such as the Black Panthers.

“There’s been a profound 

shift, a historiographical shift, 
one might say, a political shift, 
that’s made it possible to write 
about radical anti-state orga-
nizations that was absolutely 
not true when I was in graduate 
school,” she said.

Murch was working on a book 

on the Black Panthers when she 
realized the history of incarcera-
tion is central to research on race 
and marginalized groups.

“It started out very empirical-

ly, with trying to understand why 
such large numbers of southern 
born migrants ended up in juve-
nile systems,” she said.

The study of the carceral state 

also has implications for other 
areas of study, such as research 
on crime and drug policy.

“It’s very difficult to write 

about a drug economy without 
dealing with the state apparatus 
of punishment,” she said.

Most recently, Murch has 

studied political mobilization 
in current social movements 
against mass incarceration and 
police brutality. She travelled to 
Ferguson, Mo. after last year’s 
protests, following the fatal 
shooting of an unarmed, Black 
teenager by a white police officer, 
to study the “explosion of activ-
ism” there. She said these kind of 
events are important for shaping 
how researchers reinterpret the 
period in which incarceration 
rates soared in the U.S.

Thompson began her discus-

sion by agreeing with Murch’s 
assertion that many historians 
who study incarceration stum-
bled on the topic while study-
ing other things. Thompson, for 
example, came across the topic 
while working on a book about 
Black activism and civil rights in 
Detroit.

“We all came to this quite as a 

surprise to ourselves,” she said. 
“I didn’t even see in my own 
book, which is fundamentally 
about police brutality and funda-
mentally about the carceral state 
… I didn’t understand what a car-
ceral state was. I didn’t see the 
forest for the trees.”

Thompson also worked on 

a book about the Attica Prison 
Riot, which took place in the 
Attica Correctional Facility in 
1971. While working on the book, 
Thompson realized the connec-
tion between civil rights and the 
increasing incarceration rate. 
She recounted asking of herself, 
“Well wait a minute, something 
happens after Attica. After 1971 
we start to lock everybody up. 
What’s the relationship? Is there 
a connection here?”

She also noted that this body 

of research has been largely 
fueled by women and feminists, 
and that experts in this area have 
recently been called upon to edu-
cate legislators in Washington, 
D.C., an unusual request for his-
torians.

One question she answered in 

Washington was how to accom-
modate the wealthy interest 
groups and corporations who, 
like legislators and historians, 
believe in decarceration, but 
don’t know what to do when this 
decarceration happens. She sug-
gested funds be diverted from 
the prison system into social wel-
fare, charter schools and other 
services that will help those most 
affected by the incarceration 
trend.

“I thought (the event) went 

pretty well,” Lassiter said. “We 
got some really good questions, 
including a number of really 
good ones from undergrads. We 
didn’t resolve anything today, but 
that’s not how historical discus-
sions usually happen. The goal 
is to ask the right questions as 
much as finding easy answers.”

Chen sought support from 

the GEO to submit a grievance 
hearing to Taubman College.

Ware said the GEO believes 

Taubman 
College 
breached 

protections outlined in Article 
9 of its collective bargaining 
agreement with the University. 
The article states that once an 
offer has been made to a potential 
GSI and the GSI signs a contract, 
the duties can be changed or taken 
away completely, but the pay, 
benefits and tuition waiver can be 
no less than what was promised.

“This is one of the articles in 

our contract that is most dear to 
us,” Ware said. “In addition to it 
being an awful situation for Alex, 
who doesn’t deserve to be in the 
situation that she’s in, it’s also a 
threat to job security for all GSIs.”

According to Ware, Taubman 

College has declined to overturn 

their decisions thus far in prior 
grievance hearings for Chen. 
Monday’s 
protest 
occurred 

during 
her 
third 
grievance 

hearing with Academic Human 
Resources. Ware said a mix of 
more than 100 graduate and 
undergraduate 
students 
and 

University 
alumni 
attended 

Monday’s 
demonstration, 

but were denied access to the 
grievance hearing.

