A New York Times columnist has called for the ouster of Harvard University President Claudine Gay amid accusations of plagiarism, writing that the situation has reached “a tipping point.”
John McWhorter, a linguistics professor at Columbia University, wrote an op-ed for the New York Times on Thursday saying Gay should resign if the Ivy League school refuses to fire her from her position.
Gay allegedly quoted or paraphrased authors more than 40 times without proper attribution in his academic works, violating the school’s strict rules on plagiarism.
“Harvard has a clear plagiarism policy that threatens students with punishments up to the equivalent of expulsion from the university for a single instance of plagiarism,” McWhorter wrote.
“That policy may not apply to the university president, but recent and growing revelations about past cases of plagiarism by Dr. Gay make it untenable for her to remain in the position.”
He added that keeping Gay in her position “would not only be a terrible sign of empty leadership, but also risks conveying the impression of a double standard in a progressive institution for a black woman, who serves no one well, and much less Dr…. Homosexual.”
Claudine Gay is accused of 40 acts of plagiarism and has drawn the attention of Congress amid its investigation into allegations of anti-Semitism on campus. David McGlynn
Gay, Harvard’s first black president, has produced just 11 scholarly articles in her career and no books of her own, said McWhorter, who is black.
Her appointment as president, he argued, “gives the appearance that Dr. Gay was chosen not for her academic qualifications, which Harvard is believed to value, but rather because of her race.”
On Thursday, a complaint revealed more than 40 accusations of plagiarism from others’ works.
The allegations first surfaced earlier this month, with accusations that he had erased the work of other academics in his 1997 doctoral dissertation and that four articles published between 1993 and 2017 did not include proper attribution.
The allegations also came to the attention of Congress amid its investigation into existing allegations of anti-Semitism on campus, which McWhorter noted he initially rejected, wanting more evidence.
“But in the wake of reports of additional acts of plagiarism and Harvard saying it would make more corrections to earlier writings, the weight of the accusations has taken me from ‘wait and see’ to ‘that’s it,'” he wrote in the Times.
“If it is a mafia to ask influential black figures to meet the standards held of others, then we have arrived at a rather mysterious version of anti-racism, and just in time for the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday in less than a month,” he wrote.
“I would even wish Harvard luck in finding another black woman to serve as president if that were an imperative. But right now that black woman cannot, not even gracefully, be Claudine Gay,” McWhorter said.
“Harvard has a clear plagiarism policy that threatens students with punishments up to the equivalent of expulsion from the university for a single instance of plagiarism,” McWhorter wrote. Getty Images for Meet the Press
Gay has defended his academic integrity, telling the Boston Globe: “Throughout my career, I have worked to ensure that my scholarship meets the highest academic standards.”
Harvard has supported its president and its board of directors has announced unanimous support for Gay.
The House Education and Workforce Committee on Wednesday announced an investigation into how the school handled plagiarism allegations against Gay.
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