Harvard won't consider Cornel West for tenure -- and he's threatening to leave: report

Harvard University may lose Cornel West for the second time in two decades according to a new report from the Boston Globe.

"Harvard University professor Cornel West, the well known philosopher, progressive political activist, and outspoken social critic, is threatening to leave Harvard University after he said the administration disrespected him by denying his request to be considered for tenure," the newspaper reported. "If West follows through on the threat, it would be his second departure from the university, where he teaches in the law school, divinity school, and Department of African and African American Studies. West first departed in 2002 after a public spat with then-president Lawrence Summers over the quality of West's scholarship and West's complaints about the depth of the university's commitment to affirmative action."

The newspaper interviewed West on Thursday.

"It is once again this issue of just not putting up with being disrespected," West explained.

"It's sad you have to go through this again," he said. "But I wasn't raised to put up with being disrespected or tolerate disrespect. I don't try to negotiate respect."

Harvard confirmed that West's hopes for tenure were denied.

"West, 67, said the administration offered him a prestigious endowed chair with a 10-year contract and a pay raise, but he is not interested," the Globe reported. "West on Thursday said he has watched a number of Black faculty depart over the past year and a half, including history professor Elizabeth Hinton, who left for Yale University, and divinity professor and Memorial Church minister Jonathan Walton, who became dean of Wake Forest University's School of Divinity."

Before receiving his PhD from Princeton University, West received his undergraduate degree from Harvard and first began teaching there in 1994.

Read the full report.