<p>An Emory University professor has formally complained to university administrators that a colleague used a racial epithet during a panel discussion.</p><p>Assistant Professor Tracy Rone filed the complaint with the colleges Equal Opportunity Programs office against anthropology Professor Carol Worthman. Rone said Worthman, who is white, used a derogatory phrase in reference to blacks.</p><p>Rone declined to comment to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for a Thursday story. She said she attended the Sept. 15 panel and that she was the only black among the audience of anthropology faculty and graduate students.</p><p>Worthman said in a statement released by the universitys media relations department that she used the offending phrase to explain how her field _ biological anthropology _ is viewed by cultural anthropologists outside of Emory.</p><p>I am distressed that I offended unintentionally, she said in the statement.</p><p>Emory Vice President for Equal Opportunity Programs Robert Ethridge said his office investigated Rones complaint and concluded that Worthmans comment was an isolated incident that did not indicate a pattern of workplace hostility.</p><p>The office recommended Worthman be sanctioned and that Rone receive written and public verbal apologies from Worthman and department chairman George Armelagos. Armelagos said he was at the panel but did not hear the remark.</p><p>Armelagos said he would take some type of punitive action that could range from a verbal reprimand to suspension.</p><p>The incident led Bennett College President Johnnetta Cole, a former Emory anthropology professor, to write a letter to the department urging administrators to develop a plan for substantially increasing the number of black faculty and graduate students.</p><p>In an Oct. 24 memo to Armelagos, Rone and Huditha Mustafa _ another black assistant professor _ characterized conditions in Emorys anthropology department as institutionalized ... racism that ranges from marginalization to intimidation.</p><p>In a Nov. 3 letter to Emory University President James Wagner, the universitys Presidential Commission on the Status of Minorities wrote that it wants Emory to reopen and broaden the Worthman investigation and to require all students, faculty and staff members to get diversity certification.</p><p>Nagueyalti Warren, chairwoman of the commission, said commissioners believe racial problems are systemic at Emory and that action should go beyond the anthropology department.</p>