Upon request for comment on 

the issue, University spokesman 
Rick 
Fitzgerald 
said 
Monday 

evening he could not discuss the 
matter.

“It’s not appropriate to discuss 

these types of personnel issues 
publicly,” he said. “This matter 
is being addressed appropriately 
through the process outlined in 
the GEO collective bargaining 
agreement.”

Ware said many people were 

intersted in learning the outcome 
of Monday’s hearing.

“Everybody that was at the 

Taubman building today came 
hoping to watch the meeting,” 
Ware said. “We did request a room 
large enough for that to take place, 
but (Human Resources) took the 
position that they didn’t want any 
spectators in the meeting.”

According to Ware, officials 

closed the blinds in the meeting 
room 
and 
held 
the 
meeting 

privately while four or five police 
officers monitored protesters from 
a classroom next door.

The department will have 30 

days to consider Chen’s case before 
they release a final decision. During 
that time, Ware said the GEO plans 
to appear before the University’s 
Board of Regents to argue Chen’s 
case.

“We 
hope 
that 
Human 

Resources, 
being 
intimately 

familiar with our contract and 
knowing 
what 
the 
contract 

requirements are, we hope they 
will overturn the decision, and that 
we’ll get Alex what she deserves,” 
he said. 

“It’s ridiculous,” Rahman 

said. 
“Protesting 
against 

political correctness … I’m 
of course not for that, but I 
(also) think it’s really weird 
to equate that that to the 
Berlin Wall. It doesn’t make 
any sense.”

Passersby spoke with YAF 

members about the purpose 
of the display. The wall had 
words 
like 
“protect 
left 

handed people” and “report 
me” 
spray 
painted 
in 
a 

graffiti-like fashion. 

“We chose words that were 

all part of this politically 
correct effort, to replicate an 
environment where people 
are coerced into silence from 
expressing 
their 
beliefs,” 

Strobl said.

Students 
said 
they 

felt 
some 
groups 
were 

marginalized by the words 
written on the wall.

“I believe that people’s 

identities 
are 
being 

challenged 
based 
on 

the words on the wall,” 
Sweitzer said. “People who 
have 
suffered 
traumatic 

experience — you need to be 
aware of that when watching 
a movie in class, or just going 
through life.”

The 
aim 
of 
the 
day, 

according to Strobl, was to 
draw connections between 
instances of institutionalized 
censorship.

“It is our mission to fight 

for 
freedom 
of 
speech, 

intellectual discussion and 
dialogue and the opportunity 
to engage in this dialogue 
as a University,” Strobl said. 
“If we didn’t have this event 
today, I wouldn’t have had 
tons of discussions about this 
today.”

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Tuesday, November 10, 2015 — 3

Theme semesters to 
celebrate University 
bicentennial 

The University announced 

Tuesday it will devote courses 
in the 2017 winter and fall 
semesters 
to 
celebrate 
its 

bicentennial. 

According to a statment form 

Bicentennial Communications, 
the winter theme semester, 
titled “The Making of the 
University of Michigan,” will 
highlight the history of the 
University. 

The fall 2017 theme semester, 

“Michigan 
Horizons: 
The 

Possible 
Futures 
of 
U-M,” 

will focus on the challenges 
and dilemmas facing both the 
University and higher education 
at large. 

Theme 
semester 
planning 

was chaired by Howard Brick, a 
professor of history and director 
of the Eisenberg Institute for 
Historical Studies. 

Classes cancelled 
at UM-Dearborn 
after mall shooting 

Police 
confirmed 
Monday 

afternoon that shots were fired 
in Fairlane Mall in Dearborn, 
Michigan.

The shooting prompted both 

a lockdown of the mall and the 
University’s Dearborn campus, 
which is located across the 
street. 

Classes 
at 
the 
Dearborn 

campus were cancelled and 
students were encouraged to 
remain indoors. 

According 
to 
police, 
the 

shooting 
occurred 
after 
a 

dispute between two people 
escalated. 

