[gamesbrainiac]

I think some are focusing on his mother's death; it's the straw the broke the camel's back but the root cause is apathy towards him.

They are however, ignoring the part where he was declined tenure for no good reason, and despite being a professor at other prestigious universities. He was also paid badly and was treated poorly when it came to sabbaticals.

In other words he was sidelined for no good reason. This is sad.

There are some questions though, why did he leave Princeton? I mean what difference does it make if you're at Princeton or Harvard, they are both great schools.

[whymauri]

Exactly. At nearly 20 years of membership and collective service to the Divinity School and Harvard College, he's been a fixture (from undergrad, to postdoc, to lecturer, to professor, to joint appointee, to commencement speaker) for nearly as long as I have been alive, and certainly for longer than current undergrads have been alive.

If I devoted half that amount of time to an institution and received this treatment in return, I would struggle to contain my composure. I think the letter insinuates that his service to Harvard stems from a love/appreciation for what the institution stood for 20, 30, perhaps even 40-50 years ago. Who here doesn't feel similarly about their undergrad? Of those who feel that way, who else would feel irate if they were treated this way in return?

[endisneigh]

To add to this, ironically the only reason he even went back to Harvard (IIRC) is because he has strong feelings for Harvard. He was actually tenured at Princeton when he went to Harvard. So I can't blame him lol

[chadash]

> "he was declined tenure for no good reason"

Usually you get tenure for a good reason. Plenty of very talented people are denied it for no good reason. I'm not saying that his accusations are untrue, but denial of tenure happens all of the time, so the onus is really on him to say why he should have gotten it.

I feel like i'm missing some pieces of this story though. Why did a previously tenured academic well into his career agree to take a poorly paid job without tenure in the first place?

[okareaman]

Some people are less interested in money and status than they are in discovering something original about the Universe. If not original, a new take on it. Dr West strikes me as such a person. I focused on the part of the letter that says he wanted to explore philosophy but they miscategorized his endeavors as Afro-Studies. I'd get frustrated and quit too.

[smt88]

> I mean what difference does it make if you're at Princeton or Harvard, they are both great schools.

Why do we tell academics they have to stay in one place forever once they get tenure? Don't they want to move around as much as anyone else? Maybe his reason was just that he wanted a change.

[NtochkaNzvanova]

> Why do we tell academics they have to stay in one place forever once they get tenure?

We don't tell them that. Tenured academics do move between universities, and rarely if ever have to regain tenure -- because they negotiate with the new university to immediately be at the same status they had at the old university.

If West couldn't swing that, that's on him. West definitely seems to be more interested in playing the outspoken celebrity intellectual / activist than being a serious academic, and Harvard probably didn't want to risk a replay of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornel_West#Dispute_with_Lawre....