Water buffalo incident

Last updated

The water buffalo incident was a controversy at the University of Pennsylvania in 1993, in which an Israeli-born Jewish student, Eden Jacobowitz, was charged with violating the university's racial harassment policy. The incident received widespread publicity as part of the increasing debate about political correctness in the United States in the 1990s.

Contents

History

The incident occurred on January 13, 1993, when Eden Jacobowitz shouted, "Shut up, you water buffalo! If you're looking for a party, there's a zoo a mile from here," [1] out of his window to a crowd of mostly black Delta Sigma Theta sorority sisters making noise outside his dorm. Others had shouted at the crowd, but Jacobowitz was the only one charged. Members of the sorority stated that they had been rehearsing for an event which involved stepping, a traditional dance among African Americans.

Initially Jacobowitz had an advisor assigned to him, who urged him to accept the University's offer of a settlement. The settlement required him to admit to violating the racial harassment policy. Instead, he contested the university's decision under the advice of Penn history professor and libertarian activist Alan Charles Kors.

Jacobowitz, who was born in Israel and speaks Hebrew, explained his choice of water buffalo as from Hebrew slang behema (animal or beast, see also behemoth), used by Israelis to refer to a loud, rowdy person. He procured several expert witnesses who attested to this and others, such as Michael Meyers, President and Executive Director of the New York Civil Rights Coalition, who gave testimonies that water buffalo was not a racial epithet against African Americans. [2]

Jacobowitz's story was brought to the fore by the media focus on Penn. On April 23, several days before his hearing, the New York-based Jewish Daily Forward broke his story with the headline "Pennsylvania Preparing to Buffalo a Yeshiva Boy". The story gained even wider media coverage after The Wall Street Journal picked up the story with an editorial entitled "Buffaloed at Penn" on April 26. Jacobowitz was interviewed on television several times.

Based on testimony that Jacobowitz had called the women "water buffalo" and the university's belief that this was a racial epithet, it proceeded with prosecuting him. On May 13, 1993, news anchor John Chancellor opined that "the language police are at work on the campuses of our better schools. The word cops are marching under the banner of political correctness." [3]

Vernon Jordan offered a dissenting viewpoint years later when he wrote "the participant in the white mob became a hero for the right wing, while the four black women remained faceless and the objects of national ridicule." [4] University President Sheldon Hackney argued that the incident "was hijacked for ideological purposes" and that dismissing the phrase as harmless "ignores the long history of animalistic representations of African Americans as part of white supremacy's mind game [and] ignores the question of what the women thought they heard and why they got so angry." [5]

The hearing was delayed for another two months while international press commented and criticized Penn's decisions. Garry Trudeau devoted a Sunday's Doonesbury to the water buffalo incident. [6]

The affair ended in May 1993 when the group of students agreed to drop charges, spokeswoman Ayanna Taylor saying that they were "disappointed by a judicial process which has failed us miserably". [7]

See also

Related Research Articles

Doonesbury is a comic strip by American cartoonist Garry Trudeau that chronicles the adventures and lives of an array of characters of various ages, professions, and backgrounds, from the President of the United States to the title character, Michael Doonesbury, who has progressed from a college student to a youthful senior citizen over the decades.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of Pennsylvania</span> Private university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The University of Pennsylvania is a private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is one of nine colonial colleges chartered prior to the U.S. Declaration of Independence when Benjamin Franklin, the university's founder and first president, advocated for an educational institution that trained leaders in academia, commerce, and public service. Penn identifies as the fourth oldest institution of higher education in the United States, though this representation is challenged by other universities, as Franklin first convened the Board of Trustees in 1749, arguably making it the fifth oldest institution of higher education in the U.S.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chester, Pennsylvania</span> First city in Pennsylvania, United States

Chester is a city in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located in the Delaware Valley on the western bank of the Delaware River between Philadelphia and Wilmington, Delaware. The population of Chester was 32,605 at the 2020 census.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">C. Vann Woodward</span> American historian

Comer Vann Woodward was an American historian who focused primarily on the American South and race relations. He was long a supporter of the approach of Charles A. Beard, stressing the influence of unseen economic motivations in politics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lambda Phi Epsilon</span> North American collegiate fraternity

Lambda Phi Epsilon is the largest Asian-American-Interest fraternity in North America. Lambda Phi Epsilon is affiliated with the National APIDA Panhellenic Association, and is a former member of the North American Interfraternity Conference.

