119 - Alan Davison - Diversity, Dogma and Dissent

Two for Tea Podcast

General Follow Alan on Twitter: https://twitter.com/alan_davison Alan’s academic profile: https://profiles.uts.edu.au/Alan.Davison Alan and Josh Szeps’ special speaker podcast series ‘Permission to Think’ homepage: https://www.uts.edu.au/about/faculty-arts-and-social-sciences/partners-and-community/fass-industry-events/permission-think Josh Szeps’ podcast series ‘Uncomfortable Conversations’, of which ‘Permission to Think’ is under the aegis: https://play.acast.com/s/uncomfortable-conversations-with-josh-szeps/ References Josh Szeps’ appearance on ‘Two for Tea’: https://soundcloud.com/twoforteapodcast/18-josh-szeps Interview with Alan in the ‘Times Higher Education’: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/people/interview-alan-davison?mc_cid=4b6d8a0b62&mc_eid=1347a1c1c0 ‘Two for Tea’ episode with Jesse Singal: https://soundcloud.com/twoforteapodcast/84-jesse-singal-the-quick-fix-public-limited-version ‘Trans Ideology and the New Ptolemaism in the Academy’ by Kathleen Rowley in ‘Archives of Sexual Behavior’: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-021-01950-9 ‘Should You Trust the Myers-Briggs Personality Test?’ by Laith Al-Shawaf in ‘Areo Magazine’: https://areomagazine.com/2021/03/09/should-you-trust-the-myers-briggs-personality-test/ ‘Two for Tea’ episode with Tomiwa Owolade: https://soundcloud.com/twoforteapodcast/85-tomiwa-owolade-racial-cultural-kaleidoscopes-public-limited-version Alan’s paper ‘A Darwinian Approach to Postmodern Critical Theory: Or, How Did Bad Ideas Colonise the Academy?’ in ‘Society’: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12115-020-00505-3 Alan’s paper ‘Multiculturalism, Social Distance and “Islamophobia”: Refections on Anti‑racism Research in Australia and Beyond’ in ‘Society’: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12115-021-00641-4 ‘Two for Tea’ episode with Jonathan Rauch: https://soundcloud.com/twoforteapodcast/93-jonathan-rauch-in-defence-of-truth-public-limited-version Timestamps 00.00 Opening and introduction. 2:36 Iona reads from Alan’s interview in the ‘Times Higher Education’ about the problems he sees in academia and asks him about the problem of ‘wokery’ in academia and how it has affected his own institution, wider society, and academic science/tech. 6:45 Specific examples of wokery infecting academia: diversity training, no-go research areas, and censorship. Wokery within Alan’s own discipline of music. 11:45 What is going wrong in Australian universities? The example of implicit bias training, based on the discredited implicit association test, being used in higher education. 16:02 Cultish mindsets in academia and the discouragement of scepticism. 18:25 The corporatisation and marketisation of academia. The “perfect storm”: the combination of identity politics and brand/risk-aware corporatisation in academia. 22:12 How is the culture of diversity training affecting universities? 26:30 Is testing for implicit bias simply workplace totalitarianism? The ‘who you are’ over ‘what you do/say’ mindset. Clumsy and counterproductive attempts to measure injustice and “redress the balance.” ‘Representation’ in music, particularly orchestral music. Does dealing with economic inequalities earlier in the ‘pipeline’ matter more? 40:30 Socioeconomic and cultural factors in inequalities. 44:25 Discussions of Alan’s evolutionary psychological/memetic approaches to understanding the success and influence of postmodern critical theory and Iona’s view that tribalism is a universal heuristic, including in the ‘anti-woke’ circle. Alan: “Resist the heuristic!” The risk of orthodoxy taking over. 1:00:46 What universities should be and the decline of public trust in higher education. Alan’s defence of universities. What are the risks to universities? 1:11:00 How has the atmosphere on campus changed since Alan began his academic career? 1:12:10 Last words and outro.