Opinion: Harvard’s Claudine Gay should resign; The Washington Post, December 23, 2023

Ruth Marcus , The Washington Post; Opinion: Harvard’s Claudine Gay should resign

"Perhaps the most disturbing example is the least academic — Gay’s borrowing of words from another scholar, Jennifer L. Hochschild. In her acknowledgments for a 1996 book, Hochschild described a mentor who “showed me the importance of getting the data right and of following where they lead without fear or favor” and “drove me much harder than I sometimes wanted to be driven.”

Gay’s dissertation thanked her thesis adviser, who “reminded me of the importance of getting the data right and following where they lead without fear or favor,” and her family, “drove me harder than I sometimes wanted to be driven.”

Now, can I just say? Acknowledgments are the easiest, and most fun part, of writing a book, the place where you list your sources and allies and all the people who helped you get the manuscript over the finish line. Why not come up with your own thanks? What does it say about a person who chooses to appropriate another’s language for this most personal task."