Colleges: Semantics in San Francisco

After two weeks of churning disorder, as black militants campaigned for changes in curriculum and admission policy, San Francisco State College President Robert R. Smith reluctantly closed his campus down (TIME, Nov. 22). Last week, convinced that he was not the man to reopen the college, Smith resigned. Named to replace him as acting president was Professor Samuel I. Hayakawa, 62, an internationally recognized expert not in administration but in general semantics, the study of the interrelationship of language, thought and behavior.

Hayakawa, who is the third new president in 27 months,...