A United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) writing competition forwarded to English majors by the department caused backlash from several students in early January.
The flyer for the competition, sent to students on the Colorado College English majors mailing list on Jan. 5, was from the Institute for Future Conflict (IFC), which is located at USAFA. The flyer called for students to submit either an essay from the perspective of a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) strategist in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on how to “take over Taiwan,” or a short fiction story from the perspective of a “contemporary American adversary,” giving the examples of Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping, focusing on any point in that person’s life. The first-place winner of this competition will receive $1,000 and a trip to the Pentagon to “brief senior leaders on their work” and their work will be published by the IFC.
After receiving the email, some students responded expressing their concerns about CC circulating the competition, given the controversial nature of the prompts.
“I am a bit confused why CC would ever enter a competition that assumes the continuation of, and even perpetuates, war, violent conflict and political fear,” said Ella Boyd Brocker ‘27 in an email response. “It reads like a bribe from the Air Force to use students as think tanks for furthering atrocities across the world.”
Henry Hasselmann ‘28 echoed Boyd Brocker’s sentiment, saying, “I know this is not what we need right now. After a year of hard-to-swallow events and hardly covered fascism, it is beyond inappropriate to ask for us to write on how to our country should continue to perpetuate its actions on the world stage.”
Both Boyd Brocker and Hasselmann urged CC to withdraw from the competition.
Sylvan Goldberg, Associate Professor and Associate Chair in the English Department, emphasized that this competition is not affiliated with CC and was just sharing the opportunity with CC students. According to Goldberg, this was an opportunity USAFA opened up to a variety of undergraduate schools on the Front Range, including University of Colorado Colorado Springs, University of Denver, CU Boulder and Colorado State University.
Goldberg also said that because USAFA is “quite a different institution than CC,” extending the competition to other schools signals their “openness to diverse perspectives.” According to Goldberg, “Narrowing of voices can only diminish the imagined possibilities.”
In response to students’ concerns, Natanya Pulley, Associate Professor and Chair of the English Department, encouraged students to use this competition as a way to make their voices heard through their submissions. “Dismissing contests because of the message it sends suggests we have no power in making a change,” wrote Pulley in her response. “By opening the contest to more schools, USAFA is opening the door for possibilities. Frankly, they know we are a liberal arts college and what the tenor of CC entries may be, which means they are looking to shake up the submissions (or expect our silence).”
Similarly to Pulley, Goldberg outlined ways that students could engage with this competition if they were uncomfortable with the prompts, suggesting satirical or subversive writing. Giving an example, Goldberg said in an interview with The Catalyst, “One could write satire that could be taken quite literally, and you could get invited to the Pentagon to present this idea that you think of as a kind of exaggerated opportunity to mock and ridicule these military figures and military ideas and yet present them right with some level of sincerity.”
Goldberg said he understand students’ concerns and asks them to keep their “ethical and moral commitments” in mind when considering submitting to this competition.