No 
 
injuries 
have 
been 

reporterd. No arrests have been 
made in connection with the 
incident. 

Wayne County 
to build pier at 
wildlife refuge 

The Wayne County com-

mission voted unanimously to 
approve $1 million deal to build 
a boat dock and pier at a wildlife 
refuge. 

The commission made the 

agreement with the Downriver 
Community Conference. The 
conference is an alliance of 20 
Wayne County cities and town-
ships dedicated to improving 
the Detroit River International 
Wildlife Refuge Gateway in 
Trenton and Gibraltar. 

Plans for the project include 

for a 755-foot boat dock and 
pier that will accommodate 
100 people. A floating pier will 
house a boat from the Michigan 
Sea Grant program. The pro-
gram, backed by the Univeristy 
and Michigan State University, 
funds research, education and 
training projects about con-
servation and use of the Great 
Lakes

The project is anticipated to 

be completed in 2017. 

In light of student 
outcry, Missouri 
president resigns

Timothy 
Wolfe, 
president 

of the University of Missouri, 
announced he would resign 
Monday after students demand-
ed he step down for his alleged 
lack of attention to racial issues 
on campus. 

Following the painting of a 

swastika on a campus building, 
students at the school began 
protesting 
the 
university’s 

administration. 
One 
student 

pledged he would not eat until 
Wolfe resigned. 

The Missouri football team 

also pledged they would not 
partipate in any football-related 
activities until Wolfe stepped 
down. 

In his final speech to the Uni-

veristy of Missouri community, 
Wolfe said he hopes his resinga-
tion was a step toward healing 
on the campus. 

—ALYSSA BRANDON 

NEWS BRIEFS

equity, inclusion and academic 
affairs, introduced the panel, 
explaining that its aim was to 
contextualize the current state of 
diversity at the University before 
continuing to develop future plans 
later in the week.

“Whatever progress we make 

in the future has already been 
purchased by the blood, sweat 
and tears of those who have come 
before us,” Sellers said. “Whatever 
heights we reach in the future, we 
can only reach those heights by 
standing on the shoulders of the 
gargantuan contributions of those 
who have come before us.”

Cotera argued that despite the 

University’s history as a leader in 

promoting diversity on campus — 
most notably through defending 
affirmative action in the 2003 
U.S. Supreme Court case Gratz 
v. Bollinger — the administrative 
leadership has often minimized its 
commitment to diversity.

She cited the critically low 

enrollment numbers for Black 
and Native American students 
— 4.82 percent and 0.25 percent, 
respectively. Noting a lack of 
administrative 
leadership 
in 

recruiting and retaining faculty 
of color, Cotera said the campus 
climate for minority students is 
unwelcoming.

“Not a week goes by that a 

student of color, whether graduate 
or undergraduate, does not come 
crying in my office,” she said. “It 
happens every week.”

Stephens 
said 
the 
low 

enrollment numbers for minority 
students is also due to the 
normalization of microaggressions 
on campus. She said many students 
of color believe the University is a 
hostile place for minorities, even 
before they set foot on campus.

“The University needs to come 

to understand that that 4 percent is 
in part based on how the University 
does business,” she said.

Despite 
the 
critical 
words 

panelists had for racial diversity 
on campus, Toy remarked on 
how receptive and courageous 
the University was when he first 
conceived the Human Sexuality 
Office in 1971. 

“The University took, I believe, 

an enormous risk in creating what 
we now refer to as the Spectrum 
Center,” Toys said.

In addition to panel members, 

a number of other distinguished 
campus 
leaders 
attended 
the 

discussion, 
including 
Nellie 

Varner, the first Black regent at 
the University; Harold Johnson, 
the first Black dean; and Henry 
Johnson, former vice president of 
student affairs and the first Black 
vice president.

Business 
sophomore 
Dhara 

Gosalia said she said left the 
event 
feeling 
that 
achieving 

a 
more 
diverse 
University 

community must occur through 
an institutional, systemic way.

“When I came in, I expected 

them to talk more about the 
history, but I thought it was really 
cool that they connected it to the 
present times,” she said.

