Intro to Intertextuality

INTERTEXTUALITY:

USING ONE ARTICLE TO SHED LIGHT ON ANOTHER

1. Read the Vaillancourt article below about ways in which leaders sabotage the efforts of their followers.
2. Then read the letter “Public Statement by Eight Alabama Clergymen” published in the newspaper as a statement to the Rev Dr. Martin Luther King and his followers on April 12, 1963.

from “Five ‘Dirty Tricks’ Common in Campus Administration”

Chronical of Higher Education, January 2020

by Allison M. Vaillancourt (Vice President for Business Affairs and Human Resources, Univ.of Arizona)

In 1944, the U.S. Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the precursor to the Central Intelligence Agency, created the "Simple Sabotage Field Manual." This once-classified booklet offered OSS officers guidance for training citizen-saboteurs in other countries to quietly and discreetly disrupt war efforts against the United States during World War II. The booklet offered instructions on how to damage equipment, transportation, and communication systems, but also included fascinating instructions for disrupting organizations, "based on universal opportunities to make faculty decisions, to adopt a noncooperative attitude, and to induce others to follow suit."

In a section of the manual on "general interference with organizations," the tactics for disrupting foreign governments look eerily familiar to those many of us see in the academic workplace today:

• Never permit shortcuts. Or, as the manual states: "Insist on doing everything through ‘channels.’ Never permit shortcuts to be taken in order to expedite decisions."
• "Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your ‘points’ by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences."
• Refer all matters to committees. "When possible, refer all matters to committees, for ‘further study and consideration.’ Attempt to make the committees as large as possible — never less than five."
• Focus on the trivial. "Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible."
• Nitpick over phrasing. "Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, resolutions."
• Reopen debate. "Refer back to matters decided upon at the last meeting and attempt to reopen the question of the advisability of that decision."
• Advocate caution. "Urge your fellow-conferees to be ‘reasonable’ and avoid haste which might result in embarrassments or difficulties later on.
• Express concerns about the propriety of any decision. "Raise the question of whether such action as is contemplated lies within the jurisdiction of the group or whether it might conflict with the policy of some higher echelon."

Public Statement by Eight Alabama Clergymen Denouncing Martin Luther King's efforts, April 12, 1963

http://www.massresistance.org/docs/gen/09a/mlk_day/statement.html

On April 12, 1963, while Martin Luther King was in the Birmingham jail because of his desegregation demonstrations, eight prominent Alabama clergymen published the following statement in the local newspapers, urging blacks to withdraw their support from Martin Luther King and his demonstrations. Four days later, King wrote his Letter from the Birmingham Jail in reply.

We the undersigned clergymen are among those who, in January, issued "An Appeal for Law and Order and Common Sense," in dealing with racial problems in Alabama. We expressed understanding that honest convictions in racial matters could properly be pursued in the courts, but urged that decisions of those courts should in the meantime be peacefully obeyed.

            Since that time there had been some evidence of increased forbearance and a willingness to face facts. Responsible citizens have undertaken to work on various problems which cause racial friction and unrest. In Birmingham, recent public events have given indication that we all have opportunity for a new constructive and realistic approach to racial problems.

            However, we are now confronted by a series of demonstrations by some of our Negro citizens, directed and led in part by outsiders. We recognize the natural impatience of people who feel that their hopes are slow in being realized. But we are convinced that these demonstrations are unwise and untimely.

            We agree rather with certain local Negro leadership which has called for honest and open negotiation of racial issues in our area. And we believe this kind of facing of issues can best be accomplished by citizens of our own metropolitan area, white and Negro, meeting with their knowledge and experience of the local situation. All of us need to face that responsibility and find proper channels for its accomplishment.

            Just as we formerly pointed out that "hatred and violence have no sanction in our religious and political traditions," we also point out that such actions as incite to hatred and violence, however technically peaceful those actions may be, have not contributed to the resolution of our local problems. We do not believe that these days of new hope are days when extreme measures are justified in Birmingham.

            We commend the community as a whole, and the local news media and law enforcement in particular, on the calm manner in which these demonstrations have been handled. We urge the public to continue to show restraint should the demonstrations continue, and the law enforcement official to remain calm and continue to protect our city from violence.

            We further strongly urge our own Negro community to withdraw support from these demonstrations, and to unite locally in working peacefully for a better Birmingham. When rights are consistently denied, a cause should be pressed in the courts and in negotiations among local leaders, and not in the streets. We appeal to both our white and Negro citizenry to observe the principles of law and order and common sense.

1. C. J. Carpenter, D.D., LL.D., Bishop of Alabama

Joseph A. Durick, D.D., Auxiliary Bishop, Diocese of Mobile, Birmingham

Rabbi Hilton L. Grafman, Temple Emanu-El, Birmingham, Alabama

Bishop Paul Hardin, Bishop of the Alabama-West Florida Conference

Bishop Nolan B. Harmon, Bishop of the North Alabama Conference of the Methodist Church

George M. Murray, D.D., LL.D., Bishop Coadjutor, Episcopal Diocese of Alabama

Edward V. Ramage, Moderator, Synod of the Alabama Presbyterian Church in the United States

Earl Stallings, Pastor, First Baptist Church, Birmingham, Alabama