Do Professors "profess" outside their discipline in class?

How seriously should we take such accusations?

My brother shared a widely believed criticism of the current university.  The gist of it is that under the cover of “academic freedom” faculty use their privileged position in the classroom to “profess” their personal views of politics and society.  The most outspoken of these critics allege that students are thus exposed to theories and interpretations that are “un-American,” radically “left-wing” and not what professors were hired to teach. 

My brother asks my opinion on this. 

My first thought is the social scientist “go to” question about any claim of this nature.  How widespread or frequent is it?  Is this a criticism of a common practice or an exceptional one? 

Coupled with this is the definition problem. “Un-American?”  Are the critics casting so large a net that they are mislabeling many innocuous comments (perhaps ill-phrased or even patriotic in a sense unfamiliar to the critic)? In the course of a conversation with students one tells stories, makes references to present events, and tries to hold the attention of an often not very attentive audience.

In general, though, the critique needs to be taken seriously.  We hire university faculty to study, research and teach their “subject.” 

But it needs to be put into perspective.  Some academic subjects are “knee-deep” in controversy.  Even a cursory review of the “truths” professors have taught in the past will illustrate how wrong they have often been and how contentious were the efforts to defend old ideas and support different thinking.  University faculty in every discipline challenge accepted knowledge, discover new information and develop new explanations of that information.  That is their job. 

The threat, it seems to me, if there is one (and I believe there is), comes from the administrative side, that is sensitivity to donor sentiment that often goes so far as to limit or even eliminate areas of study that produce unpopular ideas.  Economics, sociology, history and political science are rightly concerned with controversial analysis and produce new ways of seeing social and cultural reality.  They are not the favorites of cautious administrators or the political forces in State legislatures that fund and regulate public universities.

And how can biology remain indifferent to what are still ongoing controversies about evolution, or geology not take seriously good scientific research about the environment? 

When our schools provide students with the experience of questioning received “truth,” we prepare them for citizenship in a 21^st century world.   When we provide them with an understanding of new discoveries in their field of study, we give them the tools and “facts” to think for themselves about the future. 

One further thought.  How serious are these critics of today’s universities?  Or should I say is their real interest what they claim--locating and scandalizing “woke” examples. 

In a paper Steve Ceccoli and I presented at the New English Political Association Conference this Spring, we suggested that a “follow the money” approach to these issues would suggest that what we are really seeing is an attempt to delegitimate the university itself and therefore its “radical” product, i.e. expertise that rebuffs the efforts of powerful private interests to manage government and the economy for their own interest, at the expense of the public good.