The Philomathean Society of the University of Pennsylvania is a collegiate literary society, the oldest student group at the university, and a claimant to the title of the oldest continuously-existing literary society in the United States. Founded in 1813, its goal is "to promote the learning of its members and to increase the academic prestige of the University." Philomathean is derived from the Greek philomath, which means "a lover of learning." The motto of the Philomathean Society is Sic itur ad astra.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander</span> American lawyer, civil rights activist, and economist (1898–1989)

Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander was a pioneering Black professional and civil rights activist of the early-to-mid-20th century. In 1921, Mossell Alexander was the second African-American woman to receive a Ph.D. and the first one to receive one in economics in the United States. In 1927, she was first Black woman to receive a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and went on to become the first Black woman to practice law in the state. She was also the first national president of Delta Sigma Theta sorority, serving from 1919 to 1923.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chi Omega</span> Womens fraternity

Chi Omega is a women's fraternity and a member of the National Panhellenic Conference, the umbrella organization of 26 women's fraternities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zeta Beta Tau</span> American fraternal organization

Zeta Beta Tau (ΖΒΤ) is a Greek-letter social fraternity based in North America. It was founded on December 29, 1898. Originally a Zionist youth society, its purpose changed from the Zionism of the fraternity's early years when in 1954 the fraternity become nonsectarian and opened to non-Jewish members, changing its membership policy to include "All Men of Good Character" regardless of religious or ethnic background, while still being recognized as the first Jewish Fraternity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mordecai Manuel Noah</span> American diplomat and utopian writer (1785–1851)

Mordecai Manuel Noah was an American sheriff, playwright, diplomat, journalist, and utopian. He was born in a family of Portuguese Sephardic ancestry. He was the most important Jewish lay leader in New York in the early 19th century, and the first Jew born in the United States to reach national prominence. His politically motivated reviews blasting plays and performers "of colour" at William Brown's African Grove Theatre led to his identification as the originator of the stereotypical black portrayed in American minstrel shows and as "the father of Negro minstrelsy".

Francis Sheldon Hackney was an American educator, historian, and chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities. He was president of Tulane University from 1975 to 1980 and president of the University of Pennsylvania from 1981 to 1993.

A speech code is any rule or regulation that limits, restricts, or bans speech beyond the strict legal limitations upon freedom of speech or press found in the legal definitions of harassment, slander, libel, and fighting words. Such codes are common in the workplace, in universities, and in private organizations. The term may be applied to regulations that do not explicitly prohibit particular words or sentences. Speech codes are often applied for the purpose of suppressing hate speech or forms of social discourse thought to be disagreeable to the implementers.

Rogers M. Smith is an American political scientist and author noted for his research and writing on American constitutional and political development and political thought, with a focus on issues of citizenship and racial, gender, and class inequalities. His work identifying multiple, competing traditions of national identity including “liberalism, republicanism, and ascriptive forms of Americanism” has been described as "groundbreaking." Smith is the Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. He was the president of the American Political Science Association (APSA) for 2018–2019.

Students at the University of Pennsylvania enjoy many different events at social gatherings around campus, with some sponsored by the college.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alpha Omega (fraternity)</span> Professional Jewish dental fraternity

Alpha Omega, is a professional Jewish dental fraternity. It was founded in Baltimore, Maryland in 1907 by a group of dental students originally to fight discrimination in dental schools. The headquarters is currently located in Clarksville, TN.

The water buffalo is a domesticated bovid widely kept in Asia, Europe and South America.

The Friars Senior Society of the University of Pennsylvania, commonly nicknamed Friars, is the oldest undergraduate secret society at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1899, it recognizes student leaders who have made a significant contribution to the University in all areas of campus life. The organization remains the most active secret senior society at the University with over 2,000 alumni in the United States and 24 countries throughout the world.

Amy Laura Wax is an American legal scholar and neurologist. She is the Robert Mundheim Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Her work addresses issues in social welfare law and policy, as well as the relationship of the family, the workplace, and labor markets. She has often made remarks about non-white people that have been described as white supremacist and racist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Daisy Myers</span> African-American woman

Daisy D. Myers was an African-American woman who lived with her family in Levittown, Pennsylvania, reportedly designed to be an all-white town, beginning in 1957. She faced months of harassment and violence before security forces intervened to protect the family, leading her to be dubbed the "Rosa Parks of the North".

References

  1. Savage, David G. (May 10, 1993). "Penn Debates the Meaning of Water Buffalo". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 2016-06-04. Retrieved March 19, 2018.
  2. Hinds, Michael Decourcy (15 May 1993). "A Campus Case: Speech or Harassment?". The New York Times . Retrieved 2022-05-10.
  3. "The Shadow University". Partners.nytimes.com. Archived from the original on 2009-07-09. Retrieved 2010-06-16.
  4. Jordan, Vernon (2002). "Foreword". In Sheldon Hackney (ed.). The Politics of Presidential Appointment: A Memoir of the Culture War . NewSouth Books. p.  9. ISBN   978-1-58838-068-5.
  5. Hackney, Sheldon (2002). "Foreword". The Politics of Presidential Appointment: A Memoir of the Culture War . NewSouth Books. p.  101. ISBN   978-1-58838-068-5.
  6. Trudeau, Garry. Doonesbury Comic Strip, July 11 1993 Archived 2010-04-12 at the Wayback Machine . GoComics.com. Retrieved 6 March 2010.
  7. Hinds, Michael Decourcy (25 May 1993). "Blacks at Penn Drop a Charge Of Harassment". The New York Times. Retrieved 10 October 2023.