Controversy at Brown

Edwin Forman, Steven Hamburg,Arthur Landy, Dietrich Rueschemeyer

To the Editor:

Colla himself calls the outcome of his workshop (which was well attended in part because of Rabbi Eisenberg’s efforts) “remarkably sedate.” His accusation that Rabbi Eisenberg was involved in any claims made by Campus Watch is untrue, and there is no evidence that she ever attempted to interfere with faculty members’ curricular authority or that she was “implicated” in any slander of the Muslim Student Association. In fact, during Rabbi Eisenberg’s tenure, the Brown University–Rhode Island School of Design Hillel has cosponsored several programs to facilitate dialogue and cooperation between Jewish and Muslim students. The essay also gives a polemically misleading account of the invitation of Nonie Darwish to speak on campus.

The essay ends with the absurd and mean-spirited insinuation that Rabbi Eisenberg’s resignation is due to growing criticism of her supposed political positions. In fact, her decision /to resign was for family reasons and was communicated to the administration and Brown-RISD Hillel long before this workshop ever occurred.

Those who engage in public controversies must be prepared for robust discussion. What is not acceptable, however, is to spread untruths and to engage in personal attacks based on insinuation. What Colla does in his article is precisely what he says he fears will happen to untenured Middle East scholars: his claims appear designed to damage the reputation—and possibly the professional future—of a good person of integrity and ability.

Edwin Forman
(Pediatrics)

Steven Hamburg
(Environmental Studies)

Arthur Landy
(Medicine)

Dietrich Rueschemeyer
(International Studies)
Brown University

Colla Responds:

My colleagues and I share a sense of distress about the events described in my article. Of course, the sources of our distress are different. Mine comes from the direct experience that academic freedom is vulnerable to political pressure. Their distress derives from their contention that my piece is not true, and that it is unfairly personal. Because I share my colleagues’ interest in the truth, I would ask them to research the matter more fully. When they do so, they will find plenty of evidence for the report I published and see the degree to which Eisenberg’s behavior was significant to the unfolding of the events.

In researching my article, I interviewed many faculty, administrators, and students. All were direct witnesses to or participants in the events described. I based my report on the points where multiple sources agreed on what happened. True,my account narrates the facts in a particular way, but I remain confident about the facts as described. Moreover, there were limits to what I could report given the delicacy of the matter—but I did my best to report what I could as explicitly as possible To date, only one substantive mistake has been pointed out to me (see “Corrections,” page 11).

It will be for the Hillel community to judge Eisenberg’s tenure and whether her views and style adequately represented the pluralistic nature of Brown’s Jewish community. I spoke to enough people to sense that reviews will be mixed. I do not doubt that she may be a wonderful person to her friends and political allies. However, the many people she viewed as political enemies were privy to another side—one that was far from collegial.

While it is not pleasant to dwell on the events I described, pretending they did not happen serves no one.

Elliott Colla
(Comparative Literature)
Brown University

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