untitled

This job listing is from from The Chronicle of Higher Education
(http://chronicle.com/jobs)

American Studies -- Doshisha University -- Japan

American Studies: The Graduate School of American Studies at
Doshisha University in Kyoto, Japan invites applications for a
one-year visiting position (renewable for up to three years),
teaching our core course in American Civilization and other
courses on American culture broadly defined. The American
Civilization course is a history-centered comprehensive
introduction to American studies, covering such topics as
religion, individualism, democracy, popular culture, etc.
Although we envision selecting a Ph.D. trained in American
Studies, applicants who study the U.S. in other disciplines may
also be considered. A record of accomplishment in teaching and
publication is required, as well as a willingness to work with
students from another culture who vary in English language
capability. Doshisha is a highly selective private university,
offering excellent working conditions. The position is open
starting April 1, 2000, but the start date may be postponed
until September 2000. Japanese language ability is a plus, but
not required. Send a letter of application, curriculum vitae,
writing samples, and two or more letters of recommendation to
Dean Taisuke Kamata, Graduate School of American Studies,
Doshisha University, Kyoto 602-8580, Japan. Applications should
be received by January 10, 2000, but will be accepted until the
position is filled.

From: The Chronicle of Higher Education, November 19, 1999

RESPONSE FROM DOSHISHA UNIVERSITY

From: XXXXX@aol.com
Date: Tue, 10 Apr 2001 01:47:46 EDT
Subject: Blacklist
To: debito@debito.org

Dear Mr. Aldwinckle:

I write to you in response to your recent placement of Doshisha University on
your "blacklist" of Japanese universities that allegedly engage in
discrimination against non-Japanese. You have your facts wrong, and have made
erroneous assumptions about the position in question.

First, in regard to the position advertised, it is not open only to
non-Japanese -- we welcome the applications of Japanese nationals as well. To
use your terminology, it is not a position "set aside specially for
foreigners," and the job advertisement does not say that. In the future, we
may well hire a Japanese professor for the position, and have had discussions
about doing so even this year (the position is open again for 2001/2002).

Second, Doshisha University has a very long history (going back over a
century) of granting tenure to foreign professors, and has numerous tenured
foreign professors at the present time.

Third, in the Graduate School of American Studies, we currently have two
American citizens (one of whom is me) who are in tenured positions or in
positions that have comparable job security. In 1996, the university
advertised in the Chronicle of Higher Education, seeking applicants for two
permanent, tenured positions in the Graduate School, regardless of
nationality (I was hired for one of these positions, while another went to a
Japanese citizen and US permanent resident who had been working in the US for
the past decade).

Fourth, the Graduate School has gone so far at to appoint me as an Associate
Dean, even though I am a US citizen and don't even know Japanese!

So, your allegations of discrimination are totally groundless in this case.
Just like American universities, we like to have visiting professors, but
this does not mean that we do not grant tenure (including tenure upon hire)
to foreign professors.

On your web site, you write: "I have checked, recorded, and substantiated the
allegations below to the best of my ability."

This statement is ridiculous -- you made no effort to contact us (it's not
hard, all you have to do is send an e-mail). If you are going to maintain a
"blacklist," you should at least check your facts.

Sincerely,

TD
Associate Dean
Graduate School of American Studies
Doshisha University
Kyoto 602-8580
Japan

REPLY FROM LIST MONITOR
April 11, 2001

Dear TD:

Thank you very much for your reply and corrections. As Doshisha does, according to you, have tenured full-time non-Japanese faculty, I have already Greenlisted it with you as the primary source (http://www.debito.org/greenlist.html). Your letter above has been (and any future correspondence will be) webbed, as I said I would on the Blacklist index page, at http://www.debito.org/doshishadata.html.

Now, about Doshisha's Blacklisting. According to the 1999 Chronicle advertisement, a primary source, Doshisha offers contracts to full-time non-Japanese faculty. By definition, this is a Blacklistable situation.

