Ward Churchill acknowledged this morning that he had worked with a Canadian professor on an essay that was later published in a book he edited without giving her credit — but he again denied that he was guilty of plagiarism.
Churchill conceded that sections of an essay by Fay Cohen, a professor at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, were used without giving her credit in the book “State of Native America,” but he said that someone else — he’s not sure who — was responsible for the content of the writing.
“Plagiarism occurred,” Churchill said as he faced cross-examination by Patrick O’Rourke, an attorney for the University of Colorado.
Churchill, an ethnic-studies professor at CU, was fired in 2007 after an investigation concluded that he committed numerous acts of academic fraud. He is suing to get his job back, contending he was terminated not for questions about his scholarly work but because of his controversial essay on the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
In that work, Churchill compared some of the victims of the attack on the World Trade Center to “little Eichmanns,” a reference to Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann.
Churchill’s suit accuses the university’s administration of violating his free-speech rights.
The courtroom was packed for the second day in a row as Churchill testified.
O’Rourke got his first crack at Churchill at 10 a.m., and he bored in on both the Cohen essay and another piece, published under the name Rebecca Robbins, which the former professor contends he wrote.
O’Rourke pointed out that Churchill edited Cohen’s essay for inclusion in a book he was publishing and noted that they passed drafts back and forth. In one of them, according to O’Rourke, Cohen made changes on nine pages and to 15 footnotes.
Later, he said, after Cohen withdrew permission for the essay to also be published in a second book that Churchill was editing, large portions of her essay appeared without her name on it.
At one point, O’Rourke asked Churchill whether he was telling the jury that when he edited the second book just months after the first that he didn’t recognize Cohen’s prose.
“Yes, that’s what I’m telling them,” Churchill said.
But O’Rourke’s questioning backfired when he asked Churchill a second time how he could not have known both essays were written by Cohen. After Churchill challenged that assertion, O’Rourke had the two essays put up on a big screen in the courtroom, which showed the two articles were, indeed, titled differently.
“You know what professor, you are right, I am wrong,” O’Rourke said.
Later, he questioned Churchill at length about ghost-writing, pointing out that Churchill contends he wrote the piece that was published under Robbins’ name and then later cited it as a source in other writings of his.
Asked whether he disagreed that it was deceptive, Churchill replied, “Yes, I disagree.”
Churchill argued that ghost-writing is an entirely accepted practice in the academic world, and he said he could bring numerous witnesses to the courtroom who would testify to that.
O’Rourke pointed out that none of the professors Churchill had called as witnesses had agreed with that assertion.
Judge Larry J. Naves called a recess at noon, and Churchill returned to the stand in the afternoon.
