By Andrew Scheinman A few weeks ago, the AAUP released its Report on the Steven Salaita affair at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), in which it concluded that UIUC and its Chancellor Phyllis Wise violated Salaita’s academic freedom and committed serious breaches of governance when they “un-hired” Salaita by Wise’s not forwarding his hire…
On January 30, I posted an item to this blog under the title “The Troubling Case of Professor Stephen Cohen and the American Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies.” The post recounted the background to a decision by the Association’s Board to reject an offer by Professor Stephen F. Cohen, his wife, Katrina vanden…
From the Conclusions of the report, “Academic Freedom and Tenure: Felician College (New Jersey)”, May, 2015: In terminating the appointments of sixteen fulltime faculty members, seven of whom sought the Association’s assistance, the administration of Felician College attributed its action simply to “the exigency of the college’s financial status” without any further explanation. The administration’s…
What follows is an open letter from the President Robert A. Brown of Boston University in response to the controversy surrounding “anti-White” tweets made by incoming assistant professor of African-American Studies Saida Grundy. I could be wrong, but I believe that in reaffirming the university’s stance against racially charged language and attitudes, President Brown quite…
The following is an edited transcript of remarks given by Noam Chomsky via Skype on 4 February 2014 to members of the Adjunct Faculty Association of the United Steelworkers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Robin J. Sowards prepared the transcript and there was additional editing by Noam Chomsky. While our New York-minute society may recoil at a post that…
This past weekend, I had the pleasure of joining the leadership and some members of the Illinois Conference at their annual meeting in Chicago. I had previously met several of those in attendance, and I had the opportunity to meet in person several others with whom I have corresponded about posts to this blog and…
George Mason University (GMU) has gotten a lot of attention this week, with FIRE declaring that GMU “has eliminated all of its speech codes, earning the highest, ‘green light’ rating from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education.” Unfortunately, this isn’t true. GMU continues to have a Student Code of Conduct that’s flawed in many…
Since 1992 the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression at the University of Virginia has celebrated the birth and ideals of its namesake by calling attention each year to those who would censor free expression. Announced on or near April 13—the anniversary of the birth of Thomas Jefferson—the Jefferson Muzzles are awarded as…
The National Labor Relations Board has ruled that a worker using profanity on Facebook that criticised an employer cannot be used to fire the worker. The N.L.R.B. has jurisdiction over labour and union issues at private post-secondary institutions. It is possible that this ruling could have major academic freedom implications when civility is claimed as…
The issue of naming John Doe donour defendants in Professor Steven Salaita’s lawsuit against the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, was one of the more creative and interesting aspects of this case. Donour pressure has frequently been a fulcrum in suppressing academic freedom as institutions run for cover when controversy arises, and the corporate university…