Rackham 
student 
Tissyana 

Camacho said the panel made 
her realize how the University 

will need to remain committed to 
attaining a diverse student body 
for a while before achieving it 
achieves goals for inclusion.

“I think my biggest takeaway 

was realizing that this is something 
that is a long-term commitment,” 
Camacho said. “I think many if not 
all of the panelists discussed that 
the change is not going to happen 
overnight.”

Toward 
the 
end 
of 
the 

discussion, 
all 
panelists 

encouraged 
senior 
leaders 

and 
administrators, 
not 
just 

students and faculty, to make 
campus inclusion a priority at the 
University.

“We need everybody involved,” 

Stewart said. “We know that when 
institutional change happens it 
happens when it converges from 
bottom up, top down leadership.”

DIVERSITY
From Page 1

WALL
From Page 1

GEO
From Page 1

state. Murch said the carceral 
state 
“entails 
multiple 
forms 

of 
surveillance, 
control 
and 

confinement … the carceral has 
to do with when state institutions 
take on a punishing function.”

“Mass incarceration is the 

symptom. The carceral state 
is the cause,” Thompson said. 
“We’ll have a carceral state even 
if we let a million and a half 
people out of prison and we go 
back to levels of 1970.”

The discussion also explored 

the rise of juvenile incarceration, 
and who is responsible for the 
policies that encouraged these 
incarceration trends, as well as 
mass incarceration.

The 
issue 
of 
mass 

incarceration is polarizing: some 
say it’s a result of policy shift in 
the 1960s and 1970s, while others 
say it’s due to a longstanding 
tradition 
of 
imprisonment. 

Some camps of social scientists 
argue the trend is a result of 
de-industrialization or under-
policing of Black neighborhoods.

The event began with a 

short lecture by each of the 
guest panelists. Murch, who is 
considered a pioneer in the study 
of mass incarceration through a 
historical lens, spoke about the 
development of of research on 
the carceral state.

She said the group of historians 

working on the topic is very small, 
and research has been limited 
until very recently due to bias 
against the subjects of research, 
such as the Black Panthers.

“There’s been a profound shift, 

a historiographical shift, one 
might say, a political shift, that’s 
made it possible to write about 
radical anti-state organizations 

that was absolutely not true 
when I was in graduate school,” 
she said.

Murch was working on a 

book on the Black Panthers 
when she realized the history of 
incarceration is central to research 
on race and marginalized groups.

“It started out very empirically, 

with trying to understand why 
such large numbers of southern 
born migrants ended up in 
juvenile systems,” she said.

The study of the carceral state 

also has implications for other 
areas of study, such as research 
on crime and drug policy.

“It’s very difficult to write 

about a drug economy without 
dealing with the state apparatus 
of punishment,” she said.

Most recently, Murch has 

studied political mobilization 
in current social movements 
against mass incarceration and 
police brutality. She travelled 
to Ferguson, Mo. after last 
year’s protests, following the 
fatal shooting of an unarmed, 
Black teenager by a white police 
officer, to study the “explosion of 
activism” there. She said these 
kind of events are important 
for shaping how researchers 
reinterpret the period in which 
incarceration rates soared in the 
U.S.

Thompson 
began 
her 

discussion 
by 
agreeing 

with 
Murch’s 
assertion 
that 

many 
historians 
who 
study 

incarceration stumbled on the 
topic while studying other things. 
Thompson, for example, came 
across the topic while working on 
a book about Black activism and 
civil rights in Detroit.

“We all came to this quite as a 

surprise to ourselves,” she said. 
“I didn’t even see in my own 
book, which is fundamentally 
about 
police 
brutality 
and 

fundamentally about the carceral 
state … I didn’t understand what a 
carceral state was. I didn’t see the 
forest for the trees.”

