Door Flair

Communication studies professor Michael Rabby posed this conundrum to six of his students this summer: what do University professors’ office doors say about the men and women behind them? His students (Justin Ackley, Morgan Armstrong, Michael Garvey, Matthew Loucks, Stephen Stewart, and Laura Steffen) promptly “analyzed” 140 doors (49 female, 91 male, so to speak), coding their adornment for humor, news, information, inspiration, motivation, University fandom, and personal stuff. Some results: the School of Nursing had the highest per-capita use of humor, the philosophy department had the funniest, the bio department had the most news, the English department had by far the most stuff (a stunning average of 22 pieces per door, you wonder if there’s really wood under there at all), the world record-holder for pieces per door is engineering professor Aziz Inan (47), among the visionaries quoted on doors were Arnold Schwarzenegger, Voltaire, and Drew Carey, among the people portrayed on doors were Michael Jordan, the Virgin Mary, Willie Nelson, and Richard Nixon, and among the items attached to doors were guitar picks. We could not, of course, resist the urge to send the photographer Steve Hambuchen after such peculiar game.