Scandalous!: An Analysis of Administrative Discourse Around the Student Body, and an Examination of Student Resistance at UIUC, January- August 2014

Abstract

This paper examines the various discourses surrounding students during scandals on the University of Illinois campus between January and August of 2014, with a focus on the racist Twitter scandal and the Salaita scandal. Drawing on administrative statements, emails to the campus community, and University documents, this project analyzes the administration's rhetorical deployment of the student body. Further, the project examines the modes of resistance utilized by students and their allies to resist efforts by the administration to shape the narrative of student experience. Making use of critical content analysis with a queer theoretical lens, the paper shows how the discourse of "civility" was used as a neoliberal policing tool by University administration to avoid conversations of larger issues such as race and colonialism.