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Monday, August 25, 2008
Censorship Islam Fish Rushdie Language Log
Random House recently decided not to publish a historical novel about the prohpet Muhammad and Aisha, his child bride, for fear of an extreme response by Muslims. Using the word “censorship,” Salmon Rushdie strongly criticized the publisher (his publisher, BTW) for this decision. Stanley Fish argues that Random House’s actions don’t “rise to the level of constitutional or philosophical concern” characteristic of true censorship: “Formulations like that at once inflate a minor business decision and trivialize something too important and complex to be reduced to a high-school civics lesson about the glories of the First Amendment.” Over at Language Log Bill Poser argues that Fish is wrong and that “Rushdie is referring to the threat of Muslim reprisals as censorship, not Random House’s decision to give in to this threat.” Poser also notes that “Fish’s dig at Rushdie reveals a poor understanding not only of the definition of the term ‘censorship’ but of the Enlightenment tradition of freedom of expression.” [Note: Fish has since corrected a quotation error that Poser notes early in his post.]