articulate support from the specificity of the relationship between the mission of the University and position occupied by Professor Hawkins, in the moment of multi-culturalism.

As of late Syracuse University is promoting diversity and multiculturalism, as it attempts to foster respect for and appreciation of differences. A precondition for producing culturally diverse spaces is the allocation and maintenance of certain subject positions; and these (necessary) positions enable the formation of discursive spaces for articulating and sustaining multicultural discourses. Producing multicultural subjectivities requires more than just the dissemination of a compact, it demands the allocation of resources to strengthen the already existent structures (African-American Studies Dept.) and the reproduction of useful subject positions (Prof. Hawkins) as both contribute towards realizing the (multicultural) mission of Syracuse University. If Syracuse University is authentic in its multicultural agenda, then the subject position of a Professor Hawkins (as well as other historically marginalized positionalities), must be maintained otherwise how can the University hope to execute its mission without these “bearers”? At stake is nothing less than the ideological legitimacy of the mission of Syracuse University!

Robert Young
Syracuse, N.Y.