Your argument is that the position is open to Japanese as well, therefore it is not discriminatory. However, the Chronicle advertisement does not say this position is also open to Japanese nationals. In fact, it is clear from the wording that the position is being advertised for people who do not have Japanese ability, cf. "a willingness to work with students from another culture who vary in English language capability. ...Japanese language ability is a plus, but not required." It is difficult to believe that this position was also advertised as is in Japanese in the Japanese market. The point is that from the advertisement it is, I'm afraid, easy to make the "erroneous assumptions" you mention. Making conditions clear is the job of the advertiser, not the reader.

The fact gleaned from the advertisement is that Doshisha offers contracts to full-time foreigners. "Only" or not is not the point. Even if that advertised position is open to Japanese (although it is hard for me to imagine any Japanese wanting to take it, when they can go just about anyplace else in the Japanese university system and receive tenure with their full-time status--unlike non-Japanese academics), the fact of the matter is that Doshisha is, like other Japanese universities, offering contracts to full-time foreign faculty. Offering insecure employment (and capped at three years, for that matter, despite Monbushou disapproval of contract capping) for anyone is certainly not a situation I, or other concerned academics (http://www.debito.org/PALEJournals.html), consider fair. Two wrongs do not make a right.

The Blacklist exists to encourage Japanese universities to desist in the widespread and highly unequal practice of not tenuring or tenure-tracking full-time foreign faculty. Period. Doshisha will stay on the Blacklist until that situation is discontinued. I understand you do not consider this employment position discriminatory, but I beg to differ. It is like saying that since Whites can now use the Colored facilities that segregation is no longer discriminatory. Given the long history of unequal job statuses for foreigners in the Japanese university system, which I hope you are aware of (see http://www.debito.org/essays.html#ninkisei), I hope you will understand that contract employment of this type is not something we can conscionably let stand.

That said, Doshisha is now Greenlisted as well. Thank you very much for your information.

Arudou Debito
Sapporo

From: XXXXX@aol.com
Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2001 21:50:32 EDT
Subject: Re: Response from Doshisha University Re Blacklist
To: debito@debito.org

Dear Arudou Debito:

Thank you for your prompt reply. As you may suspect, I continue to strongly
disagree with your placement of Doshisha University on a "blacklist" of
institutions that have "a history of discriminatory practices towards their
educators/staff on the basis of extranationality, or for other reasons
unrelated to professionalism."

First, I think you make a fundamental mistake when you argue that
limited-term employment contracts are inherently unfair. In fact, they are
ideal for scholars--either from within Japan or from abroad--who for
various reasons do not want to make a long-term commitment to an institution.
We have found that there are numerous professors, especially those from North
America, who would like to teach in our program for one or two years, but do
not want or cannot accept a tenured appointment. Typically, these are people
who are on a sabbatical leave from the United States, or who simply do not
want to make a long-term commitment to Japan for personal reasons. Our
visiting professor position is ideal for such people, allowing them to teach
in Japan for a while without forcing them to engage in the bad-faith and
deception that is involved in accepting a tenured position while planning to
actually leave after one or two years. Those professors who are interested
in a long-term commitment can and should apply for our tenured positions,
which we regularly fill with non-Japanese scholars.

The problem with banning short-term contracts altogether, as you seem to
propose, is that it actually discriminates against every foreigner in the
world (as well as any Japanese national) who does not want to make a
long-term, tenured commitment to a particular job. Such people should have
an opportunity to teach in Japan, just as Japanese scholars take advantage of
similar visiting professor positions in the United States. This is a win/win
situation for both parties, and is common everywhere in academia. We do not
use this system as a means to avoid granting full faculty privileges for
foreign scholars--on the contrary, it allows us to better meet the needs of
those foreign scholars who want a short-term job. Just because foreign
scholars may have been ghettoized into these positions in the past does not
mean that the use of contracts is forever stained as inherently inequitable.

Second, you suggest that no Japanese professor would want to accept a
limited-term contract in our institution. In fact, the Doshisha rules
pertaining to this position were originally designed as a means to lure
Japanese professors--mainly those who are retired -- to teach for several
years in our university. We have adapted them--quite appropriately in our
view--to also allow us to bring in visiting foreign scholars. It would
truly be a pity to fill this position only with retired Japanese professors
when there are so many American professors who would love a chance to teach
in Japan for a year or two. To limit the position only to Japanese would
itself be discriminatory against foreign nationals. If we were to follow
your advice, and not advertise in foreign markets, we would then have no
choice but to hire a Japanese professor instead. Does that help foreigners?

