Dissident Knowledge in Higher Education
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Advance Praise for Dissident Knowledge in Higher Education “The space for dissent and real democratic debate is quickly shrinking both in public life and academic institutions in western democracies. Today, the cries of ‘fake news’ make the loudest (though rarely the best informed) voices the site of authority and truth. This volume helps readers in higher education ask critical and conscious questions about what it means to con- tend for truth. It is an important and significant read for those who want the intellectual space to remain a terrain for thinkers.” —Gloria Ladson-Billings, author of The Dreamkeepers “This deep and layered book maps the path toward a university based on eth- ics and justice rather than corporate needs and military standards. It reaches anyone who wants to understand the social, political, and economic trends that define our times. It is an outstanding contribution to the scholarship on higher education.” —William Ayers, author of Teaching with Conscience in an Imperfect World “Dissident Knowledge in Higher Education is a rich and multi-layered examina- tion of the impact of corporatization on our universities, as well as how they can be reclaimed. Highly recommended.” —James Turk, editor of Academic Freedom in Conflict dissident knowledge in higher education edited with an introduction by marc spooner & James MCNinch © 2018 University of Regina Press “An Interview with Noam Chomsky” © 2016 Noam Chomsky, Marc Spooner, and James McNinch This publication is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical- NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. See www.creativecommons.org. The text may be reproduced for non-commercial purposes, provided that credit is given to the original author. To obtain permission for uses beyond those outlined in the Creative Commons license, please contact University of Regina Press at [email protected]. Printed and bound in Canada at Marquis. The text of this book is printed on 100% post- consumer recycled paper with earth-friendly vegetable-based inks. Cover design: Duncan Campbell, University of Regina Press Text design: John van der Woude, jvdw Designs Copy editor: Kirsten Craven Proofreader: Nadine Coderre Indexer: Sergey Lobachev, Brookfield Indexing Services Cover art: “Apple Core” by Barcin / iStockphoto. Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Dissident knowledge in higher education / edited with an introduction by Marc Spooner & James McNinch. Includes bibliographical references and index. Issued in print and electronic formats. isbn 978-0-88977-536-7 (softcover).— isbn 978-0-88977-537-4 (pdf).— isbn 978-0- 88977-538-1 (html) 1. Education, Higher. 2. Educational change. 3. Neoliberalism. i. Spooner, Marc, 1969-, editor ii. McNinch, James, 1947-, editor lb2322.2.d57 2018 378 c2017-907936-0 c2017-907937-9 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 University of Regina Press, University of Regina Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, s4s 0a2 tel: (306) 585-4758 fax: (306) 585-4699 web: www.uofrpress.ca We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada. / Nous reconnaissons l’appui financier du gouvernement du Canada. This publication was made possible with support from Creative Saskatchewan’s Creative Industries Production Grant Program. We dedicate this collection to, in the words of Martin Luther King Jr., all the “creatively maladjusted” who are working toward justice within and beyond the academy. This collection is devoted to all your efforts in resisting colonialism, neoliberalism, and audit culture locally and globally. Truly, I live in dark times! The guileless word is folly. A smooth forehead Suggests insensitivity. The man who laughs Has simply not yet had The terrible news. —Bertolt Brecht, from "To Those Born Later" Contents Foreword The Trump Card: Racialized Speech in the Era of Desperate White Supremacy Zeus Leonardo xi Preface Marc Spooner and James McNinch xxi Introduction Marc Spooner and James McNinch xxiii Part i Historical Perspectives and Overview Chapter 1 A Dangerous Accountability: Neoliberalism’s Veer toward Accountancy in Higher Education Yvonna S. Lincoln 3 Chapter 2 The Art of the Impossible— Defining and Measuring Indigenous Research? Linda Tuhiwai Smith 21 viii • Contents Chapter 3 An Interview with Dr. Norman K. Denzin on the Politics of Evidence, Science, and Research 41 Chapter 4 An Interview with Dr. Noam Chomsky on Neoliberalism, Society, and Higher Education 55 Part ii Activism, Science, and Global and Local Knowledge Chapter 5 Accumulation and Its Dis’(sed) Contents: The Politics of Evidence in the Struggle for Public Education Michelle Fine 65 Chapter 6 Beyond Epistemicide: Knowledge Democracy and Higher