On October 31, 2024, University of Florida (UF) administrators cancelled a previously approved symposium fewer than 24 hours before it was scheduled to take place. The cancellation occurred after a campaign of public pressure on the university to cancel or alter the event.
According to Malini Schueller, a professor in UF’s Department of English and an organizer of the event, UF’s Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere’s (CHPS) advisory board had approved 2-day symposium, entitled, “Fostering Critical Conversations in the Humanities: The War in Israel/Palestine,” and its list of speakers. The featured speakers included Judith Butler, a gender studies scholar who has been a critic of Israel’s conduct in Gaza, and Palestinian academics Saree Makdisi, a professor and chair of the English department at the University of California at Los Angeles, and Umayyah Cable, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Both Makdisi and Cable are experts in Israeli-Palestinian relations. The CHPS had also provided around $5,000 to support speaker honorariums, lunch, and a small reception.
On October 29, an external individual unaffiliated with the university launched an email campaign on X demanding that UF either cancel the symposium or add pro-Israel speakers to the lineup. The campaign prompted CHPS director Jaime Ahlberg on October 30 to call Schueller to express concern about the lack of balance in the symposium’s viewpoints.
Two days later, on October 31, UF’s English department chair, Sidney Dobrin emailed two event organizers, including Schueller, to notify them that UF’s Office of the General Counsel had cancelled the symposium because “it [was] not a university event and [was] not compliant with the University’s use of space policy,” and had revoked the university’s funding of the event. In a separate statement, a university spokesman said that the organizers had “wrongly marketed” the symposium as a university-sponsored event. The spokesman further claimed that the event did not comply with the institution’s use-of-space policy; however there was no elaboration on how the policy was violated.
In response, the event organizers chose to continue with the event without university affiliation. The first day of the symposium was held at a local Presbyterian Church. The second day was held remotely.
Scholars at Risk is concerned about the cancellation of a previously approved on-campus, academic event, apparently in response to public pressure. Higher education leaders should respect academic freedom by refraining from restrictions on academic activity. Attempts to limit academic discussion and exchange undermine academic freedom, institutional autonomy, and democratic society generally.
Sources:
https://www.chronicle.com/article/why-did-the-u-of-florida-back-away-from-a-seminar-on-the-war-in-gaza-at-the-last-minute
https://www.wuft.org/education/2024-11-01/uf-cancels-academic-symposium-on-israeli-war-in-gaza
https://www.gnvinfo.com/uf-cancels-palestine-symposium-under-matthew-feinbergs-twitter-pressure-approves-israel-internship-promotion/
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/25263128-edinger-letter/
https://www.instagram.com/p/DBzf9GERdnQ/?img_index=1
https://www.thefire.org/cases/university-florida-university-orders-last-minute-cancellation-symposium-israeli-palestinian#:~:text=Case%20Overview,funds%20to%20support%20the%20event.