Third, contrary to your suppositions, our ads last year, even though mainly
aimed towards scholars educated or working in the USA, did in fact yield a
number of applications from Japanese nationals who, I might add, were quite
interested in the position. We considered such applications along with the
rest of our applications, regardless of formal citizenship. How all this
amounts to unethical discrimination against non-Japanese is beyond me.

In summary, your problem seems to be with any kind of "contract" employment,
even if the university in question regularly tenures foreign professors, and
also hires Japanese professors as "contract" employees. You are entitled to
your own judgments, of course, but I certainly feel that in this part of
Doshisha University, at least, our hiring practices are fully in line with
appropriate ethical standards. We have nothing to apologize for.

Lastly, I think the problem with your lists, more generally, is that they are
premised on the assumption that you can generalize, on the basis of one
tidbit of information, about hiring practices throughout an entire
university. Obviously, you have no idea of what is going on across the board
at your greenlist or blacklist universities. Many of your greenlist
universities may well be (indeed, probably are) using contracts in other part
of the university for various purposes.

If I were you, therefore, I would scrap the lists, and just present the
information you currently have available about each school. Then, let the
reader decide if the school in question should be "trusted" or not. That may
not be as emotionally satisfying as deeming certain schools "good" or "bad,"
but it would certainly be more fair, professional, and responsible.

Sincerely,

TD
Associate Dean
Graduate School of American Studies
Doshisha University
Kyoto 602-8580
Japan

To: XXXXX@aol.com
From: Arudou Debito/Dave Aldwinckle <debito@debito.org>
Date: Thu, 12 Apr 2001 11:01:49 +0900

Alright, TD, we can agree to disagree here. I have taken your comments
into advisement and will put this letter up at doshishadata.html as well for
people to think about. Thank you very much for your thorough and prompt
replies.

Best wishes, Arudou Debito in Sapporo

To: PALE@topica.com
From: Joseph Tomei <jtomei@kumagaku.ac.jp>
Subject: Re: [JALT PALE SIG List] Response from Doshisha University Re Blacklist
List-Help: <http://topica.com/lists/PALE/>
List-Archive: <http://topica.com/lists/PALE/read>
Date: Thu, 12 Apr 2001 17:33:34 +0900

A very short note about this.

I think that Professor D has a point. If the school is up front
about the contracts and makes efforts to have foreign staff as
tenured faculty, I don't think this is blacklistable. Clearly, the
tertiary education sector must undergo restructuring, just as every
other section in Japan has to. The problem is that it appears that
foreigners are the thin edge of the wedge, and Gwen's case may be
held up as an example.

If you do list Doshisha simultaneously on green and black lists, you
also need to do so with Gakuen. We hire foreigners as tenured, but we
also have shokutaku positions for both office workers and for people
at our gaikokugo center, which is like an internal language school
for students. The idea is to give them a lower price than for=profit
concerns, plus (in theory) have a linkage with the teachers there so
they can know what the students are getting in regular classes.

There is a 3 year limit on the contracts and this is because if they
are employed longer, they could argue for 'tenure'. In fact, Gakuen
has an affiliated kindergarten and though the initial assumption was
that the women who would work there would not make it a career and so
they was no contractual agreement as to renewals. Thus they became
'tenured'. The school is not thinking of getting rid of them, but
from a budgetary standpoint, with the raises that come, the more
experienced kindergarten teachers are making salaries equivialent to
a junior professor (I should add that I'm not against this, but if a
business (and a private university _is_ a business) can't make
accurate projections of the money it spends on labor, it is not going
to be a business for very long)

A number of us on the union are trying to find a way to eliminate the
current restrictions on the gaikokugo center positions, possibly by
allowing people to stay, but maintaining them at the same pay scale,
so some people may be encouraged to stay, especially as job
conditions are not so good now. In a sense, we want to set up a
contract system for this aspect that doesn't bind the employers into
lifetime employment, yet allows the workers to stay _if they want
to_. The hope is that this sort of job might be a stepping stone to
regular university employment. However, legally, there is no way to
do that.

