Talk:Cornel West/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Archive 2 →

"While at Yale he participated in campus protests for a clerical union and divestment from apartheid South Africa, one of which resulted in his being arrested and jailed. " What was the charge? Was he convicted? 64.168.31.248 21:34, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

"Nevertheless, West remains a widely cited scholar, though his contributions to philosophy have been ignored almost entirely by the academy" - I (spinoza1111@yahoo.com, spinoza1111 at wikipedia, Edward G. Nilges) have removed the text of this statement commencing with "comma, though his".

This is because it's a logical contradiction and apparently a rather gratuitous non-NPOV put-down. IF West is widely cited THEN he isn't be ignored by the academy whose notice, if not necessarily approbation, is expressed in the main by citation.

The only academy that is ignoring Corn consists of those interesting tenured chaps who no longer read anything except the sports pages. Perhaps the multiply-talented Corn would like to write a book on the philosophy of American sport, and I for one would be very interested to read Dr. West on how Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen racially healed Chicago during the NBA playoffs. This way clowns with tenure such as are mentioned by Saul Bellow might actually read Dr. West.

A less responsible chap like me would then insert a sly, but alas non-NPOV, mention of The Lawrence Summers Award for Running One's Big Mouth and Offending People, received from me about a year after Corn's demeaning and gravely insulting performance assessment. But, the fact that big Larry has terminal foot in mouth is not relevant to Corn's situation at all except for purposes of amusement.

I was honored to meet Dr. West when I worked at Princeton but unlike the case of Nash, I have nothing to add to this article, only a little to correct.

Contents 1 Removed "After Race Matters, he failed to produce any significant solo scholarship for several years and instead focused on slight, co-authored and edited volumes and on popularizations" 2 Removed "never satisfied with the world of academia" Spinoza1111 05:59, 26 January 2006 (UTC) 3 Clarification of West's Role at Princeton 4 West's Ties to Sacramento, California 5 West's son Kanye 6 Cornel West and Kanye West 6.1 World Cant Wait 7 Louis Farrakhan (whom he has actively criticized) 8 rap? 9 This hardly seems NPOV 10 we have to include 11 Neutral now (?) 12 Lead sentence

Removed "After Race Matters, he failed to produce any significant solo scholarship for several years and instead focused on slight, co-authored and edited volumes and on popularizations"

West produced far more at an earlier age than MANY white academics. In particular, The American Evasion of Philosophy is first-rate.

As to "popularizations", Harold Bloom's recent book on Shakespeare was a "popularization". When white academics produce a popularization, they are praised as having the common touch. The rules should be the same for black academics.

The fact is that many religious people in America lack an intellectual foundation for their progressive political views. Dr. West has given this to them. This may be inconvenient for cynical elites who fear a mass movement based in part on religious convictions, such as the mass movement in Poland that ended thug Communism.

I don't believe myself biased by knowing Dr. West personally, for my encounters were few (too few) and when I compare his work with Bloom's I see a more responsible *corpus* with far more depth.

The matter of publishing in American universities appears to be a sore spot with the elbow patch crowd. The little known but first rate Midwestern philosopher E. D. Klemke was denied a lifetime achievement award because he "published too much" while at the State University of Iowa because the second-raters there couldn't write and were jealous of a dove trooping amongst crows.

I conclude that the publication rule is bespoke and tailored by sour spirits to fit local enmities, local enmities that fold into a larger racism. It was in fact a first rate discovery in the humanities for West to point out that Marvin Gaye's 1968 song, What's Going On, was an ontological statement, and that it asked an ultimate, if subaltern question (and you got that right: it is RACISM and classism to mock the subaltern when the subaltern uses "big" words).

It was innovative for West to use a CD to promulgate his views, and, when white academics use multimedia as does Negroponte et al., they are praised.

In West's case, the publication rule was bespoke, and twisted to EXCLUDE what was convenient to exclude. I have found sly attempts in this article to downgrade West and THIS violates a wikipedia rule that is not bespoke and may not be tailored: neutral point of view. The POV that West is a lightweight is I believe false and certainly not neutral.

Because of sexual fears, white people seem in America to believe that there relations with black folks are about power and power alone, and that, for this reason, "real men" will enforce pre-existing "standards" of conduct on black men that are systematically not observed by white men. Lawrence Summers was in fact, when he tried and failed to bitch-slap Cornel into submission, trying for a Sistah Souljah moment: this was Clinton's criticism of that rapper which had nothing to do with her as a person, and everything with Clinton's felt need to establish his "masculinity" in a sense that was futile, because just as soon as Clinton was elected, the Republican right set about deconstructing that masculinity.

It's all about the establishment of authority, and subaltern white people experience it all they time when THEY are bitch-slapped, as Dr. West was, in "performance reviews" which have nothing to do with the content of academic or industrial performance, and everything to do with the *telos* of a system which no longer serves human needs.\

<<<<<Nice way to Show your bias. There is no need for you to explain you knew the man, the way you sugarcoated him, you seem to his number #1 fan.....Tijernas

Spinoza1111 05:10, 7 February 2006 (UTC)Let's see the logic here.

If a white man expresses informed admiration for a black man, his admiration is girlish and unrestrained...sugar-coated.

This is less logic than the irruption of sexual fear into what should be an academic dispute about Dr. West's contributions, because the thing about sexual fear is its non-negotiable quality.

I also knew and assisted John Nash. As such, I was able to contribute while maintaining NPOV.

NPOV isn't the slack-jawed, drool-streaked ignorance of the jury member who the attorney in the wrong wants on the jury. It happens to be having the facts (including the VALUABLE judgements made because of personal acquaintance IN ADDITION to reading Dr. West's books, something most of his enemies on hate radio, and at Harvard, have not done) and making an informed judgement on those facts.

