[1840] in peace2
UNC faces lawsuit over including book on Islam
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Aimee L Smith)
Wed Aug 7 17:19:49 2002
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To: peace-announce@MIT.EDU
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Date: Wed, 07 Aug 2002 17:19:37 -0400
From: Aimee L Smith <alsmith@MIT.EDU>
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Is teaching about a religion and promoting dialog and
discussion the same as proselytizing? Or is this lawsuit
more about religious-based hatred? If you think the latter,
you may wish to write letters of support to the following
individuals.
Robert N Shelton
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Title: Executive Vice Chancellor & Provost
E-Mail: RNSHELTO@email.unc.edu
Michael Sells
Professor of Religion and author of
"Approaching the Qur'an: The Early Revelations"
Haverford College
E-Mail: msells@haverford.edu
you also can hear a program in which these two spoke:
Teaching the Koran
http://www.onpointradio.org/shows/2002/07/20020730_a_main.asp
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52484-2002Aug6.html
part of the article:
No one complained two years ago when the University of North Carolina required
its incoming freshmen to read a book about the lingering effects of the Civil
War, nor last year when it assigned a book about a Hmong immigrant's struggle
with epilepsy and American medicine.
But this year, the university in Chapel Hill is asking all 3,500 incoming
freshmen to read a book about Islam and finds itself besieged in federal court
and across the airwaves by Christian evangelists and other conservatives.
The university chose "Approaching the Qur'an: The Early Revelations" by
Michael A. Sells, a professor of comparative religion at Haverford College,
because of intense interest in Islam since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks,
said UNC Chancellor James Moeser.
"We're obviously not promoting one religion," Moeser told concerned university
trustees last month. "What more timely subject could there be?"
But a national TV talk show host, Fox News Network's Bill O'Reilly, compared
the assignment to teaching "Mein Kampf" in 1941 and questioned the purpose of
making freshmen study "our enemy's religion."
To the university's faculty and some students, the dispute is about upholding
UNC's tradition of academic freedom. To the university's critics, it's about
maintaining America's moral backbone in the war on terrorism. And to other
schools and educators across the country, it has a double lesson: demand for
lectures and courses on Islam is higher than ever, but so is the sensitivity
of the topic.
