Mahmood Mamdani and the Academic Freedom Lecture:
Public Intellectualism Gone Wrong
28 September 2017
On 22
August, the University of Cape Town’s 2017 T.B. Davie Memorial Lecture on
Academic Freedom titled “Decolonising the Post-Colonial University” was given
(over the objections of several UCT academics) by one of the world’s top
10 public
intellectuals and arguably the world’s leading authority on African
colonial and post‐colonial international politics and the
decolonization of African universities, Mahmood Mamdani.
First,
what’s a public intellectual? Here’s my definition:
- an undisputed expert
and critical thinker a subject (e.g. Ernst Mayr and Stephen Jay Gould
– not Richard Dawkins – on evolution; Noam Chomsky on
linguistics and political action; Salman
Rushdie on humanism and cultural relativism);
- a translator who can
distil academic verbiage into accounts that can be understood and
appreciated by laypeople;
- a dissenter who can
rattle the cages of tradition and normality without bias towards a
particular ideology;
- a rational debater
who participates in respectfully-competitive discussions beyond endless
‘conversations’;
- a knowledge gatekeeper
who can ensure effective communication and understanding without
constraining it in twitter-sized packets of hyper-simplified jargon; and
- ultimately a revealer of
truth, even when it contradicts overwhelming power.
Why the requests?
UCT’s
Executive, led by Vice Chancellor Max Price, cancelled
(with short notice and over strong objections from UCT’s Academic Freedom
Committee and many staff/students/alumni) the 2016 Davie Lecture. Price acted
because the invited speaker (journalist Flemming Rose) was anonymously defamed
(without published evidence) as a “bigot”/“blasphemer”/”Islamophobe”, and Price
feared that Rose’s potentially unconstitutional address (the topic of which
never discussed – but probably self-censorship) might provoke unspecified
(hypothetical?) “violent protest”.
The
objectors felt that no further Davie Lectures should be given until Rose was
allowed to present one.
Why did Mamdani refuse?
Islamophobia
Mamdani
maintained that Rose and the publishers of cartoons of Mohammed, especially
with a hand grenade in his turban, are Islamophobic, and because they refused
to publish similar cartoons of Christ.
No.
According to Rose, Jyllands-Posten, the newspaper concerned, published
several cartoons similarly ridiculing Jesus, even by Kurt Westergaard, the
artist that did the cartoon of the Mohammed.
Reminiscing
Jyllands-Posten and – according to Mamdani
– cartoons drawn by South African cartoonist Zapiro – are also Islamophobic
because the offensive cartoons are ‘reminiscent’ of those published in an
anti-Semitic Nazi tabloid for which the editor was executed. Mamdani also
indicated that the newspaper’s and Rose’s actions remind him of those of
journalists, radio broadcasters and intellectuals who encouraged the genocide
in Rwanda.
Being
‘reminiscent’ of something proves nothing. Der Stürmer, the
vehemently, anti-Semitic, German tabloid Mamdani refers to, was published
by Julius
Streicher, the man justifiably executed. The paper was not an official
publication of the Nazi Party. Indeed, Hermann Göring
regarded it as an embarrassment to Nazism and Joseph Goebbels tried
to ban it, since it was too salacious, even for him. Der Stürmer was
published privately by Streicher and made him a millionaire. It also ran
sexually explicit, anti-Catholic, anti-Communist, and
anti-monarchist propaganda
and, in its editorials, Streicher relentlessly called for the annihilation and
extermination of the Jewish
race.
Cartoons
depicting Mohammed may offend self-proclaimed jihadist terrorists (such as
those who murdered employees, police and bystanders at Charlie Hebdo, a French satirical
newspaper) and Mamdani and remind them of actionable Nazism/anti-Semitism.
But, how can a couple of cartoons be a stepping stone to genocide? Moreover,
the horrific acts in Rwanda were the result of a concerted, well-coordinated
conspiracy that had a strong basis in politics and socio-economics, in addition
to tribal/racial hatred. Rose, the relevant cartoonists and newspaper
publishers produced one product and have never been proven to be hatemongers.
In short,
neither Mamdani’s inference nor unsuccessful legal action by Muslim agencies
prove Islamophobia or a connection between Rose and clarion calls for
group-based discrimination or genocide.
Amos n’ Andy
Also, for
the umpteenth time, Mamdani referred to Amos n’ Andy, the longest-running and
one of the most popular radio shows in US history as a comparable example of
anti-‘black’ racism. The show a was an offshoot of failing minstrelsy and
highly popular even with African-Americans. Nevertheless, some eminent citizens
objected to it because its white actors stereotyped their folk as “inferior,
lazy, dumb and dishonest”. The National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) national office
initially declined to endorse their objections.
