BY HANK REICHMAN Yesterday I posted to this blog a piece that compared the current protests against police violence with the urban rebellions of prior years, especially the 1960s. In it I wrote that “the looting, arson, and window-smashing that have marred the overwhelmingly peaceful protests . . . may have been carried out by…
BY KELLY HAND Over the past few months, Academe Blog has published many posts—by contributing editors, other regular bloggers, and guest bloggers—about the pandemic and its impact on higher education. Our collective preoccupation with this topic is not surprising, since we all live with the daily consequences of the pandemic, even as it has become…
POSTED BY HANK REICHMAN On Monday night, June 1, through the following morning the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) crowded protesters arrested in downtown Los Angeles and Westwood into sheriff’s buses and brought them to Jackie Robinson Stadium. Located off-campus, on the grounds of the Los Angeles Veterans Health Administration and seating just 1,820, it…
BY HANK REICHMAN No right-thinking person can fail to condemn the looting, arson, and window-smashing that have marred the overwhelmingly peaceful protests that have swept the nation for the past week in the wake of the brutal slaying of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers. These criminal actions may have been carried out by a…
BY RUDY FICHTENBAUM AAUP president Rudy Fichtenbaum issued the following statement today. The murder of George Floyd by four police officers in Minneapolis has unleashed a massive protest movement across the country. These protests, led by young people, are revealing years of pent-up frustration with racism and inequality. The militarization of policing in the United…
BY ANTHONY ALESSANDRINI Not long after the election of Donald Trump, I shared a message in support of the right of undocumented students to pursue their education at City University of New York (CUNY), produced by a group of faculty and students and intended for inclusion on syllabi, to a faculty email list at Kingsborough…
BY EMILY K HOBSON AND JENNA N. HANCHEY Since August 2017, when one of our students became a symbol of the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR) has seen a rise in white nationalist activity and hate speech on our campus. Yet, UNR is just one target in…
BY JUDY ROHRER It feels like every week there is a new case of an instructor being fired, released, or not renewed because of some (usually progressive) political statement or action. The increasing number of us in untenured and contingent positions find ourselves self-censoring in meetings, stressing over student evaluations, second-guessing our political activism, habitually…
BY MICHAEL C. BEHRENT The ongoing controversy surrounding the Confederate statue known as “Silent Sam” at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has raised many issues relating to inclusivity and free expression. But as administrators have sought over the past month to find ways to lay the issue to rest, the controversy has…