Why Research Is Not Enough

Philip N. Cohen

Philip N. Cohen, author of Citizen Scholar, explores how social scientists can engage with the public, emphasizing the need for transparency and local relevance.

June 4, 2025

How Trump’s Executive Order Threatens Scientific Understanding of Health Inequities

Joseph L. Graves Jr.

Joseph L. Graves Jr. explores health inequities, racial disparities, and the misconceptions surrounding biological race in his work.

July 24, 2024

Why History Lessons Are So Threatening to Those with Power

Chana Teeger

Erasure and denial of the past are not the only ways to suppress historical claims and reproduce privilege. Chana Teeger’s research in two racially diverse South African schools shows how the past can be recalled while its legacies are ignored.

August 23, 2023

Why Palestinians Are Known as the World’s “Best Educated Refugees”

Anne Irfan

In September 2018, a report from the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics found that Palestinians have one of the highest literacy rates in the world. The finding chimed with the Palestinians’ long-running reputation as the world’s “best-educated refugees” – a...

May 12, 2021

Eight or Nine Things to Know About Universities and Their Media

By Reinhold Martin

Ever since Pliny the Elder included a table of contents in his thirty-seven-volume Natural History as a shortcut for Vespasian Caesar, to whom that work was dedicated, the device has proved invaluable to readers with even less time on their...

May 5, 2021

Q&A: Robert Radin on Teaching English to Refugees

Robert Radin is the director of citizenship and immigration services at a prominent social-service agency in Massachusetts. His work has appeared in various publications and has been recognized in The Best American Short Stories and The Best American Essays. In...

September 10, 2020

Heath Brown on Homeschooling the Right

“In this exciting book, Heath Brown enlarges our understanding of conservative public policies and their relation to American political development, helps situate the homeschooling movement within the larger “New Right” enterprise, and offers a novel theory of conservative freedom policies...

February 27, 2019

Jon N. Hale On The Mississippi Freedom Schools—An Ongoing Lesson in Justice Through Education

In today’s Black History month post, Jon N. Hale, author of The Freedom Schools: Student Activists in the Mississippi Civil Rights Movement discusses the ongoing impact of Freedom Schools, which arose in the South as part of the Civil Rights Movement in the...

February 6, 2015

"What Is Academic Freedom For?," by Robert J. Zimmer

Read “What Is Academic Freedom For?,” by Robert J. Zimmer, excerpted from WHO’S AFRAID OF ACADEMIC FREEDOM?, edited by Akeel Bilgrami and Jonathan R. Cole.

February 5, 2015

"Exercising Rights: Academic Freedom and Boycott Politics," by Judith Butler

Read “Exercising Rights: Academic Freedom and Boycott Politics,” by Judith Butler, excerpted from WHO’S AFRAID OF ACADEMIC FREEDOM?, edited by Akeel Bilgrami and Jonathan R. Cole.

February 4, 2015

"Academic Freedom and the Boycott of Israeli Universities," by Stanley Fish

Read “Academic Freedom and the Boycott of Israeli Universities,” by Stanley Fish, excerpted from WHO’S AFRAID OF ACADEMIC FREEDOM?, edited by Akeel Bilgrami and Jonathan R. Cole.

February 3, 2015