BY ANTHONY ALESSANDRINI The AAUP’s new “Statement on Academic Boycotts,” which reverses its prior opposition to academic boycotts, is a major declaration. Stating clearly that boycotts “can be considered legitimate tactical responses to conditions that are fundamentally incompatible with the mission of higher education,” it confirms there are instances in which upholding academic freedom may…
BY DANIEL A. SEGAL At a moment when the Israeli assault on Gaza has destroyed every university that had existed in Gaza, and the Palestinian-led boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement again calls on academics outside of Palestine to support the nonviolent strategy of institutional academic boycotts, it is time for the AAUP to reconsider…
BY HANK REICHMAN The following joint statement was issued March 9 in English, Ukrainian, and Russian: As international professional associations that foster the study of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian peoples and cultures, ASEEES, BASEES, and AATSEEL* are committed to promoting international communication among scholars of all countries and identities across the humanities and social…
BY BILL MULLEN The Modern Language Association, one of the largest academic organizations in the world, voted by a margin of 101-93 in the Delegate Assembly in January to support a resolution declaring that the organization would not boycott Israeli Universities. The resolution now goes to a vote of the general membership this week. If…
This is a guest post by Kamala Visweswaran. She is a professor of ethnic studies at the University of California–San Diego. She is the editor of Everyday Occupations: Experiencing Militarism in South Asia and the Middle East (University of Pennsylvannia Press, 2013). My current Academe article, “Palestinian Universities and Everyday Life Under Occupation,” is not an article that describes causes, but rather the consequences of…
Writing for University World News, John Kelly reports on the debate over an academic boycott of Israeli universities that is now occurring in Ireland. Kelly notes that the issue has become prominent in Ireland considerably later than in most member nations of the European Union, 14 of which have governmentally endorsed the boycott. In Ireland,…
The Orwellian-named “Protect Academic Freedom Act” is not a defense of academic freedom; this is a total attack on academic freedom. Now, you might think that it’s purely a symbolic law because no American college would ever endorse an academic boycott of Israel, and it doesn’t even apply to colleges that are institutional members of…
I’m starting to think that the American Studies Association has become the Emmanuel Goldstein of our times, the mythical object of the daily two minutes of hate in the novel 1984. The outpouring of denunciations against the ASA, and calls for their suppression for daring to embrace a boycott of Israel, have made them the most…
Ever since the American Studies Association announced in mid-December that its membership had voted to endorse an academic boycott of Israel, criticism of the organization’s action has snowballed. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education the “Association has itself become the target of widespread criticism and ostracism. It has gone from relative obscurity to prominence…