User:Howard C. Berkowitz/Ivory

Ivory Towers on Sand: The Failure of Middle Eastern Studies in America is a book by Martin Kramer, published by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, which analyzes the approach taken to Middle Eastern studies in U.S. academia. Kramer is associated with serious academic and research circles, although recognized as "hard-line". This concerns him, given the realities of dealing with conflict in, and from, that area. He argues that much academic presentation is defined by "fads and fashion", and, in part, from educators that are part of the "leftover left" biased toward Third World causes, suspicious of American motives and supportive of radicalism.

The book has been criticized as being part of a right-wing assault on academic freedom in this area, coupled with its own set of biases. The Middle East Studies Association, which Kramer considers unrealistic, has made it a centerpiece of their objections.