Althouse: "It's hard to find anyone who teaches at Harvard who shaves."

June 19, 2007

"It's hard to find anyone who teaches at Harvard who shaves."

Said longtime Harvard lawprof Arthur Miller, talking about his decision to move to NYU.

33 comments:

Steven said...: Grooming, Ann? Struck me as a comment about age. Derisive comments about younger men not being old enough to shave are pretty common from older men.; 6/19/07, 9:37 PM
The Drill SGT said...: Or women that don't :); 6/19/07, 9:41 PM
Ann Althouse said...: Steven: I know. It's not fair.; 6/19/07, 9:47 PM
ricpic said...: Age? I thought Miller meant they were all a bunch of BoBo's.; 6/19/07, 10:01 PM
Unknown said...: "I am putting myself to the fullest
possible use, which is all I think
that any conscious entity can ever
hope to do."; 6/19/07, 10:04 PM
The Drill SGT said...: Steve,

On the other hand, it seems the guy moving to Harvard is a tenured full professor at or prior to 32. By that I mean he is 32, but it seems he was promoted in 2006 at 31.

And is what one might call "baby-faced"; 6/19/07, 10:07 PM
Ruth Anne Adams said...: Some of 'em need an Ari Gold.; 6/19/07, 10:36 PM
Synova said...: I thought it might be a reference to a lack of men. In context it seems to be a remark about the guys too young to shave.; 6/19/07, 10:37 PM
Eli Blake said...: If I was a right winger, I'd note that all you conservatives haven't said anything yet about the fact that there is a major religion, whose most extreme adherents don't believe in shaving, and who have been known to slay barbers in places like Afghanistan who have cut men's beards. OK, now that I've provided the fodder, I will wait and see what someone says about Harvard faculty members and extremists who are members of that religion (but since I'd be annoyed at the implication, I won't take the obvious cheap shot myself.); 6/19/07, 10:40 PM
Steven said...: I agree, it is unfair. Fortunately, as the possessor of a full mustache who's otherwise shaved, it's never been unfair to me.

Oh, one guy actually tried it. I turned to face him, placed a finger to my lips, and went "Hmmm". He turned red.; 6/19/07, 10:43 PM
Eli Blake said...: Also note that the last three Presidents (as well as John Kerry) attended Yale, not Harvard.

It must be a terrible blow to Harvard's ego, and perhaps they are in a state of mourning because of it.; 6/19/07, 10:44 PM
Revenant said...: Also note that the last three Presidents (as well as John Kerry) attended Yale, not Harvard.

Bush attended both, but somehow I doubt many of the Harvard faculty are bragging about it.; 6/19/07, 10:57 PM
dave™© said...: Apparently in the Mind of Ann Althouse absolutely anything (even something as innocuous as a humble onion ring) gets larded down with layers of pscho-sexual significance when it’s submerged in the warm, sticky tide of sexual charisma that surrounds our former president like a fog.; 6/19/07, 11:15 PM
Anonymous said...: You sure have been here spewing a lot recently, Dave. Did you lose your job?; 6/19/07, 11:23 PM
JSE said...: I used to shave every day; then I cut down to shaving every teaching day; now that we have a baby I shave right before I go get my hair cut and that's about it.; 6/19/07, 11:56 PM
hdhouse said...: At least he has leaped to the conservative bastion NYU...where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking and all the children are above average.

Wait until he finds out that all that healthy looking out in the sun complexions are, on close inspection, really pale and pasty city skin covered in the smuge of Con Edison.; 6/20/07, 4:18 AM
Anonymous said...: Shaven face, unshaven face, don't care. What baffles me is the recent fetish with waxing men's chests.; 6/20/07, 4:35 AM
Dave said...: Um, Arthur Miller is dead as disco...

And Harvard is full of hippies.; 6/20/07, 5:22 AM
Ron said...: I have a friend who teaches at HLAW and she shaves! Does that count?; 6/20/07, 6:23 AM
Anonymous said...: I hope Ann makes some more of her trademark lunatic comments today. It is so entertaining. I honestly can't get enough of the crazy!

LOL!

Come on, Ann! Don't disappoint!

What'cha got for us today?

