The sociology professor who used her now-protected Twitter account to announce that white people are synonymous with “terror” and to define the Confederate flag as “the ultimate symbol” of capitalism has accepted a position on the faculty at Rhodes College.
The professor, Zandria Robinson, was formerly on the faculty at the University of Memphis in Memphis, Tenn.
Rhodes College is a private bastion of the liberal arts also located in Memphis. The fancypants school enrolls “students of color” at a rate of 23 percent. Thus, 77 percent of the students are white.
“Whiteness is certainly and most inevitably terror,” Robinson proclaimed in a June 26 tweet.
Students enrolled at Rhodes enjoy a lovely, leafy, pseudo-Gothic campus surrounded by upscale homes. An art museum, the Memphis Zoo and one of the best golf courses in the city are all just across the street.
Tuition, fees and room and board at Rhodes run roughly $55,300 per year. By way of comparison, the annual household income in Memphis is $36,817, according to Sperling’s Best Places.
Robinson’s rancorous statements on Twitter brought her substantial notoriety earlier this week. In addition to her claims that “whiteness” “is” “terror” and that the Confederate flag is “the ultimate symbol of heteropatriarchal capitalism,” Robinson also declared that “white folks” believe politeness provides immunity from her biting analysis of power structures based on race. (RELATED: Professor: ‘Whiteness’ Is ‘Terror,’ Confederate Flag Represents ‘Capitalism’)
In a statement issued on Wednesday, officials at Rhodes offered extravagant praise for Robinson, reports Memphis CBS affiliate WREG.
“As a leading scholar and author in the areas of race, class, gender, culture, and the South, Dr. Zandria Robinson’s comments are sometimes provocative, controversial, and debatable,” the statement asserted.
“Dr. Robinson was hired for a faculty position in the Rhodes Anthropology & Sociology Department that calls for expertise in particular areas, specifically gender studies and social movements.” the statement effusively claimed. “Her expertise in these areas, her extensive understanding of the complex problems of race in American society, her deep roots in the Memphis area, and many years of successful teaching experience, made her an attractive candidate for the position.”
The top brass at Rhodes also said students appreciated Robinson’s “ability to challenge them to think about society with fresh eyes” during a 2008-2009 stint at Rhodes.
Rhodes administrators further praised their school “as a place where intellectual engagement and the exchange of ideas are among our highest priorities.”
When the kerfuffle over Robinson’s bizarre tweets broke out, officials at the University of Memphis quickly noted that Robinson no longer worked at the taxpayer-funded state school, despite the fact that the University of Memphis website contained a page clearly calling Robinson a faculty member.
School officials removed that information at some point after The Daily Caller and other sources publicized Robinson’s Twitter activity.
As of Thursday morning, however, Robinson’s curriculum vitae still resided on the University of Memphis website, listing her contact information as:
University of Memphis
Department of Sociology
231 Clement Hall
Memphis, TN 38152
Phone: (901) 678-3778
E-mail: zandria.robinson@memphis.edu
In any case, Robinson tweeted that she was not fired from the University of Memphis.
Around the same time, she also set her tweets to protected status.
When her Twitter account was public, Robinson described herself as this way: “Dirty South black feminist sociologist. Zora-type ethnographer. Some babies’ mama. Negressdamus. Norf Memphis Teacake’s wife. Never in no particular order.”
Rhodes College was last in the news because leaders of ISIS, also called the Islamic State, had called on followers to assassinate a Rhodes professor in their propaganda magazine. The religious studies professor on the radical Muslim group’s hit list is is Yasir Qadhi. He is also the resident scholar at the Memphis Islamic Center. (RELATED: ISIS Is Now Threatening To Murder A COLLEGE PROFESSOR IN TENNESSEE)
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