Wednesday, January 28, 2004

Creeping Thing

I started this as a comment to yesterday's entry at the Chutry Experiment. Then what before was dormant became a Creeping Thing. So I'll link and deposit it here at EWM, where I feel less duty-bound to apologize for leaping about without explaining all of the connections, evidence and so on.

I'm glad you didn't delete this entry, Chuck. I read it with interest, partly because I live smack-dab in the Heartland (with a Baptist church adjoining our back yard, a Greek Orthodox church two lots to the north, and the largest Catholic Diocese in Missouri less than a stone's pitch past that--not that anyone's casting stones). Your point about "how politically and socially homogeneous many of these campuses are" is incredibly important to this discussion because that is what leads to "the stereotypes of evangelical colleges as weak academically and ultraconservative socially." While academic credibility varies significantly among evangelical institutions, their projection of social ultraconservativism is hearty and regular, here in the Midwest. William Jewell College, an institution reputed for academic rigor, was in the local paper today for its student-body vote on adding "sexual orientation" to the institution's anti-discrimination code (link | subscription link | link). The measure didn't pass; "sexual orientation" is not a part of William Jewell's anti-discrimination policy. So you're right that anecdotal evidence can be misapplied to the whole range of institutions, but still there's enough anecdotal evidence to correlate evangelical institutions and patterns of social homogeneity.

I'm watching these issues especially as they pertain to international student-athletes (mainly because it's one of my current jobs). The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) serves as the governing organization for the athletic programs at many evangelical institutions, William Jewell and Azusa Pacific included. In recent years, there's been an astounding call (among the member institutions--some 300+ schools) for restrictions on the number of international student-athletes who would be allowed to participate in intercollegiate athletics in the NAIA. The tenor of these proposals (usually as by-law amendments to set limitations on age or to impose quotas) is alarming. I might even characterize it as a new spirit of Ashcroftian xenophobia--the subtle rumblings that international student-athletes have a competitive advantage, that they don't belong in the same sporting arena as domestic student-athletes. A quick look will confirm who has more lucrative resources--new uniforms, equipment, irrigated fields, paid coaches, sponsors, etc.--through well-funded development programs. And so we've forgotten Perry Wallace; and it's usual to hear raging clusters of fans (sometimes, but not always, from evangelical institutions) chant "U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A." when an international student-athlete takes the field or when a domestic counterpart makes a fine play. Probably should make this a series since there's much, much more to say.

Posted by ewm at January 28, 2004 10:01 AM to Sport