[This call was published by the Ad Hoc Committee of Scholars 4 COLA on 16 March 2020, with the following initial signatories (more than 200 people have now signed on). For a full list of signatories, or to sign on to the call, please click here.]
THE CALL FOR A UC BOYCOTT
A CALL OF CONSCIENCE NOT TO SPEAK AT ANY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA CAMPUSES UNTIL THE ADMINISTRATION REINSTATES ALL GRADUATE STUDENTS FIRED FOR STRIKE ACTIVITIES.
The case for a boycott is laid out in five points here.
We, the undersigned, will not give guest lectures or provide public speeches, either remotely or in person, at the University of California. We invite all signatories to reflect on other forms of protest and boycott they might employ.
This boycott should be honored until all graduate students fired for participating in the wildcat strike are reinstated and the administration vows that there will be no subsequent retaliation either against individual students or against their respective departments. However, since we strive to support individual academic laborers and to build possibilities for critical thought, exceptions will be made for lectures or visits related to departmental hiring practices.
The grading strike began when graduate workers removed their grades from Canvas, thereby withholding grades from the administration (but not from students). Part of the disciplinary process has focused on the obligation of faculty and TAs to use online tools such as Canvas and Zoom in ways mandated by the university. At one point, a “tattle-bot” was integrated onto Canvas so that undergraduate students could report “disruptions” in the curriculum that resulted from the strike directly to the administration. As we enter into an unprecedented time of online teaching, these issues are at the very heart of academic freedom and the struggles that we all face going forward.
On 28 February 2020, a number of graduate students who partook in this wildcat strike were terminated from their spring appointments; the total number of graduate workers fired is around 80. This includes international students and could lead to their deportation, thereby going against the campus’ declared commitment to protecting international students. In addition to losing their appointments and their income, all the fired students will lose their health insurance. In the midst of a global health pandemic, it is unconscionable that these students will be stripped of their health care and/or forced to relocate.
We therefore call upon our colleagues to join this very targeted academic boycott. We hope that this strategy can serve to rapidly shift the terrain, since the status quo currently favors the administration against student workers striking for their most basic of rights.
CURRENT SIGNATORIES (to sign on to this call, please click here or email adhoc4cola@gmail.com):
Asma Abbas, Director of Advanced Studies and Associate Professor in Politics and Philosophy, Bard College at Simon’s Rock
Sadia Abbas, Associate Professor of English and Women's and Gender Studies, Rutgers University
Hosam Aboul-Ela, Associate Professor of English, University of Houston
Nadje Al-Ali, Robert Family Professor of International Studies and Professor of Anthropology and Middle East Studies, Brown University
Anthony Alessandrini, Professor of English & Middle Eastern Studies, Kingsborough Community College-CUNY and the CUNY Graduate Center
Patricia Alessandrini, Assistant Professor, Department of Music and Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA), Stanford University
Dina Al-Kassem, Professor, University of British Columbia
Lori Allen, Reader in Anthropology, SOAS, University of London
Eyal Amiran, Professor of Comparative Literature, University of California-Irvine
Sinan Antoon, Associate Professor, New York University
Talal Asad, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Middle Eastern Studies, CUNY Graduate Center
Cristina Bacchilega, Professor of English & Graduate Director, University of Hawai’i
Toby Beauchamp, Associate Professor of Gender and Women's Studies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
Joel Beinin, Donald J. McLachlan Professor of History, Emeritus, Stanford University
Daniel Benson, Assistant Professor of International Cultural Studies and Foreign Languages, St. Francis College
Anna Bernard, Senior Lecturer in English and Comparative Literature, King’s College London
Tithi Bhattacharya, Professor of History, Purdue University
Timothy Brennan, Samuel Russell Chair in the Humanities, Department of Cultural Studies & Comparative Literature and English, University of Minnesota
Neil Brenner, Professor of Urban Theory, Harvard Graduate School of Design
Stephen Brier, Professor of Urban Education, CUNY Graduate Center
Kylie Broderick, Graduate Student, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Melissa A. Brzycki, Assistant Professor of History, Monmouth University
Susan Buck-Morss, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, CUNY Graduate Center
J. Mijin Cha, Assistant Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy, Occidental College
Sophie Chamas, Senior Teaching Fellow, SOAS, University of London
Piya Chatterjee, Professor of Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Scripps College, Claremont Consortium
Ajay Singh Chaudhary, Executive Director and Core Faculty in Social and Political Theory, Brooklyn Institute for Social Research
Zahid Chaudhury, Associate Professor of English, Princeton University
Noam Chomsky, Professor of Linguistics, MIT
Samantha Christiansen, Assistant Professor of History, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs
Kandice Chuh, Professor of English, CUNY Graduate Center
George Ciccariello-Maher, Visiting Scholar, Decolonizing Humanities Project, The College of William & Mary
Daniel Aldana Cohen, Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of Pennsylvania
Altha Cravey, Associate Professor of Geography, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Carole Crumley, Professor Emerita of Anthropology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Elyse Crystall, Teaching Associate Professor of English, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Ayça Çubukçu, Associate Professor in Human Rights and Co-Director of LSE Human Rights, London School of Economics and Political Science
Jocelyne Dakhlia, Directrice d'Etudes, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris
Monisha Das Gupta, Professor of Ethnic Studies and Women's Studies, University of Hawaiʻi