Professor D wrote
>> We have found that there are numerous professors, especially those from North
>> America, who would like to teach in our program for one or two years, but do
>> not want or cannot accept a tenured appointment. Typically, these are people
>> who are on a sabbatical leave from the United States, or who simply do not
>> want to make a long-term commitment to Japan for personal reasons. Our
>> visiting professor position is ideal for such people, allowing them to teach
>> in Japan for a while without forcing them to engage in the bad-faith and
>> deception that is involved in accepting a tenured position while planning to
>> actually leave after one or two years.

Again, this is a budgeting problem. A school that hires a tenured
faculty is making a commitment to pay a certain amount through the
entire career of the employee. Thus, revenue projections had better
show that there are adequate funds and promise of funds to pay this
person. If it does not, then the solution they choose, to hire people
on contract, seems appropriate. Far better than farming these classes
out to part time teachers with a weaker connection to the institution.

Professor D further notes
>> In summary, your problem seems to be with any kind of "contract" employment,
>> even if the university in question regularly tenures foreign professors, and
>> also hires Japanese professors as "contract" employees. You are entitled to
>> your own judgments, of course, but I certainly feel that in this part of
>> Doshisha University, at least, our hiring practices are fully in line with
>> appropriate ethical standards. We have nothing to apologize for.
>>
>> Lastly, I think the problem with your lists, more generally, is that they are
>> premised on the assumption that you can generalize, on the basis of one
>> tidbit of information, about hiring practices throughout an entire
>> university. Obviously, you have no idea of what is going on across the board
>> at your greenlist or blacklist universities. Many of your greenlist
>> universities may well be (indeed, probably are) using contracts in other part
>> of the university for various purposes.
>>
>> If I were you, therefore, I would scrap the lists, and just present the
>> information you currently have available about each school. Then, let the
>> reader decide if the school in question should be "trusted" or not. That may
>> not be as emotionally satisfying as deeming certain schools "good" or "bad,"
>> but it would certainly be more fair, professional, and responsible.

I'm not sure if I would propose scrapping the lists. They provide a
useful handle. Specific acts of non-renewal against foreigners,
though only a tidbit of information, if accompanied by a blanket
tenuring of Japanese, constitutes a prima facia case of
discrimination. However, the point he makes about contracts is a good
one.

If a school chose to go to _all_ contracts, that would not be
discriminatory. It would put the faculty in a very disadvantageous
situation, which is why Japanese teachers show an unbelievable amount
of solidarity in opposing them. However, to reject the special
application of contracts to foreigners does not mean that we need
reject the concept of contracts.

I would also suggest that we solicit a piece for the PALE Journal
from Professor D. He said (and perhaps this is modesty) that

> Fourth, the Graduate School has gone so far at to appoint me as an Associate
> Dean, even though I am a US citizen and don't even know Japanese!

I would be very interested to know how this works. I don't want to
claim that Professor D knows no Japanese, but I imagine that the
position of associate dean requires written fluency. How he works
around this and how the school works around this would be very
interesting.

cheers
joe
--
Joseph Tomei
Kumamoto Gakuen Daigaku
Department of Foreign Languages
Oe 2 chome, 5-1, Kumamoto 862-0911 JAPAN
(81) (0)96-364-5161 x1410
fax (81) (0)96-372-0702
jtomei@kumagaku.ac.jp
http://www.kumagaku.ac.jp/teacher/~jtomei/index.html

I'll see you at JALT 2001 in Kitakyushu, November 22-25, 2001
http://jalt.org/jalt2001/

To: PALE@topica.com
From: ewaunionosaka@aol.com
Subject: Re: [JALT PALE SIG List] Response from Doshisha University Re Blacklist
List-Help: <http://topica.com/lists/PALE/>
List-Archive: <http://topica.com/lists/PALE/read>
Date: Thu, 12 Apr 2001 02:45:51 EDT

In a message dated 01.4.12 11:11:51, debito@debito.org writes:

<< Alright, Mr D, we can agree to disagree here. I have taken your comments
into advisement and will put this letter up at doshishadata.html as well for
people to think about. Thank you very much for your thorough and prompt
replies. Best wishes, Arudou Debito in Sapporo

