The Strawberry Statement
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The Strawberry Statement is a non-fiction book by James Simon Kunen, written when he was 19, which chronicled his experiences at Columbia University from 1966–1968, particularly the April 1968 protests and takeover of the office of the dean of Columbia by student protesters. The title comes from a speech made by Herbert Deane, a Columbia administrator, who deprecated student opinions about university administrative decisions as having no more importance than if the students had said they liked the taste of strawberries.
Deane himself said often that he had been misquoted on the matter. He insisted that student opinions about university policy did matter to him, but that if they were offered without reasoned explanations, then they meant no more to him than if a majority of students liked strawberries.
A movie, The Strawberry Statement, loosely based on the book, but fictionalized, was made in 1970.
[edit] References
- Kunen, James Simon. The Strawberry Statement: Notes of a College Revolutionary, 1968/69, Brandywine Press, 3d edition (May 1995). ISBN 1-881089-52-5