William Cronon

William 'Bill' Cronon (born September 11, 1954) is the Frederick Jackson Turner and Vilas Research Professor of History, Geography, and Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. As of March 2011 he is the President-Elect of the American Historical Association.[1]

Contents

Education and awards

Born in New Haven, Connecticut, he obtained a D.Phil from Jesus College, Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. (1976–1978).[2] Cronon holds a B.A. (1976) from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and an M.A. (1979), M.Phil. (1980), and Ph.D. (1990) from Yale University.

In July, 1985, Cronon was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship.[3] Cronon was Wayne Pacelle's advisor at Yale in the 1980's.

Cronon serves on the board of directors for The Trust for Public Land, a national land conservation group. He also sits on the governing council of the Wilderness Society.

Scholarship

A noted environmental historian,[3] Cronon is probably best known as the author of Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England (1983), a work based on a seminar paper he wrote for Edmund Morgan at Yale. Two insights in that book have reshaped the way historians think: The first is that the way cultures conceptualize property and ownership is a major factor that affects economies and ecosystems. The second is that the Indians were active interveners in and shapers of the ecosystems in which they lived.[3]

Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West (1991), which won the Bancroft Prize in 1992,[2] "is credited with having radically widened many environmental historians' gaze beyond such things as forests and public lands to include cities and what Cronon calls the 'elaborate and intimate linkages' between city and country."[3] Cronon shows how Chicago and capitalism fundamentally transformed the midwestern countryside. In one memorable chapter, for instance, he details how grain became a standardized commodity: how it went from being something sold in sacks with the farm's family name stamped on it to a standardized good, stored in silos according to grade.

In his essay, "The Trouble with Wilderness", published in the New York Times, and in Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature (1995), Cronon traced the idea of wilderness throughout American history. Cronon argues that this history allows us to see how fantasies of untouched, pristine wilderness, are only fantasies. Even wilderness is indelibly shaped by human history and labor, and we mislead ourselves when we conceive of wilderness otherwise (as many environmentalists did). Cronon does not argue that we should therefore dispense with wilderness or fail to protect it. The trouble with our fantasy of untouched wilderness is that it distracts us from the nature everywhere about us by fixating instead on the allegedly untouched nature out there, in the wild. The task Cronon gives us is to form a responsible relationship with both the nature of the wilderness, where we play, and the nature where we live and work.

Cronon was also featured prominently in Ken Burns' 2009 documentary, The National Parks: America's Best Idea.

Scholar as citizen: Tension between transparency and academic freedom

Amid protests over the Wisconsin state budget in March 2011, Cronon began a personal blog called "Scholar as Citizen." His first blog post dated March 15, 2011 was a tutorial on the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative organization that provides model legislation to Republican state legislators. According to Anthony Grafton of The New Yorker, "Cronon argued from indirect evidence that ALEC had played a major role behind the scenes in Governor Walker's attack on public employee unions in Wisconsin. He also argued that this sort of political work, though legitimate, should be done in the open."[4] Cronon's first post went viral and received approximately 800,000 hits in less than 10 days.

On March 17, 2011 (two days after Cronon's post about ALEC went live), Stephan Thompson of the Wisconsin Republican Party filed a freedom of information request for any emails sent from and received by Cronon's University of Wisconsin-Madison email account that contained any on a list of 20 keywords related to the ongoing political events. (The terms were: Republican, Scott Walker, recall, collective bargaining, AFSCME, WEAC, rally, union, Alberta Darling, Randy Hopper, Dan Kapanke, Rob Cowles, Scott Fitzgerald, Sheila Harsdorf, Luther Olsen, Glenn Grothman, Mary Lazich, Jeff Fitzgerald, Marty Beil, or Mary Bell.)[5]

In the midst of this, Cronon also wrote an op-ed for The New York Times which was published on March 21, 2011 that criticized Republican Governor Scott Walker.[6]

On March 24, Cronon released his second blog entry. The post announced the Wisconsin Republican Party's freedom of information request for his emails. In the piece, Cronon commented that the party's action had "the nakedly political purpose of trying to embarrass, harass, or silence a university professor".[6][7] Citing Wisconsin's long history of protecting the right to academic freedom, Cronon also asked the Republican Party of Wisconsin to withdraw its request for the contents of his email.[5] Between the release of Cronon's second blog entry on March 24 and April 1, when the university turned over a selection of Cronon's emails, the party did not withdraw the request.

