The File is a collection of documents from a major dispute
involving a number of American college professors, mainly
mathematicians, statisticians,and sociologists. The
controversy was ignited by the mathematician Serge Lang's
reaction to a questionnaire, "The 1977 Survey of the
American Professoriate", distributed by E. C. Ladd of the
University of Connecticut and S. M. Lipset of Stanford. The
ensuing discussion - in part acrimonious and personal - soon
involved a large group of active and passive participants,
and included issues such as survey techniques, evaluation of
academic work, public and political honesty, and McCarthyism
at Harvard.