:D :D :D; 6/20/07, 6:26 AM
Paco Wové said...: "If I was a right winger... all you conservatives... wait and see what someone says about Harvard faculty members and extremists who are members of that religion"

Suprisingly thought-free comment, Eli.; 6/20/07, 7:02 AM
tjl said...: "there is a major religion, whose most extreme adherents don't believe in shaving"

Radical Islam isn't likely to sweep Harvard Yard any time soon. While many faculty would gladly embrace the anti-Western aspects, they'd balk at the ban on wine consumption.; 6/20/07, 7:02 AM
Hoosier Daddy said...: If I was a right winger, I'd note that all you conservatives haven't said anything yet about the fact that there is a major religion, whose most extreme adherents don't believe in shaving,

And what has that to do with the price of tea in China?; 6/20/07, 7:13 AM
Amber said...: Miller's move has been coming for years, ever since they revamped the 1L curriculum to include only one semester of Civ Pro instead of a year-long course (he decamped to NYU after that changes for a year as a visitor in protest).

But by all means, attribute it to hippies and shaving. It's not like Harvard has recently hired several prominent conservative professors like Jack Goldsmith or John Manning.; 6/20/07, 8:57 AM
Anonymous said...: I got my chest waxed once, on a complete whim during a trip to a spa in Napa Valley. It hurt something awful and I felt seven afterwards. I don't recommend it.; 6/20/07, 9:29 AM
vet66 said...: Too many people have a convenient memory lapse when it comes to Harvard and the Larry Summers case. It is a left-wing bastion of semi-educated hippies who hate the U.S. Since we are talking about hippies, it is difficult to separate the term from pachouli, marijuana, free sex, abortion, long hair (both sexes), rebellion, the ACLU, CAIR, and a love of anything anti-American (al qaeda is a group of freedom fighters!)

I am not surprised at how shallow some of the commenters here are.; 6/20/07, 9:44 AM
Amber said...: a left-wing bastion of semi-educated hippies who hate the U.S. Since we are talking about hippies, it is difficult to separate the term from pachouli, marijuana, free sex, abortion, long hair (both sexes), rebellion, the ACLU, CAIR, and a love of anything anti-American

At the law school? I was just there a couple of years ago, and it was a lot more buttoned-up than that. Larry Summers got a standing ovation from the Federalist Society conference at HLS (and the HLS FedSoc chapter is the largest in the country).

Charlie Nesson is clean-shaven, by the way.; 6/20/07, 9:49 AM
Eli Blake said...: Oligonicella and Seven Machos:

I have lots of hair, so I get my neck waxed. Yeah, it hurts but until I started doing it, no matter how much I'd shave I still had hair there. Sometimes you just have to 'suck it up.' (don't get the chest thing though, since shirts cover it up anyway.)

On the other hand, maybe there will be a trend towards more facial hair. During the latter part of the nineteenth century there was a run of Presidents with facial hair (begun when a ten year old girl wrote a letter to Licoln sugggesting that he grow a beard) because all the successors to Lincoln wanted to conjure up the image of Lincoln (sort of like how today Democrats try to remind people of Kennedy and Republicans try to remind people of Reagan.); 6/20/07, 10:09 AM
tjl said...: "a left-wing bastion of semi-educated hippies"

The Harvard community has many obvious flaws, but semi-education isn't one of them. The reverse is true -- too much erudition in too arcane fields of study causes a certain loss of touch with the real world.

As for vet66's list of rampant Harvard vices, I do seem to recall lots of marijuana in my student days, a measured amount of rebellion, and a wholly inadequate supply of free sex. There weren't too many abortions being performed, unless I missed those due to the marijuana fumes and all.; 6/20/07, 1:43 PM
vet66 said...: tjl;

Got the munchies yet? As far as HLS is concerned, where were they when the science and social studies departments staged the coup?; 6/20/07, 3:58 PM
Adrian said...: to bring this discussion back around to bill clinton's chopped carrot, did you know that when clinton gave a speech at Harvard a couple weeks ago (charming as always, and, like everyone has already said, reminding us all over again just how screechy his wife is), he angrily refused the students' request that he play his saxophone?

has the campaign-driven emasculation gone so far that he strikes back in anger against even the vaguest freudian (althousian) symbolism?; 6/20/07, 10:44 PM
Adrian said...: p.s. speaking of symbolism and the lack of tenured stubble, there seriously is a debate about the overly phallic nature of harvard's architecture. not just the obvious things, like all the statues and stained-glass portraits of men, but things you would never think about except in a hillary ad. for example, people complained that the gate posts, which rise up to end in iron spikes, were overly masculine, so in a recently constructed gate, the tops of the bars were made into tulip shapes, very georgia o'keefe. i swear i'm not making this up, but i can't find any pictures online, sorry.; 6/20/07, 11:11 PM
From Inwood said...: Does USNews have a category in its law school ratings for "percentage of faculty shavers?"; 6/21/07, 12:17 AM