Chris Smith said the Jason Arday cause of death debate must not drown out a rigorous review of the plagiarism claims after the 41-year-old was found dead on Friday at home in London. Arday had resigned on August 5 after accusations that he had plagiarised parts of his doctoral thesis were widely covered by media.
Smith told the the claims should be “rigorously investigated” and said he would “refuse to join in a racist feeding frenzy over a particular academic.” Arday himself had said he had “reached the limits of what any person should reasonably be expected to endure.”
Chris Smith on Monday
The Cambridge University chancellor tied the scrutiny to two separate questions: whether the plagiarism allegations were handled properly, and whether the response to Arday’s death crossed into racial abuse. He said the claims needed proper examination while rejecting the way the public debate had developed around a black professor’s death.
That split runs through the case. The allegations involved parts of Arday’s doctoral thesis, but the public response widened after his death and turned toward Cambridge University’s handling of the matter.
Deborah Prentice investigation
Deborah Prentice had already announced an investigation into the circumstances of Arday’s appointment and his time working at Cambridge before the announcement of his death. That inquiry now sits alongside the reaction to his death and the pressure on the university to account for how the case was managed.
Arday was Cambridge’s youngest ever black professor, and his death followed weeks in which the allegations had been widely reported. His family blamed a misinformation campaign, and an online fundraising page for the family had raised over £146,000 by Monday morning.
Trafalgar Square and Cambridge
By Monday, a petition demanding a public inquiry into the media coverage of Arday had gathered almost 32,400 signatures. Stand Up To Racism was set to hold one vigil in Trafalgar Square and another in Cambridge on Monday evening.
James Cleverly said “quite possibly” some scrutiny of Arday was motivated by racism, and said the situation would never have come this far if people within the university establishment had done “the robust due diligence and checking that should happen with any senior academic appointment.” The unanswered issue at the center of the story remains the same one readers came for: Jason Arday’s cause of death has not been stated, even as the scrutiny around his death and his treatment intensifies.
