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Lauren Zuravel
Princeton Tory
I contend that the narrow, politicized curatorial approach of the new Princeton Art Museum’s American wing turns our nation’s vibrant story into a muted tapestry. Like a quilt losing meaning when its unique patches are made uniform, the exhibit elevates grievance over achievement, division over unity, and progressive ideology over historical accuracy. The overall structure, deliberate additions, and obvious omissions dull the nation’s artistic vibrancy and overlook Princeton’s remarkable place in the American experiment.
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Faith in higher education continues to plummet, and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP)—the nation’s leading organization representing faculty interests and a longstanding voice on academic freedom and university governance—has decided to train its guns on the growing movement to establish civic education centers at public universities. The AAUP’s objections amount to a single, unlovely demand: we get to decide what students learn, and nobody else gets a vote.
Six days after the report went online, the AAA fired back with a full-throated defense. “Anthropologists welcome rigorous critique of the discipline,” wrote its president, Carolyn M. Rouse. “What we cannot accept is a sweeping verdict about anthropology’s intellectual culture, scholarly practices, and professional norms built on selective evidence and issued without consultation.
Since faculty voted in may to proctor in-person exams, national news outlets and some alumni have decried the end of Princeton’s 133-year-old tradition of unsupervised testing, but students, faculty, and recent graduates say the conversation within the campus community has been mild.
