click here for the PDF (pg. 13-16)
click here for the radio coverage
The Blue and White | 04/15/2013
“It’s a body blow,” says Barnard English chair Peter Platt. “But we’re big and we’re strong. We have to pick up the pieces, and we’re doing that.”
Platt is referring to the loss of former colleague Bashir Abu-Manneh, whom he helped hire in 2004—and who, in November 2012, was denied tenure by his department, effectively ending his employment at Barnard.
While students were quick to voice their resentment toward the tenure decision by circulating a high-profile petition demanding his reinstatement, Abu-Manneh’s colleagues in the department have largely refused to speak on the matter. Abu-Manneh, too, declined to comment.
Abu-Manneh taught a number of courses, including Cultures of Colonialism: Israel/Palestine; Global Literature; Postcolonial Theory; and Marxist Criticism. He was the only Barnard English professor who specialized in postcolonial literatures and the only professor on campus who taught a course built exclusively around Arabic literature in translation. While Abu-Manneh’s deep engagement with Marxist theory and Israel-Palestine was new for many students, his openness and dynamism attracted students of disparate viewpoints. Abu-Manneh is remembered as having the rare ability to strike a pedagogical balance that was neither dogmatic nor apolitical.
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Naomi Cohen | journalist 