In Defense of Academic Freedom:
Defamation, Intimidation, and Suspension
Featuring:
Andrea Brower
Michel DeGraff
Anna Feder
Moderators:
Bassam Haddad
Lara Deeb
Organized by DC, Maryland, & Virginia Faculty for Academic Freedom and Gaza in Conrtext Collaborative Project; Cosponsored by MESA Task Force on Civil and Human Rights, MESA's Committee on Academic Freedom, Faculty for Justice in Palestine Network (115+ chapters nationally)
Monday, 3 March 2025
3:00 PM EST
The assault on academic freedom is intensifying on University campuses. This series takes note of cases of defamation, intimidation, and suspension that faculty are being subjected to in the United States and beyond. We aim to raise awareness regarding the conditions and pretenses under which such violations occur.
In this sixth session, we address a number of issues, from investigations over regular activities to suspension, “letting go,” and/or firing. We speak with three professors who were targeted by their University, each with a now familiar story to share so we may all be prepared to navigate the new repressive normal on College campuses. In Defense of Academic Freedom.
This event is Co-Sponsored by the Gaza in Context Collaborative Project
Co-Organizers: Arab Studies Institute, Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, George Mason University’s Middle East and Islamic Studies Program, Rutgers Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Birzeit University Museum, Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Brown University’s Center for Middle East Studies, University of Chicago’s Center for Contemporary Theory, Brown University’s New Directions in Palestinian Studies, Georgetown University’s Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, Simon Fraser University’s Centre for Comparative Muslim Studies, Georgetown University-Qatar, American University of Cairo’s Alternative Policy Studies, Middle East Studies Association’s Global Academy, University of Chicago’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies, CUNY’s Middle East and Middle Eastern American Center, University of Illinois Chicago’s Arab american cultural Center, George Mason University’s AbuSulayman’s Center for Global Islamic Studies, University of Illinois Chicago’s Critical Middle East Studies Working Group, George Washington University’s Institute for Middle East Studies, Columbia University’s Center for Palestine Studies, New York University’s Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies
Featuring
Anna Feder is an educator, curator, filmmaker, community builder, and activist based in Boston and Providence. Anna has over twenty-five years of experience in curating and creating cinema environments, including the Bright Lights Cinema Series at Emerson, which she has been running since its inception in 2012. In the fall of 2024, her position was eliminated, and the series was canceled for her activism in support of Palestinian liberation. She has served as a consulting producer on The Palestine Exception and offers her services to films on Palestine that are looking to connect with audiences. She currently organizes with Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine at Emerson, the Palestine Anti-Repression Network, Filmworkers for Palestine, and Food Not Bombs.
Andrea Brower is an activist and scholar from Kaua‘i. She is an assistant professor in the Solidarity & Social Justice Program with Gonzaga University's Department of Sociology and Criminology. Her research, writing, and teaching on capitalism, imperialism, the environment, and agriculture is embedded in social movements for collective liberation and ecological regeneration.
Michel DeGraff, Professor, removed from MIT Linguistics on November 14, 2024, with new title as "Faculty at Large" at MIT School of Humanities, Arts & Social Science.
Bassam Haddad (Moderator) is Director of the Middle East and Islamic Studies Program and Associate Professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. He is the author of Business Networks in Syria: The Political Economy of Authoritarian Resilience (Stanford University Press, 2011) and co-editor of A Critical Political Economy of the Middle East (Stanford University Press, 2021). Bassam is Co-Founder/Editor of Jadaliyya Ezine and Executive Director of the Arab Studies Institute. He serves as Founding Editor of the Arab Studies Journal and the Knowledge Production Project. He is co-producer/director of the award-winning documentary film, About Baghdad, and director of the acclaimed series Arabs and Terrorism. Bassam is Executive Producer of Status Podcast Channel and Director of the Middle East Studies Pedagogy Initiative (MESPI). He received MESA's Jere L. Bacharach Service Award in 2017 for his service to the profession. Currently, Bassam is working on his second Syria book titled Understanding The Syrian Tragedy: Regime, Opposition, Outsiders (forthcoming, Stanford University Press).
Lara Deeb (Moderator) is Laura Vausbinder Hockett Endowed Chair and Professor of Anthropology and MENA Studies at Scripps College. In addition to numerous articles and chapters, Deeb is the author of An Enchanted Modern: Gender and Public Piety in Shi‘i Lebanon (Princeton University Press, 2006), co-author of Leisurely Islam: Negotiating Geography and Morality in Shi’ite South Beirut (Princeton University Press, 2013), co-author of Anthropology’s Politics: Disciplining the Middle East (Stanford University Press, 2015), co-editor of the volume Practicing Sectarianism Archival and Ethnographic Interventions on Lebanon (Stanford University Press, 2023), and most recently, author of Love Across Difference: Mixed Marriage in Lebanon (Stanford University Press, 2024).