A subsequent
TV version of the show, with a highly-talented, all-‘black’ cast ran for two
years until its sponsors withdrew support based of objections/boycotts from the
NAACP. Nevertheless, its reruns continued for another 13 years despite further
objections.
Whether Amos
n’ Andy was an anti-African-American racist portrayal is by no means generally
accepted by African-Americans and radio/TV critics/historians. The documentary Amos
‘n’ Andy: Anatomy of a Controversy, looks at its history and the
show’s characters from its inception on radio to the first all-black cast show
on American TV. Hosted by African-American comedian George Kirby, this
documentary features rare archival clips and interviews with former TV cast
members, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Redd Foxx, Marla Gibbs and former NAACP leaders of
that era. None of the interviewees take the Mamdani ‘position’.
This
pioneering situation comedy depicted black actors portraying upstanding judges,
lawyers, police officers, business owners, home owners, and strong and
opinionated women; admittedly alongside other flawed individuals who
mispronounced and misused the English language. Rev. Jackson said: “We had
enough sense to see that these brilliant actors were comedians playing out
roles”. “Perhaps what was missing were other more serious shows to
establish balance.” What was missing then, and now, is a balanced focus on
education instead of poverty; appreciation of art instead of burning it;
resolute mass action rather than gang violence; sober, rational and respectful
discussion rather than profanity; love instead of pathological hatred and,
especially, respect for the rule of law and women.
On the last
score, Price chooses to quote
American ‘activist’ Stokely Carmichael on nuanced institutional racism, but
ignores his notorious comment: “The position of women in the [Civil Rights]
movement is prone.” He chose to help radical, ideologue and PASMA commissar Masixole Mlandu escape
detention by the SA Police Service so they could ‘negotiate’. Price even
suspended UCT’s 2016 Student Representative Council elections because candidate
Mlandu was interdicted from being on campus. This is despite the fact that
Mlandu has been accused of malicious damage to property, housebreaking,
intimidation and sexual harassment and described by a judge as “unrepentant”.
The pro-fallist Daily Maverick describes
him as determined to “destroy Rhodes, his legacy and all he represents” by
“bring[ing] the struggles and vagaries of township life and black pain to the
affluent centres of South Africa’s elite establishment”.
As for me, I
watched Amos n’ Andy TV re-runs as a teenager simultaneously with the equally
hilarious Honeymooners,
which depicted ‘whites’ as severely lacking in character and intellect. Think
also of the similarly-deficient Archie
Bunker and today’s Black-ish.
Perhaps Mamdani should also listen to Amos’ words describing
the Lord’s Prayer to his young daughter.
Mamdani also
maintains that Amos n’ Andy was finally cancelled in 1965 due to the “political
influence” of “inarticulate” Watts
Rioters – 30000+ rioters; 34 deaths; $40 million damage – in Los Angeles.
The riot was, in fact, triggered by an altercation between allegedly racist
police and an African-American motorist. A subsequent commission of enquiry
makes no reference to the show.
What, then,
is Mamdani’s evidence? Both events took place in the same year: 1965. But, so
did relatively non-violent
protests in Selma, Alabama, and the passage of pivotal US civil rights
legislation. Perhaps peaceful, coordinated actions have more effect in the
longer term than riotous acts.
A challenge
Mamdani
ended his riposte by asking the pro-Rose, UCT e-mailers if they would stand up
and answer the question: Would you also invite Streicher and the promoters of
the Rwandan genocide to give the Davie Memorial Lecture? Then he declared that
the “Islamophobic” Rose had no democratic right to have the honour to give the
Academic Freedom Lecture at UCT and “congratulated” Price for banning Rose.
Since these
e-mailers were not present, they were unable to answer Mamdani’s question with
an unequivocal “NO”! With regard to ‘democratic rights’, Price has steadfastly
refused to conduct democratic, anonymous, vote-based surveys of the UCT
Community on any aspect of decolonization or fallism, let alone defining
and defending academic freedom. With regard to ‘honour’, the unilateral
action by the Price-led Executive to override a decision by the Academic
Freedom Committee (whose job it is to select Davie Lecture speakers – including
Mamdani) without consulting Senate confers none on UCT’s leadership.
The
Davie-Rose-Mamdani ‘affair’ is, at best, the misuse of public intellectualism
to undermine Davie’s vision, defame Rose and eminent UCT ‘universal scholars’
and contribute to the collapse of academic freedom in order to promote
destructive decolonization.
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