Philosophy professor Joseph Levine argues in a New York Times blog that Steven Salaita was justified in violating standards of civility in a particular tweet about anyone who supports Israel during the attacks on Gaza being “an awful human being.” Levine defends Salaita against the charge of incivility on the grounds that he believes Salaita’s views to be…
“It need scarcely be pointed out that the freedom which is the subject of this report is that of the teacher,” says the 1915 Declaration of Principles on Academic Freedom and Academic Freedom. The 1940 Statement follows up: Teachers are entitled to full freedom in research and in the publication of the results, subject to the adequate performance of their…
At its idealistic best, the traditional vision of American higher education was one of beauty, dynamism and diversity. With undergraduate students able to take courses from as many as 40 different professors, with requirements designed to give as broad a taste of intellectual pursuits as possible, with “shared governance” assuring that corporate-style top-down influence is…
Getting to “know” other academics on Twitter is a very strange process. First you follow the ones you know. Then you follow the most interesting people who they “know,” and by then other folks who they follow who you don’t know have started following you. One of the people I’ve gotten to “know” through this…
Below is an open letter from Department Heads at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign to incoming president Timothy Killeen about the Salaita case. A UIUC faculty committee report on the case is expected later this month, and on Dec. 3 a forum on the Salaita case, academic freedom, and civility will be held at…
‘Academic freedom is in the eye of the beholder.’ That, I think, will be the most common takeaway by readers of Stanley Fish’s new book Versions of Academic Freedom: From Professionalism to Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press). After all, he breaks the concept into five “schools”: The “It’s just a job” school (his own…
President Robert Easter of the University of Illinois who participated in and approved of the egregious dismissal and summary suspension of Dr. Steven Salaita at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is retiring. He will receive a $180,000 Golden Parachute bonus in a state that is broke with one of the worst managed finances in the…
The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) co-counsel in Chicago, Loevy & Loevy, filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit (PDF) today against the University of Illinois, accusing it of failing to release emails between administration officials and trustees about the dismissal of Steven Salaita. According to the CCR, “The University initially denied the FOIA request…
This year, 2014, is the centennial of the outbreak of war in Europe which quickly escalated into the senseless slaughter of World War I. Charles Schenck, a secretary of the Socialist Party, opposed the draft during The Great War, a term that many used to describe World War I. He wrote an enduring, magnificent pamphlet that is…
By Marjorie Heins, Free Expression Policy Project The Koch brothers, Charles and David, are best-known for donating millions to the election campaigns of Tea Party candidates and others committed to fighting regulation of business and to protecting the oil and gas industries from efforts to combat climate change. It turns out that Charles Koch, through…