Frank Deale, Professor, CUNY School of Law
Geneviève Dorais, Professeure d'histoire, Université du Québec à Montréal
Lisa Duggan, Professor of Social & Cultural Analysis, New York University
Başak Ertür, Lecturer in Law and Co-Director of Birkbeck Centre for Law and the Humanities, Birkbeck, University of London
Eric Fassin, Professor of Sociology, Department of Gender Studies and Department of Political Science, Université Paris 8 Vincennes - Saint-Denis
Roderick Ferguson, Yale University
Michelle Fine, Distinguished Professor of Critical Psychology, Women’s Studies, American Studies and Urban Education, CUNY Graduate Center
Cynthia Franklin, Professor of English, University of Hawai'i
Candace Fujikane, Associate Professor, English Department, University of Hawaiʻi
Diane Fujino, Professor of Asian American Studies, University of California at Santa Barbara
Libby Garland, Associate Professor of History, Kingsborough Community College
Behrooz Ghamari-Tabrizi, Professor of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University
Richard Gilman-Opalsky, Professor of Political Theory and Philosophy, Political Science, University of Illinois
Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Professor, Graduate Center, City University of New York
Bassam Haddad, Director of the Middle East and Islamic Studies Program and Associate Professor, Schar School for Policy and Government, George Mason University
Dyala Hamzah, Professeure agrégée, Département d’histoire, Université de Montréal
Michele Hardesty, Associate Professor of US Literatures & Cultural Studies, Hampshire College
Stefano Harney, Honorary Professor, University of British Columbia
David Harvey, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Geography, CUNY Graduate Center
Salah Hassan, Associate Professor of English, Michigan State University
Christina Heatherton, Assistant Professor of American Studies, Barnard College
Marc Lamont Hill, Professor of Media Studies and Urban Education, Temple University
Fredric Jameson, Professor of Literature, Duke University
Caren Kaplan, Professor Emerita of American Studies, University of California-Davis
Rebecca Karl, Professor of History, New York University
J. Kēhaulani Kauanui, Professor of American Studies, Wesleyan University
Joseph Keith, Associate Professor of English, SUNY Binghamton University
Robin Kelley, Distinguished Professor and Gary B. Nash Endowed Chair in U.S. History, University of California-Los Angeles
Laleh Khalili, Professor of International Politics, Queen Mary University of London
Sherryl Kleinman, Emerita Professor of Sociology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Troy Andreas Araiza Kokins, Lecturer in Latin American Studies, University of California-San Diego
Mark Lance, Professor of Philosophy, Professor of Justice and Peace, Georgetown University
Zachary Levenson, Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of North Carolina, Greensboro
Mark LeVine, Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History, University of California-Irvine
Susana Loza, Associate Professor of Critical Race, Gender, and Media Studies, Hampshire College
Simeon Man, Associate Professor of History, University of California at San Diego
James McDougall, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History, Trinity College, Oxford
Liz Montegary, Associate Professor of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, SUNY Stony Brook University
Bill Mullen, Professor of English and American Studies, Purdue University
Donna Murch, Associate Professor of History, Rutgers University
Premilla Nadasen, Professor of History, Barnard College
Don Nonini, Professor of Anthropology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Mimi Thi Nguyen, Associate Professor of Gender and Women's Studies and Asian American Studies, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Hussein Omar, Assistant Professor, University College Dublin
A. Naomi Paik, Associate Professor of Asian American Studies, Gender and Women's Studies, and History, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Michael Palm, Associate Professor of Communication and AAUP Chapter President, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
David Palumbo-Liu, Louise Hewlett Nixon Professor, Stanford University (PhD, UC Berkeley)
Nicola Pratt, Associate Professor of International Politics of the Middle East, University of Warwick, UK
Tiana Reid, Graduate Student Worker, Department of English & Comparative Literature, Columbia University
John Rieder, Professor Emeritus of English, University of Hawai‘i
Boots Riley, Filmmaker, Performer, and Activist
Beth Robinson, Assistant Professor of History, Texas A & M University - Corpus Christi
Dylan Rodríguez, Professor of Media and Cultural Studies, University of California at Riverside
Andrew Ross, Professor of Social and Cultural Analysis, New York University
Sandrine Sanos, Professor of Modern European History, Texas A & M University - Corpus Christi
Nadya Sbaiti, Assistant Professor, Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, American University Beirut
Naomi Schiller, Associate Professor, Anthropology, Brooklyn College and The Graduate Center, CUNY
Malini Johar Schueller, Professor of English, University of Florida
Michael Schwalbe, Professor of Sociology, North Carolina State University
Zach Schwartz-Weinstein, Bard Prison Initiative
S. Shankar, Professor of English, University of Hawai‘i
Naoko Shibusawa, Associate Professor of American Studies/Ethnic Studies, Brown University
Ella Shohat, Professor of Art & Public Policy and Middle Eastern & Islamic Studies, New York University
Eric Smoodin, Professor of American Studies, University of California-Davis
Robyn C. Spencer, Associate Professor of History, Lehman College-CUNY and the CUNY Graduate Center
Rei Terada, Professor of Comparative Literature, University of California-Irvine
Jeanne Theoharis, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Brooklyn College
Molly Todd, Associate Professor of History, Montana State University
Alejandro Velasco, Associate Professor of History, New York University
Françoise Vergès, Former Global South(s) Chair, FMSH, Paris, Public Educator, Decolonial Feminist Activist
Dana Ward, Professor Emeritus, Pitzer College (UC Berkeley ’71)
Cornel West, Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy, Harvard University; Professor Emeritus, Princeton University
Catherine Zimmer, Adjunct Professor, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
