A professor at St. John’s University was fired after she uttered the n-word while reading a passage from a Mark Twain novel in class.
The story: Hannah Berliner Fischthal, who worked as an adjunct professor at St. Johns for 20 years, used the word during a class on satirical literature on Feb. 10. She was reading a passage from Mark Twain’s “Pudd’nhead Wilson,” which highlights the tragedy and absurdity of racism.
The New York Post, which first reported on the news, says that Fischthal spent some time teaching students about the history and context of the word before she quoted Twain.
“Mark Twain was one of the first American writers to use actual dialect,” Fischthal told the publication. “His use of the ‘N-word’ is used only in dialogues as it could have actually been spoken in the south before the civil war, when the story takes place.”
“It satirizes the entire evil institution of slavery,” Fischthal said of the book. “The point of this novel was that there is no inherent difference between Blacks and Whites. Clothes and education are what distinguishes people. Both the boys in the story look exactly the same, even though one is by law a slave, and the other one is a privileged white boy.”
Students complained: The following day, a student sent Fischthal an email, telling her that she “abruptly” left the lesson because of the use of the “inappropriate slur.”
“It was unnecessary and very painful to hear,” the student wrote.
Fischthal apologized both to the student who sent the email and to the rest of the class.
“I apologize if I made anyone uncomfortable in the class by using a slur when quoting from and discussing the text,” the professor wrote in a private group she created and titled “Insensitive Language.” “Please do share your thoughts.”
Four students said they disagreed with the use of the racial slur and only two did not see it as an issue.
The school’s response: Fischthal had a meeting with HR at the school the next month because of the use of the n-word. HR representatives talked to her about the mention of the racial slur in class, as well as her talk with students where she apologized.
Two days later, on March 5, St. John’s University placed her on administrative leave and launched an investigation over allegations that she broke the school’s policy against bias. She was subsequently fired on April 29.
A spokesperson for the university denied that Fischthal was fired for reading the Mark Twain novel in class. The school did not say why she was fired.
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