POSTED BY THE AAUP
We are excited to announce the publication of volume 17 of the AAUP’s Journal of Academic Freedom. This year’s call for papers was inspired, in part, by urban and cultural studies scholar Davarian Baldwin’s rousing call for courage in the face of political and material repression in US colleges and universities: “We are the power that we have been waiting for.” Affirming this declaration, contributions to the 2026 volume showcase the work of higher education community members in fighting back against repression. We feature original scholarly articles grounded in a renewed notion of academic freedom as not only an abstract value or principle to be defended but also a living practice of research, teaching, and public engagement that articulates a democratic higher education and a democratic society.
As a practice, academic freedom is embodied in the free, critical inquiry of students and scholars; in syllabi, curricula, and classrooms whose content is determined by experts rather than by administrators, boards of trustees, external special interest groups, or government agencies; and in the extramural speech and action of students and scholars, which are protected by the First Amendment and by AAUP principles. National and international political discourses and federal investigations—including those pertaining to Palestine, racial and gender diversity, and other “controversial” topics—have pressured administrators to police protected speech and action on campuses, while disregard for shared governance has created conditions of institutionalized disposability and precarity that further threaten the freedoms of academic workers. Under such conditions, the practice of academic freedom—resilient, defiant, and unwaveringly committed to the search for knowledge and to the common good—itself becomes an instantiation of democracy over and against authoritarianism.
To defend and fight for academic freedom is to defend and fight for democracy. With the explicit objective of contributing to this struggle, the new volume charts initiatives pursued, strategies deployed, coalitions built, and ongoing work in the fight for academic freedom.
We encourage readers to forward this email to friends and colleagues and to share links to article web pages on social media. You can access the complete volume at https://www.aaup.org/JAF17 or click on titles in the table of contents below. Submissions to the call for papers for next year’s volume, “Freedom and Responsibility: Palestine in American and International Higher Education,” are due by March 8, 2027.
—Karim Mattar, Faculty Editor
The Journal of Academic Freedom is supported by funding from the AAUP Foundation.
Table of Contents
Epigraph: Dark Clouds Beckon
By Sarah Jen
Editor’s Introduction: Academic Freedom as a Practice of Democracy
By Karim Mattar
Toward a New Collective
Practicing Academic Freedom in the American South: Voices of Courage and Resistance
By Joyce E. King, Casey Philip Wong, Jennifer Esposito, Haifaa Aldoohan, Nadia Behizadeh, Stephanie Behm Cross, Tanja Burkhard, Qiana Lachaud, Erin Mason, Dionne Cowan, Terrance J. Lewis, Miguel Casar, Louis Gallien Jr., and Brian Williams
Meeting the Moment: A Human Rights–Based Approach to Academic Freedom
By Anna Crowe, Glenn Mitoma, Kathleen Cavanaugh, Kristina Eberbach, Gergana Halpern, Amanda Lyons, Johanna Sirera Ransmeier, Kaushik Sunder Rajan, and Carrie Booth Walling
Students, Staff, and Faculty Under Fire
Archiving Dissent: A Memory Project to Document Primary Accounts of Pro-Palestinian Student Protest
By Michelle M. Nolan and Sarah Coates
“We Are the Power We Have Been Waiting For”: Academic Freedom, Ideological Hegemony, and the Work of Refusal in Florida
By John Wesley White
Teaching Abortion in Idaho: Idaho Federation of Teachers v. Labrador
By Aleta Quinn
Context Collapse and Retaliatory Firings: Higher Education in the Wake of Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
By Maggie Odette and Elaine Schnabel
Intimacies of Praxis from the Classroom to the Public Sphere
Virtual Coalition-Building and Academic Freedom for Black Doctoral Students
By Pamela P. Felder-Small
Palestine Anti-Repression Network: Coalition-Building for Free Speech and Academic Freedom
By the Palestine Anti-Repression Network
Nazis, Penguins, Transylvanians, Communists, and Loony Marxists: Academic Freedom and the Transformative Power of Academic Theatre in Texas
By Charlotte M. Canning
Organizing for Power
From Defense to Offense in the Higher Ed Fight: Colorado’s Mutual Academic Defense Compact
By Aaron Schneider and Steve Mumme
Sanctuary Campus Network: Beyond Academic Freedom, Toward a Democratic and Decolonized University
By A. Naomi Paik and Karma R. Chávez
From Middle East Studies to Academic Freedom Struggles for All: Palestine as Convergence Point
By Lara Deeb and Lori Allen
Equity Week: Academic Freedom as Collective Democratic Practice
By Amml Hussein and Christian D. Green
