Thanks, Brad, for sharing.  As teaching chair, I believe that proposing
such relevant and timely panels is the essence of your position rather than
a conflict of interest.  I've shared with Sharon, MAC's incoming Vice
Head/Programming Chair, that she should expect 2-3 proposals from each
chair (PF&R, research, teaching) relative to your respective areas.

Camilla

At 04:45 PM 9/24/2007 -0400, Bradley Gorham wrote:
>Fellow MAC members,
>
>Clearly this seems like a good idea for a panel given the volume of
>responses that have come in such a short time.  I'm sure that many of us
>can easily think of similar situations on our own campuses, and I know
>that I often get asked by students about how the campus media should
>handle diversity issues.  My campus (Syracuse) had our own incident a
>couple years ago: a "humor" show on the campus TV network did skits
>involving jokes about date rape and lynching, and then complained about
>censorship when the TV network management tried to change their
>content.  When the student newspaper publicized this, people on campus
>were understandably upset at the makers of the show and the network for
>letting them do it.  The chancellor shut down to the network, which turned
>the dialogue into one of free speech vs. respect for diversity (a false
>dichotomy in my mind).  Although some productive dialogue occurred on our
>campus in the wake of this, the incident also produced a fair amount of
>resentment that lingers.
>
>(Read some of the comments on the
><http://campusprogress.org/fieldreport/1917/the-racial-politics-of-college-newspapers>great
>article that Calvin Hall linked to and you will see echoes of that kind of
>resentment.)
>
>These sorts of incidents occur, unfortunately, at regular intervals, and
>they ask us to face some very important questions.  I also know that,
>equally unfortunately, many of my White colleagues are afraid to talk
>about some of these topics in their classes lest they "say the wrong
>thing."  So I strongly support a session like this.
>
>As Teaching Chair for the division, I am not sure if I should be the one
>to organize it (is it a conflict of interest for the teaching chair to
>organize a panel that I then get to have some say on?).  However, I am
>happy to take that responsibility if you all want me to.
>
>-Brad
>
>Bradley W. Gorham, Ph.D.
>Assistant Professor, Communications
>S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications
>Syracuse University
>215 University Place
>Syracuse, NY  13244
>315-443-1950
>

Camilla Gant, Ph.D.
Director/Associate Professor
Mass Communications
University of West Georgia

678.839.4933  Office
678.839.4926 Fax