Abstract: During the 2021, 2022, and 2023 state legislative sessions more than one hundred and fifty bills were introduced seeking to actively undermine academic freedom and university autonomy. This includes nearly one hundred academic gag orders affecting higher education, such as those restricting the teaching of “critical race theory” (CRT) and other so-called “divisive concepts.” This talk examines the network of right-wing and libertarian think tanks, working closely with Republican politicians, responsible for manufacturing this culture war backlash against educators and academic institutions.
Isaac Kamola is the Director of the AAUP’s Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom and an associate professor of Political Science at Trinity College, Hartford, CT. His latest book project, Free Speech and Koch Money: Manufacturing a Campus Culture War (2021), examines the dark money behind the so-called campus free speech crisis. His previous book, Making the World Global: US Universities and the Production of the Global Imaginary (Duke, 2019), examines how relationships between universities, the American state, philanthropic organizations, and international financial organizations shape the reproduction of academic knowledge about the world as global.
Attend on Zoom: bit.ly/3NLEBZJ
Open to all in the Tri-Co Community and to the public.
