the day alvin gouldner punched a guy

Fabio

Strange but true: Alvin Gouldner, author of The Coming Crisis of Western Sociology, attacked Laud Humphreys, author of The Tearoom Trade. The story? When Humphreys was a graduate student at Washington University in Missouri, he mocked Gouldner in public, which provoked the attack. According to a recent Inside Higher Education article about Humphreys:

Humphreys may have been the author of a sarcastic poster that portrayed Gouldner as an example of the species “Inter Alios Platonicus, or Silver-Tongued High-Priestly Bird.” (Everyone in the department would have caught the reference to Gouldner’s recent book Enter Plato: Classical Greece and the Origins of Social Theory.) Reproduced as an appendix to the biography, the poster is satirical if not exactly witty: “Given to nesting in high places, this raptorial bird may soar to great heights before diving to feed on carrion…. He chews on thoughts only when personalities are not available. While devouring his prey, his song is said to be quite eloquent.”

The target of this caricature was not amused. Gouldner tracked Humphreys down in the graduate student offices, punched him in the face, then kicked him when he fell down. The matter came to national attention in a New York Times article headlined “Sociology Professor Accused of Beating Student.”

So the next time a senior colleague criticizes your work, be glad that’s *all* he’s done!