Academic Freedom

‘To Make Collective Action Possible’: The Founding of the AAUP

The article reviews the developments that led to the founding of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). Events before, during, and following the founding meeting in 1915, as well as the efforts of two of its founders, Arthur Lovejoy and E.R.A. Seligman, brought about the early focus on academic freedom.

Religion, Sectarianism, and the Pursuit of Truth: Reexamining Academic Freedom in the Twenty-First Century

This essay offers a friendly critique of our customary understanding of academic freedom. Focusing on religiously affiliated institutions, Kenneth Garcia considers sectarian obstacles to academic freedom and places academic freedom in historical and theological perspective.

The Two Cultures of Higher Education in the Twenty-First Century and Their Impact on Academic Freedom

Like C.P. Snow's two cultures of the humanities and the sciences, a new bimodal view of higher education is becoming increasingly important at the start of the twenty-first century: one that sees the goal of universities as developing "the whole person" and another that sees it as largely or even exclusively in terms of job training.

Opportunities of Our Own Making: The Struggle for "Academic Freedom"

This essay examines David Horowitz’s “Academic Freedom” campaign, specifically exploring how “academic freedom,” a narrative that appears alongside “free speech” discourse frequently since September 11, 2001, can be understood as a site of struggle

On the Pros and Cons of Being a Faculty Member at E-Text University

This essay discusses e-texts in terms of academic freedom, using excerpts from conversations with instructors who have used various e-texts in their classes. These instructors often take a pragmatic approach to the materials but fear losing control of what and how they teach.

On the Ground in Kansas: Social Media, Academic Freedom, and the Fight for Higher Education

This essay explores the Kansas Board of Regents’ recently implemented rules addressing “Improper Use of Social Media” and faculty responses to this policy. It focuses on the moderate response that has predominated and the debates about the relationship between the First Amendment and academic freedom.

Editor's Introduction - Volume 4

The call for papers for this issue of the Journal of Academic Freedom was focused on the globalization of higher education and its impact on academic freedom. How, the CFP asked, is the expansion of US higher education around the world and the increasing international integration of academia affecting academic freedom? In what ways, conversely, is the globalization of higher education transforming academia within the United States, shifting and impinging upon traditional notions of academic freedom?

Rethinking Academic Boycotts

Politically inspired boycotts are a powerful form of protest. Free speech, as the US Supreme Court has recognized, includes “the opportunity to persuade to action.” Boycotts are one such opportunity: they aim “to bring about political, social, and economic change” through advocacy, petition, and association with others in a common cause.

Palestine, Boycott, and Academic Freedom: A Reassessment Introduction

The creation of the state of Israel in 1948 on land home to generations of Arab Palestinians is the contemporary world’s most egregious instance of settler colonialism. This ethnic cleansing, which included the displacement of 750,000 people in what Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe, has engendered one of the longest-standing campaigns of resistance by an occupied people to permanent political and economic subordination by another nation. 

Boycott, Academic Freedom, and the Moral Responsibility to Uphold Human Rights

Just before year end 2012, Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak signed the official document upgrading the colony-college of Ariel, built on occupied Palestinian land, to a university, inviting unprecedented condemnation. Many academics around the world had already joined the widespread silent academic boycott of Israel—that is, the unannounced, yet very effective, shunning of academic visits to and relations with Israeli academic institutions— well before this latest upgrade of Ariel.

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