Thompson also worked on 

a book about the Attica Prison 
Riot, which took place in the 
Attica 
Correctional 
Facility 

in 1971. While working on the 
book, Thompson realized the 
connection between civil rights 
and the increasing incarceration 
rate. She recounted asking of 
herself, “Well wait a minute, 
something 
happens 
after 

Attica. After 1971 we start to 
lock 
everybody 
up. 
What’s 

the relationship? Is there a 
connection here?”

She also noted that this body 

of research has been largely 
fueled by women and feminists, 
and that experts in this area 
have 
recently 
been 
called 

upon to educate legislators in 
Washington, D.C., an unusual 
request for historians.

One question she answered 

in Washington was how to 
accommodate 
the 
wealthy 
interest 

groups and corporations who, 
like legislators and historians, 
believe in decarceration, but 
don’t know what to do when 
this decarceration happens. She 
suggested funds be diverted 
from the prison system into 
social welfare, charter schools 
and other services that will 
help those most affected by the 
incarceration trend.

“I thought (the event) went 

pretty well,” Lassiter said. “We 
got some really good questions, 
including a number of really 
good ones from undergrads. We 
didn’t resolve anything today, 
but that’s not how historical 
discussions 
usually 
happen. 

The goal is to ask the right 
questions as much as finding 
easy answers.”

PROTEST
From Page 1

CRIMINAL JUSTICE
From Page 2

protests.”

Weineck 
also 
asked 
for 

Schlissel’s 
thoughts 
on 
the 

University 
issuing 
a 
formal 

apology to H. Chandler Davis, a 
former University professor.

In 
1954, 
the 
University 

suspended and terminated Davis 
and Mark Nickerson, a tenured 
faculty member, for their refusal 
to provide testimony to a group 
from the U.S. House Committee 
on Un-American Activities — as 
a result of both professors having 
had communist leanings. For 
similar reasons, the University 

suspended but later reinstated 
another 
professor, 
Clement 

Markert. 

Davis, a former communist, 

spent six months in federal 
prison for contempt. Nickerson 
and Markert were identified 
by the committee as potential 
subversives because of their 
former communist sympathies, 
but avoided federal prison by 
citing their Fifth Amendment 
rights.

In 
1990, 
the 
University’s 

Senate 
Assembly 
passed 
a 

resolution regarding the 1954 
incident, 
which 
stated 
the 

faculty “deeply regret the failure 
of the University community 
to 
protect 
the 
fundamental 

values of intellectual freedom at 
that time.” The resolution also 
established an Annual Senate 
Lecture on Academic and on 
Intellectual 
Freedom, 
“The 

University of Michigan Senate’s 
Davis, 
Markert, 
Nickerson 

Lecture 
on 
Academic 
and 

Intellectual Freedom.”

In 
response, 
Schlissel 

questioned whether it is fair to 
condemn decisions made more 
than 60 years ago.

“How do you feel about 

holding people accountable for 
events that happened 60 years 
ago, using much more modern 
viewpoints?” he asked. “It’s 
really easy to look back and say 
‘Gee, these people must really 

have been out of their minds to 
fall in line with McCarthyism 
here 
at 
the 
University 
of 

Michigan.’ ”

He acknowledged that some 

of his hesitation stems from his 
perspective as the University’s 
president.

“I’m 
very 
sensitive, 
now 

that I’m the guy in this seat, 
to somebody 50 or 60 years 
from now looking back on the 
orthodoxy of today and saying 
‘How on earth could that guy 
Schlissel not realize that?’ ” he 
said.

Biology Prof. John Lehman, 

a SACUA member, pointed to 
the United States’ 1988 decision 
to apologize for the internment 

of Japanese-Americans during 
World War II as an example of 
the importance of apologizing 
for an event, even if it comes 
years after the fact.

“It’s not that governments 

haven’t taken steps to rectify or 
receive reconciliation for things 
like the Japanese internment,” 
Lehman said. “I think the 
government was right to turn 
around and say ‘this was a 
mistake and we should be aware 
of this so we don’t make the 
same mistake again.’ ”

Schlissel said he would weigh 

the idea of issuing an apology to 
Davis with his executive team 
and the University’s Board of 
Regents.

SACUA
From Page 1

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