On April 1, 2011, attorney John Dowling, acting as senior legal counsel for the University of Wisconsin-Madison, formally responded to Thompson's request for Cronon's emails. Dowling included a statement with the documents that explained the university's decision to continue to withhold some of Cronon's emails.[8]

University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Carolyn 'Biddy' Martin further expounded upon this decision in an email to the UW-Madison campus community on the same day: "We are excluding student because they are protected under FERPA. We are excluding exchanges that fall outside the realm of the faculty member's job responsibilities and that could be considered personal pursuant to Wisconsin Supreme Court case law. We are also excluding what we consider to be the private email exchanges among scholars that fall within the orbit of academic freedom and all that is entailed by it." Martin went on to describe the idea of academic freedom and the university's firm commitment to protecting the right of all academics to engage in the "open intellectual exchange" of ideas.[9]

On April 4, 2011, the Faculty Senate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison passed a resolution to protect academic freedom. The body decided, according to University Committee Chair Judith Burstyn, that the university needed to take a public position to defend academic freedom in the wake of the FOIA records request directed at Cronon. Political scientist Howard Schweber, who was involved in writing the resolution alongside colleague Donald Downs, commented: "The university can't change the law, but the university can take a leading position on behalf of public employees everywhere and make a statement that we think this is wrong. What was begun as a classic notion of sunshine being the best disinfectant has turned into a law that's used as a weapon to target not government officials and offices but individual public employees."[10]

Despite having months to report on any improprieties discovered in the email, the Wisconsin Republican Party has made no report on the contents.[11] The Wisconsin Republican Party has similarly targeted other teachers by filing open records requests for e-mails, including public school teacher Shelly Moore[12] and UW-Oshkosh Professor Stephen Richards.[13] The American Association of University Professors concludes that "this action by the Wisconsin Republican Party is an "obvious assault on academic freedom"."[14]

News coverage of Cronon's "Scholar As Citizen" blog

Published works

External links

References

  1. ^ Paul Krugman, New York Times, 27 March 2011, American Thought Police
  2. ^ a b "Old Members News and Notes". The Jesus College Record: 48. 1993/4. 
  3. ^ a b c d Janny Scott (April 3, 1999). "An Environmentalist on a Different Path; A Fresh View of the Supposed 'Wilderness' and Even the Indians' Place in It". New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C00E4DB1239F930A35757C0A96F958260&scp=3&sq=%22william+Cronon%22&st=nyt. Retrieved 2009-07-23. 
  4. ^ Grafton, Anthony (28 March 2011). "Wisconsin: The Cronon Affair". The New Yorker, News Desk. http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/03/wisconsin-the-cronon-affair.html. Retrieved 4 April 2011. 
  5. ^ a b Gardner, John (1 April 2011). "William Cronon and academic freedom". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/apr/01/wisconsin-republicans. Retrieved 4 April 2011. 
  6. ^ a b Leonard, Andrew (2011-03-25) Wisconsin's most dangerous professor, Salon.com
  7. ^ Shafer, Jack (25 March 2011). "There's No Such Thing as a Bad FOIA Request". Slate. http://www.slate.com/id/2289482/. Retrieved 26 March 2011. 
  8. ^ Grafton, Anthony (3 April 2011). "The Cronon Affair: Wisconsin Answers". The New Yorker, News Desk. http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/04/the-cronon-affair-wisconsin-answers.html. Retrieved 4 April 2011. 
  9. ^ Martin, Carolyn 'Biddy' (1 Apri 2011). "Chancellor's message on academic freedom and open records". University of Wisconsin-Madison, News. http://www.news.wisc.edu/19190. Retrieved 4 April 2011. 
  10. ^ Forster, Stacy (5 April 2011). "Faculty Senate approves resolution protecting academic freedom". University of Wisconsin-Madison, News. http://www.news.wisc.edu/19210. Retrieved 5 April 2011. 
  11. ^ "WISGOP.ORG News". http://www.wisgop.org/news. Retrieved August 5, 2011. 
  12. ^ McCallum, Katie (June 22, 2011). "Shelly Moore Caught Campaigning on Taxpayer Dime, RPW Requests Investigation". WISGOP.ORG News. http://www.wisgop.org/news/shelly-moore-caught-campaigning-taxpayer-dime-rpw-requests-investigation. Retrieved August 5, 2011. 
  13. ^ "Wisconsin GOP Files Open Records Request on Campaigning UW Oshkosh Prof". WISGOP.ORG NEWS. May 5, 2011. http://www.wisgop.org/news/wisconsin-gop-files-open-records-request-campaigning-uw-oshkosh-prof. Retrieved August 5, 2011. 
  14. ^ "Obvious Assault on Academic Freedom". March 28, 2011. http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/newsroom/2011+Web+Highlights/Madison.htm. Retrieved August 5, 2011.