At 9:50 PM -0400 01.4.11, XXXXX@aol.com wrote:
(snip)
> We have found that there are numerous professors, especially those from North
> America, who would like to teach in our program for one or two years, but do
> not want or cannot accept a tenured appointment. Typically, these are people
> who are on a sabbatical leave from the United States, or who simply do not
> want to make a long-term commitment to Japan for personal reasons. Our
> visiting professor position is ideal for such people, allowing them to teach
> in Japan for a while without forcing them to engage in the bad-faith and
> deception that is involved in accepting a tenured position while planning to
> actually leave after one or two years. Those professors who are interested
> in a long-term commitment can and should apply for our tenured positions,
> which we regularly fill with non-Japanese scholars. >>

Here is a prime example of someone who has been given a bone and now feels
that he can pass judgement on the movement to rid Japan of discriminatory
term limits based on nationality. Doshisha is just one drop in the barrel,
Mr. D.

It is self-righteous foreigners that have gotten a "lucky" break and who then
decide to blackball those of us who have been fighting this or that
institution over the years, re: discrimination based on nationality, who are
really our problem. An "Associate Dean" who gleefully professes to
be ignorant of the working language of the institute in which he functions is
simply not very credible. Would it be possible to be an Associate Dean in the
US without being able to function in English? Not likely.

This is not a personal attack. I'm sure Mr. D's colleagues in his native
country would be just as surprised by his words and his honorary position at
Doshisha as we are here in Japan.

Please keep Doshisha on the Blacklist and list Mr. D as the one to look
out for...

David P. Agnew
Chair, EWA Kandai Branch
Institute of Foreign Language Education & Research
Kansai University
3-3-35 Yamate-cho, Suita-shi
Osaka 564-8680
JAPAN

Eliminate term limits and other forms of discrimination against foreign
teachers now! Visit the EWA site: http://www.ewaosaka.org

To: PALE@topica.com
From: Farrell Cleary <clear@pu-kumamoto.ac.jp>
Subject: Re: [JALT PALE SIG List] Webbed Doshisha Debate on Blacklist Blackish Green?
Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 17:08:38 +0900

Thanks to David for keeping track of this correspondence and webbing it.
Prof. D, in defence of Doshisha, says that there were some Japanese
applicants for the job. It would be more convincing if Japanese people were
actually hired for such "visiting" posts.

The suspicion of course remains that "visiting" is simply used to disguise
the unattractive reality of discriminatory (i.e. for foreign but not
Japanese teachers) limited-term employment. If, as Prof. D claims, the
post is aimed as those on sabbatical from their own university, why not
state that? The "renewable for three years" bit makes it plain that the
university is hoping to attract applications from those who are not in fact
visitors, but simply people looking for a job.

I was puzzled that Dave has now elected to place Doshisha on both the green
and the black lists. Isn't this taking ambiguity just a step too far?
Perhaps it might be preferable to have just one list and to assign
universities a point on a single black to green continuum.

Prof. D is obviously a sincere believer in term-employment as something
which benefits teachers as well as institutions. There is a simple flaw in
his reasoning. He is thinking of employment contracts as if they were like
any other contract. In fact employees are almost always free to leave a job
without incurring any liability for breach of contract. Whether it is term
employment or "regular" employment, the employee can leave after giving the
requisite notice. If a university actually would be happy to employ a
teacher who could stay only for a year or two, it could simply make that
plain in an advertisement. There should be no need in that case for them to
impose a limit, and there would be no need to exclude those who would stay
longer. Of course the reasons the limits are there has nothing to do with
the interests of employees and everything to do with the kind of management
interests which Joe Tomei explains in his letter.

Farrell Cleary
Prefectural University of Kumamoto
(unambiguously on Dave's black list and still without an apologist).

From: XXXXX@aol.com
Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 10:01:31 EDT
Subject: Re: Mr D, another answer FYI
To: debito@debito.org
MIME-Version: 1.0
Status: RO

In a message dated 4/13/01 7:53:53 PM Tokyo Standard Time, debito@debito.org writes:

...If you want me to stop forwarding these to you please let me know.

Thanks for being so conscientious, but I'm not really interested in continuing the debate or being kept informed of it.

Sincerely,
TD
_______________________________

Associate Dean
Graduate School of American Studies
Doshisha University
Kyoto 602-8580
Japan

ENDS