Removed "never satisfied with the world of academia" Spinoza1111 05:59, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Non-NPOV, subtly.

"The world of academia" reifies something that is constructed by the labor of people actually in it, and West is IN academia, he helps to MAKE it what it is, as much as any other faculty member.

Dude has taught. Dude has published. Dude has graded papers.

To say, even *en passant*, that West is somehow unsatisfied makes "academia" into a pre-existing plantation (yeah, you got that right) which in its largesse ALLOWS African-American scholars ifn they behave theyselves.

It makes West an angry Black man and a permanent outsider. The problem is that there is no university without people and people come in all colors, dammit.

The phrase hypostatizes (yeah, you got that right) a white world which "is" academia, which represents Power, Truth and Goodness when in fact pre-coeducation, pre-minority studies, places like Princeton were in large measure narrow barbaric by today's standards.

I have REMOVED the phrase.

This whole entry on West is suspect because the "fraud" is nowhere to be found.

Clarification of West's Role at Princeton

West's Ties to Sacramento, California

Dr. West attended John F. Kennedy High School in Sacramento California.

West's son Kanye

De-linked "Kanye West" in the biography section since it leads to the page of the rapper Kanye West, who isn't Cornel West's son.

Cornel West and Kanye West

This article had stated that Kanye West was Cornel West's son. There is no evidence of that anywhere. I have deleted it - but if that is the case, then please add it again. Thank you.

World Cant Wait

Is there any doubt that this group is anti-fascist? Is there any information that it's pro-fascist?

Louis Farrakhan (whom he has actively criticized)

That phrase means next to nothing. What did West criticize Farrakhan for? What form did the criticism take? Is the author intending (as I believe he is) to mitigate West's association with Farrakhan? If so, this isn't very convincing.

The point isn't to convince anyone of anything, it's to provide accurate information, which this is -- I don't have Race Matters handy right at the moment, but West has some pretty harsh words for Farrakhan in it. Though I was probably the author of the phrase, it's quite possible that "actively" might be too strong a word -- it'd be worth more research if you're interested in doing it. RadicalSubversiv E 02:03, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Well...someone should. This is vague and uninformative. It has the feel of "special pleading". Spell out what was criticized and what form that critique took, and what reaction there was, if any. Why not try editing this portion?

Adam Holland 17:12, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

rap?

did this guy rly do a rap? LOL

This hardly seems NPOV

The article has almost nothing good to say about West without some sort of modifier. For example: "West has been called—if only by his publisher—," or ". As a Marxist black radical he was almost unique in saying that it was not appropriate for other black militants to hate all whites and Jews. Yet he has endorsed the radicals grouped around the magazine Race Traitor, which calls for the "abolition of whiteness." " This has clearly been heavily edited/written by some people who hate him, and have nothing constructive to add. Instead of quoting from West, they link him to Farrahkhan, Race Traitor, and then Morris Powell *through* Al Sharpton. The entire paragraph that starts "This was the same Sharpton who, four years earlier, had incited a group of black anti-Semites to boycott" is not about West at all, and wouldn't even be NPOV if it was in an article about Sharpton. Why is there a mention of Roland Smith? What does he have to do with West?

we have to include

we have to include the blatant hypocrisy of Dr West when talking about him. he speaks ill of america and capitalism while driving a Cadilac and wearing suits that cost over $1000.00, according to Schweizer's book. if president bush paid for an abortion for his daughter i'm sure it would be mentioned in wik. Keltik31 14:34, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Removed 'controversial.' " and worked with such controversial figures as Louis Farrakhan and Al Sharpton,..." Using the word 'controversial' seems suggestive of other motives. Couldn't Nader be considered 'controversial?'

Neutral now (?)

I believe the serious concerns raised earlier have been substantially addressed and that the current revision is NPOV. Based on this, I intend to remove the tag in a few days unless there is a consensus that portions remain POV. Please comment here if you think the tag should remain; or better, fix the article. Matchups 21:28, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Lead sentence

The lead was reverted back to: "Cornel Ronald West (born 1953-06-02 in Tulsa, Oklahoma) is a prominent African-American scholar and public intellectual." I think the lead would be better if ethnicity was not introduced per wp:mosbio unless West's notability is due to his being African-American. Per most bios, ethnicity is not included in the LEAD sentence but introduced further into the article. I propose that the lead read :"Cornel Ronald West (born 1953-06-02 in Tulsa, Oklahoma) is an American scholar and public intellectual". The word "prominent" is also uneeded fluff. Anyways, thanks! --Tom 19:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I went ahead and reverted back to my version, thanks --Tom 19:45, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree that "prominent" should go. With respect to "African-American", I may be wrong but I think being Black is part of what makes West notable.

On the other hand, I don't think Martin Luther King, Jr. ever mentions the fact that he was Black (not just in the lede, but in the whole article), nor does Al Sharpton. The lede describes Malcolm X as a Black Muslim minister, but that's one of the things for which he was notable (a role, not an ethnicity).

So I guess I agree with you. The lede says that West was influenced by the Black church, but it seems out of step with other articles to describe him as African-American. — Malik Shabazz (Talk | contribs) 19:55, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Malik. I tried not to revert bios where the person was "the first African-American to xyz" or where ethnicity was really central to the article. As you mentioned, there are bios of individuals who are extremely famous African-Americans but it is not mentioned in the LEAD. I have been focusing primarily on bios and their lead sentence trying to remove "XYZ-American"/ethnicity unless there is a really really really good reason to mention it. If you have a question about any of my other edits please let me know. I edited probable 30 bios today. Cheers! --Tom 20:30, 16 May 2007 (UTC)