The Academic Freedom Podcast

How University Administrators Can Foster a Culture of Free Speech

The AFA's Keith Whittington interviews Howard Gillman, chancellor of the University of California, Irvine. Chancellor Gillman is an award-winning scholar and teacher with an expertise in the American Constitution and the Supreme Court. He holds faculty appointments in the School of Law, the Department of Political Science, the Department of History, and the Department of Criminology, Law and Society and every year teaches an undergraduate seminar. He also provides administrative oversight to, and serves as co-chair of the advisory board of, the University of California’s National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement.

Understanding Academic Freedom with AAUP‘s Hank Reichman

The AFA's Keith Whittington interviews Hank Reichman, professor emeritus of history at California State University-East Bay, former AAUP vice president, and former chair of the AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure from 2012 to 2021. Reichman is the author of the recently released book Understanding Academic Freedom from Johns Hopkins University Press.

Georgia‘s Post-Tenure Review Policy: The Death of Tenure?

The AFA's Keith Whittington is joined by Professor Matthew Boedy, president of the Georgia Conference of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), and Tyler Coward, the Senior Legislative Counsel at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). Matthew and Tyler join to discuss the new post-tenure review policy from the Georgia Board of Regents, which the AAUP is calling "the death of tenure." For additional information, please see the AAUP's letter objecting to the policy, FIRE's letter to the regents about the policy, and the policy itself (beginning on page 50). 

A Discussion with the Authors of FIRE‘s ”Scholars Under Fire” Report

Keith Whittington interviews Sean Stevens and Komi German, research fellows from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). Stevens and German were lead researchers and authors of FIRE's new report and database, "Scholars Under Fire," which includes a list of professors who have been targeted for their speech and features data that provide a broader perspective on threats to campus speech. View the database and learn more at thefire.org/research.

David French on the Problem with Banning Conversations

David French is a senior editor of The Dispatch and the author of several books, most recently Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation. He was senior counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, and served as president for the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) before stepping down to serve in the Iraq War.

David joins the AFA's Keith Whittington for a wide ranging conversation about his work on campus free speech at FIRE, cancel culture on the right vs. the left, his recent involvement in the critical race theory debate, and the unintended consequences of any effort to ban conversations or ideas.

 

A Conversation with Jonathan Rauch of the Brookings Institution

Jonathan Rauch is a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, a contributing editor of The Atlantic, and the author of several books, including The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth. He joins the AFA's Keith Whittington for a conversation on the past and future of free speech, the erosion of trust in institutions, and how to strengthen academic freedom going forward. 

Pragmatism v. Principle in the Liberal Approach to Free Speech

A discussion about modern liberal approaches to free speech on campuses. The conversation is hosted by Amna Khalid, Associate Professor in the Department of History at Carleton College, and features AFA members Randall Kennedy and Jonathan Zimmerman. Kennedy is the Michael R. Klein Professor at Harvard Law School and the author of several books, most recently For Discrimination: Race, Affirmative Action, and the Law. Zimmerman is Professor of History of Education and the Judy and Howard Berkowitz Professor in Education at the University of Pennsylvania, and is the author of several books, including his most recent, Free Speech: And Why You Should Give a Damn.

Meriwether v. Shawnee State: Is All Classroom Speech Free Speech?

A discussion on the landmark ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit in Meriwether v. The Trustees of Shawnee State University, which is redefining the relationship between classroom teaching, academic freedom, and the First Amendment. Featuring Jonathan Adler, Professor of law at Case Western Reserve University School of Law; Jeannie Suk Gersen, Professor of law at Harvard Law School; and Steve Sanders, Professor of law at the Maurer School of Law at Indiana University.