The Palestine exception to academic freedom : intertwined stories from the frontlines of UK-based Palestine activism
Date
10/07/2020Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
This autobiographical co-authored essay explores how hate speech wounds within the logic of the Palestine exception, whereby Israel-critical speech is subjected to censorship and silencing that does not affect other controversial speech. Three months after the UK government's "adoption" of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism in 2016, we were subjected to a series of attacks in the media, in the public sphere, and in our workplaces in connection with our Palestine-related activism and criticisms of Israeli policies from years earlier. The crackdown on academic freedom that has overtaken UK universities since 2017 has been widely condemned, but rarely has this story been told from the vantage point of those who were targeted and censored. We document here in detail how the Palestine exception to free speech and academic freedom has damaged academic freedom within the UK and silenced Palestinian voices.
Citation
Shwaikh , M M B & Ruth Gould , R 2020 , ' The Palestine exception to academic freedom : intertwined stories from the frontlines of UK-based Palestine activism ' , Biography: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly , vol. 42 , no. 4 , pp. 752-773 . https://doi.org/10.1353/bio.2019.0076
Publication
Biography: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
0162-4962Type
Journal article
Rights
Copyright © The George and Marguerite Simson Biographical Research Center. This work has been made available online in accordance with publisher policies or with permission. Permission for further reuse of this content should be sought from the publisher or the rights holder. This is the author created accepted manuscript following peer review and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at https://doi.org/10.1353/bio.2019.0076
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