Education Budd L. Hall 84 Chapter 7 Within and Beyond Neoliberalism: Doing Qualitative Research in the Afterward Patti Lather 102 Part iii Theorizing the Colonial Academy and Indigenous Knowledge Chapter 8 Reconciling Indigenous Knowledge in Education: Promises, Possibilities, and Imperatives Marie Battiste 123 Chapter 9 Biting the University That Feeds Us Eve Tuck 149 Chapter 10 Refusing the University Sandy Grande 168 Part iv From Counting Out, to Counting On, the Scholars Chapter 11 Beyond Individualism: The Psychosocial Life of the Neoliberal University Rosalind Gill 193 Contents • ix Chapter 12 Fatal Distraction: Audit Culture and Accountability in the Corporate University Joel Westheimer 217 Chapter 13 Public Scholarship and Faculty Agency: Rethinking “Teaching, Scholarship, and Service” Christopher Meyers 235 Afterword: The Defenestration of Democracy Peter McLaren 253 Contributors 303 Index 309 Foreword The Trump Card: Racialized Speech in the Era of Desperate White Supremacy Zeus Leonardo I submitted this foreword to Marc Spooner and James McNinch on January 20, 2017, or “j20” to some, as President-Elect Trump was sworn in as the forty-fifth president of the United States amid nationwide protests. The world is in a state of crisis and the United States is no exception. If it is a leading nation of the world, it has not always earned that title for the right reasons. That is, many of the country’s citizens question whether the United States is leading the world in the wrong direction. With the election of Donald Trump, the United States finds itself in a maelstrom of debates, deep insecurities, and divisions it was by and large surprised by and for which it was unpre- pared. Trump’s election to “make America great again” reinvigorates the old Right found in white, working-class resentment and energizes an apparently new and alternative Right dressed in Banana Republic metrowear. The inter- esting word here is “again,” a nostalgia or return to a past that can only be accomplished with naïveté, a time that harkens back to Jim Crow, Manifest Destiny, and when whites ruled this earth with an iron fist rather than a soft touch. Yet this is not the Klan, as satirized by popular comedian Dave Chappelle in the first episode of his celebrated Chappelle’s Show. It is an alter- native Right resulting in the confluence of new technologies, a newfound xii • Leonardo confidence, and a newbie politician-president it considers a card-carrying member of the club even if Trump disavows it. Kristen Buras’s (2008, 2010) and Michael Apple’s (Apple and Oliver 1998; Apple 2006) studies of the hege- monic process (applicable to the Right or Left) have never been more useful. This critical moment represents at once the conservative movement’s trium- phalist cry, as well as the Right’s desperate move to recapture the “greatness” of that endangered empire known as the United States. It is indeed a dan- gerous moment in American history as part of overall global development, a new era trumpeted by United States conservatives whose discourse divides at the same time they profess to heal said divisions. To anyone observing, it is quite a trick or deception to throw both water and gas at the fire. The American Right is not alone, of course. It is joined by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who would also like to make his nation great again, spurring a second Cold War fought in the trenches of the computer-hacking business. It also includes Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte, whose masculine bluster and death squad tactics against known and suspected drug dealers speak of secret desires to re-establish the archipelago’s former economic sta- tus as one of Asia’s best, that is, before Marcos stepped in. Although Trump has called the Philippines a terrorist nation and shows some caution in his dealings with Putin, all three leaders’ Marlboro Man personae, albeit from radically different social contexts, are eerily compatible, cut from the same cloth, one might say. Of course, we should recall Margaret Thatcher, who, with Ronald Reagan’s help, wanted to make Britain great again (see Hall 1996). But, just as a New York Times article states that oppositional books are more relevant in this antagonistic predicament (which would apply equally had Hillary Clinton won), this edited book’s timing is impeccable and provides a resounding voice of dissent in a neoliberal, neomacho, and, to some, a neofascist condition. To Foucault’s (1980) pleasure, power begets resistance (itself an expression of power), and it is comforting to see the Left organize against a strident and emboldened yet desperate Right. The gender dynamics and consequences of the 2016 elections are clear. They make Jackson Katz’s (2010) unrelenting study of masculinity more relevant than