MESA and the undersigned associations condemn the actions taken in the past weeks at Columbia University and the Department of Education, which imperil the autonomy of centers for regional study at universities across the United States and the future of area studies as a domain of scholarship and research in American higher education.
In the current national climate, as institutions of higher education and their mission of critical inquiry face unprecedented attack, MESA unequivocally supports efforts to stand up for freedom of expression, academic freedom, and institutional autonomy. Rather than facilitating or acting in the interests of government repression, we must all take a collective stance to defend higher education in the United States.
The Board of Directors of the Middle East Studies Association and its Committee on Academic Freedom decry in the strongest of terms the growing number of cases of colleges and universities calling on police to repress campus protests against the ongoing genocide in Gaza. We also deplore actions and statements from officials that seek to delegitimize student and faculty activists and their criticism of the war.
The MESA Board of Directors and its Committee on Academic Freedom view with alarm the attempts to intimidate, repress, and criminalize campus protests against the ongoing Israeli state violence against Palestinians. We call upon college and university boards of trustees, presidents, and administrations across the country immediately to clearly and forcefully recommit themselves to the freedom of inquiry, expression, and protest on campus that have been pillars of the US academy for decades.
The Board of Directors of the Middle East Studies Association and its Committee on Academic Freedom condemn in the strongest possible terms the ongoing attack on Gaza by the state of Israel, resulting in the widespread destruction of the built environment and civilian infrastructure of the Gaza Strip with the apparent intention of erasing Palestinian heritage, thereby amounting to cultural genocide.
MESA's Board of Directors and Committee on Academic Freedom call upon college and university presidents throughout North America to redouble efforts to protect the free speech rights and defend the academic freedom of all members of their campus communities.
Letter on behalf of the Middle East Studies Association of North America calling on the Biden administration to support an immediate, unconditional, and permanent ceasefire in — and lifting of the siege on — Gaza.
The MESA Board of Directors is heartbroken by the loss of Israeli and Palestinian lives over the last week. There can be no justification for the targeting of civilians. We join our members directly affected in grief, and we join all who are committed to a political solution that offers safety, dignity, and equal rights for Palestinians and Israelis. We are deeply concerned about the cumulative effect of the Israeli siege and bombardment of Gaza, resulting in massive death, displacement and destruction — including the bombing of schools and universities — imperiling, among many other things, the possibility of access to education for generations of Gazan students indefinitely. We also reaffirm the right and ability of students, faculty, and staff at universities across North America (and elsewhere) to express their viewpoints free of harassment, intimidation, and threats to their livelihoods and safety. MESA calls on university leaders and administrations to oppose all forms of discrimination, including anti-Arab and anti-Muslim racism and anti-Semitism, and to affirmatively assert and protect the right to academic freedom and freedom of speech on their campuses.
MESA has endorsed a statement from the ACLS emphasizing a continued commitment to diversity in American higher education, after the Supreme Court of the United States recently ruled against race-conscious admissions programs at colleges and universities.
In response to a Notice by the Office of Management and Budget regarding Initial Proposals for Updating Race and Ethnicity Statistical Standards, MESA submitted a formal comment wholeheartedly supporting the inclusion of the new Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) category as a checkbox on the United States Census questionnaire.
MESA has endorsed a statement from the ACLS regarding a new bill proposed in the Florida legislature (HB 999), which is a frontal attack on the principles of academic freedom. If it passes, it would effectively end academic freedom in the state’s public colleges and universities, with dire consequences for their teaching, research, and financial well-being.
MESA has endorsed a statement from the AAUP regarding Florida HB 999, which poses a dire threat to higher education and to academic freedom.
MESA has endorsed a statement from the ACLS in support of the New College community as well as faculty and students at other institutions of higher education experiencing similar political interventions.
MESA joins 37 other associations in endorsing a statement by the American Historical Association historicizing and condemning the numerous bomb threats, received by at least 17 Historically Black Colleges and Universities in early 2022, as crimes against Black institutions of higher education and as threats to the Black community.
22 ACLS member organizations and 26 other associations or institutions of higher education join MESA, the American Institute for Afghanistan Studies, and Scholars at Risk in urging the Biden Administration to take immediate action to enable the safe and speedy relocation of Afghanistan’s students and scholars.
The Board of Directors of the Middle East Studies Association of North America calls for the cessation of state-directed cyber surveillance attacks against members of the academic community. Digital violence, such as hacking, is inimical to academic freedom and basic rights.
MESA has endorsed a statement by the American Historical Association condemning the harassment and intimidation of participants, organizers, and university sponsors of the virtual conference “Dismantling Global Hindutva: Multidisciplinary Perspectives.”
MESA has endorsed a letter by the American Association of University Professors, the American Historical Association, the Association of American Colleges & Universities, and PEN America stating “firm opposition” to legislation, introduced in at least 20 states, that would restrict the discussion of “divisive concepts” in public education institutions.
MESA's Board of Directors calls on university administrators in Florida to support their faculty and speak out against the threat that a new bill poses to academic freedom and free speech rights of both faculty and students, as well as to proper governance and independence of Florida’s colleges and universities.
MESA expresses its grave concern about a number of the “Contemporary Examples of Antisemitism” that accompany the working definition of antisemitism formulated by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). MESA therefore encourages the federal, state, provincial, and local governments of the United States and Canada, as well as university and college administrations, to refrain from adopting or making policy based on IHRA's accompanying examples.
MESA has endorsed a statement by the American Council of Learned Societies strongly condemning anti-Asian violence.
MESA has endorsed a letter by the American Council of Learned Societies strongly encouraging Iowa lawmakers to vote against bills which would remove tenure for faculty at Iowa's public universities.
MESA has endorsed a statement by the American Council of Learned Societies urging the Kansas Board of Regents to withdraw its endorsement of a proposed policy to suspend, dismiss, or terminate employees, including tenured faculty members, without formally declaring a financial emergency.
MESA has endorsed a statement by the American Historical Association condemning the report of the President's Advisory 1776 Commission, which attacks American institutions of higher education without evidence or cause. The 1776 Report omits or criticizes half a century of historical scholarship in favor of extolling a simplistic and tendentious interpretation of our past.
MESA has endorsed a statement by the American Philosophical Association concerning the threats to academic freedom posed by the Executive Order of September 22, 2020, which seeks to ban recipients of federal funding from instituting workplace training touching on what the order terms “divisive concepts” involving race.