Going to the MLA Convention? Please come to hear queer Cuban-American writer and translator Achy Obejas in Session 298 , “Endlessly Cuban: A Discussion on the Work of Achy Obejas with the Author” and Session 473, “A Creative Conversation with Achy Obejas.” See https://achyobejas.mla.hcommons-staging.org/ for bios.

The National Labor Relations Board issued a decision on 23 August “that student assistants working at private colleges and universities are statutory employees covered by the National Labor Relations Act.” https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/news-story/board-student-assistants-covered-nlra-0

Please use this discussion space to add resources for…[Read more]

(You can also read this piece here.)
Academic Boycotts and Professional Responsibility

Delivered at the Annual Convention of the

American Philosophical Association,

San Francisco, March 31, 2016
Russell A. Berman

I was invited to speak on this panel, having been reassured that it would be devoted to academic boycotts, in general, but I cannot…[Read more]

 
The Ten Worst Things About the BDS Movement
                                                                                                  Cary Nelson

1. BDS demonizes, antagonizes, and delegitimizes one of the two parties who have to negotiate a solution to the conflict by working together and uncritically idealizes the other.

…[Read more]

Proponents of BDS (currently) argue that they are (only) proposing a boycott of institutions (only Israeli universities) and that this will not harm individuals. In Inside Higher Education, David Hirsh dismantles this myth.  Boycotts of institutions harm the individuals in those institutions.

Attacking Israeli universities is an attack on un…[Read more]

BDS proponents claim only an “institutional boycott” is at stake that will not be directed against individuals. That distinction between institution and individual is untenable, as has been argued elsewhere.

But let’s assume–just for the sake of argument in this post–that one could  have an exclusively “institutional boycott” that somehow s…[Read more]