An AAUP report this month on the case of John Boyle (see more about it in the post by Peter Kirstein earlier today), an assistant professor of linguistics at Northeastern Illinois University, raises once more the problem of using the vague term “collegiality” in questions of the granting of tenure. The NEIU president, an AAUP…
Today, the AAUP released its report on Northeastern Illinois University dealing with the tenure case of John Boyle. Peter N. Kirstein of the Illinois AAUP comments on the process in this case. By Peter N. Kirstein, St. Xavier University One of the unresolved structural problems within the AAUP is the relationship between State Conferences’ Committee A…
What follows is the opening section of J. M. Coetzee’s Foreword to a new book by John Higgins, Academic Freedom in a Democratic South Africa. Coetzee is, of course, a very highly regarded South African novelist, whose honors include the Nobel Prize for Literature. Higgins is a professor at the University of Cape Town. The…
I’ve always had some ambivalent feelings about boycotts. I agree with the AAUP’s strong and principled opposition to academic boycotts, and I think engagement in almost every case is better than a boycott. On the other hand, I believe that individuals have the right to engage in boycotts, that institutions have the right to urge…
On Nov. 14, 2013, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign engineering professor Louis Wozniak had his tenure revoked and was dismissed by a unanimous vote of the Board of Trustees. Illinois Academe invited him to tell his side of the story, and this essay is reprinted from the Fall issue. By Louis Wozniak This is not…
The firing of Louis Wozniak by the University of Illinois raises disturbing questions about academic freedom, due process, and the failure of faculty to defend these principles. Normally, the firing of a tenured professor is such an extraordinary event that it involves acts of breathtaking misconduct or total incompetence. This is not the case with…
If you’re on Twitter, you probably know about a ritual called “Friday Follow.” It’s a tradition in which people recommend to their followers other people whose Tweets might interest them. While I know this isn’t Twitter, I thought I’d bring the work of one of my tweeps to the attention of readers here because it’s…
In recent years a growing number of American universities have opened Confucius Institutes as part of their programs in East Asian studies. Confucius Institutes are non-profit institutions that aim to promote Chinese language and culture and the teaching of the Chinese language, and which facilitate cultural exchanges. But the Confucius Institutes differ from the British…
Like many people with opinions on Adrian Raine’s speech tonight at the College of Charleston, I am angry. But I am not angry at the College for inviting an expert on the biological links to crime to speak, or for defending academic freedom by refusing to cancel a speech. I’m angry that pandering politicians are…
Every four years, well ahead of even the Iowa Caucuses and the New Hampshire Primary, the Ames Straw Poll or Iowa Straw Poll is held. The atmosphere in Ames on that weekend is carnival-like, and, not surprisingly, there have been all sorts of irregularities in the voting: that is, each attempt to reduce those irregularities…