Abstract

This roundtable will provide historical perspectives for exploring and responding to current controversies over academic freedom. Academic freedom is intrinsically a contested ideal. While absolutely essential for the functioning of higher education, its parameters are subject to various pressures, both from within and outside the academy. At this moment when attacks on the freedom to teach and learn are coming fast and furious from all sides of the political spectrum, prior controversies surrounding academic freedom may prove helpful in illuminating ways to understand and deal with the current crisis.

David Rabban will briefly summarize the “professional” interpretation of academic freedom within the academic world, beginning with the seminal 1915 Declaration of Principles by the newly formed AAUP, and the “constitutional” interpretation of academic freedom as a First Amendment right, beginning with Supreme Court decisions in the 1950s generated by investigations into alleged subversive activities by professors during the Cold War. He will focus on two key issues addressed by both professional and constitutional interpretations: (1) the connections and distinctions between academic freedom and free speech, and (2) legislative attempts to investigate and limit the educational functions of universities.

Ellen Schrecker will compare the current situation of academic freedom with the McCarthy period during the Cold War. She will point out that McCarthyism has long been considered the worst moment for academic freedom U.S. higher education has ever faced – until today. Unlike the Cold War Red Scare, which only targeted about 100 left-wing professors, today’s witch hunt could reach into thousands of classrooms and syllabi, preventing faculty members from teaching the truth about the most sensitive issues affecting the entire country. By comparing the political repression of the McCarthy era with the attacks on today’s fragile institutions of higher education, her presentation will explore how the current threat evolved and why it is worse than McCarthyism.

Amna Khalid and Jeffrey Snyder will look at some of the past controversies around academic freedom as a way to reflect on current debates pertaining to its purpose and scope within the academy. By focusing on the nature of internal threats to academic freedom, and mapping how they have changed (or not) over time, Khalid and Snyder will tease out the continuing tensions that persist and need to be addressed in order to mount a full-throated defense of academic freedom today.

James Shulman will discuss the role of communities of practice – including academic societies -- in setting (and over time, adjusting) the norms of what constitutes scholarship within an academic field. He will point out that these norms are a central part of insuring the appropriate role of expertise in dialogue with individual colleges and universities and also with individual scholars. He will raise questions about how this legitimacy is established and maintained, and how it evolves.