USC To Re-Post Hadiths

The original post on MUSLAMICS breaking news of the removal of five hadith from a USC president (though the Jewish Journal originally carried the news on it) and there seems to be a realization that there was a large liability for law suit against USC and administrators not only changed their "tune" but also their approach to the issue:

...I have asked Professor Donald Miller, director of the USC School of Religion and director of USC's Center for Religion and Civic Culture (CRCC), and Professor Ronald Garet, the Carolyn Craig Franklin Professor of Law and Religion, to consult with our faculty and with other members of our academic community, and to offer practical recommendations on how to address tensions that may arise between individual or group beliefs and the pluralistic and scholarly prerogatives of a research university.

The Center for Muslim-Jewish Engagement (CMJE), housed within the CRCC, is working jointly with CRCC faculty to establish a resource for scholars that can allow them to provide academic context to the development of canonical Jewish and Muslim texts. This project will interpret various texts and traditions, place them in historical perspective, and debate the ancient and contemporary moral responses. The CMJE's stated mission is to promote academic partnerships as well as dialogue, understanding, and alliances between these Abrahamic faiths. It hosts a unique academic think tank, as well as archives of materials on Jewish-Muslim relations.

Read here. Also this is basically some of the legal arguments that were forwarded to the students at USC via CAIR to help contextualize this whole fiasco, however the article in the Pheonix is much better at articulating...by the way, under many Islamic Studies programs, including Harvard's, there is a direct link as a resource to the USC Hadith database. Ridiculous how USC adminstrators could be so short sighted.

Hypocrisy of US and Canadian University Presidents Condemning Academic Boycott

In the last few weeks, university presidents across the US and Canada have rushed to issue statements about the proposed boycott of Israeli academic institutions by the British University and College Union. They view this boycott as a serious violation of academic freedom. Yet, given the general failure of these leaders to comment on any number of infringements of academic freedom that have occurred in recent years, including those close to home in the form of the politically-motivated denial of tenure to Norman Finkelstein and the colleague, Mehrene Larudee, who very publicly supported him, the harassment of Columbia University professors Joseph Massad and Rashid Khalidi, and the intimidation of faculty by Campuswatch, one might be excused for concluding that university presidents prefer to remain above the political fray and reserve their office for grave and important but non-controversial pronouncements on tsunamis. But now, even in the midst of the hot and hazy summer recess, university presidents have mobilized their most imposing academic rhetoric in expressing solidarity with Israeli academics and upholding the rights of all to engage in "an open exchange of ideas" and "freedom of association."

What is perhaps most perplexing about this trend is its entirely virtual nature, for in fact no one's freedom has been violated by the boycott yet under discussion. Nevertheless, university presidents are preparing in advance for what could be an "attack ... [on] all universities at their core mission" (Gilles Patry, University of Ottawa) and a "threat ... [to] the moral foundation of each and every university" (Amy Guttman, University of Pennsylvania). [1] University of Virginia President John Casteen compares the proposed boycott to "the conduct of the most vicious political movements and governments of the 20th century." Yet, surely they must realize that Palestinians have for many decades suffered a multitude of assaults on their universities and schools by the Israeli occupying forces. Surely if university presidents are up in arms over a proposed boycott of Israeli academics, they must have something to say about the shutting down of universities, jailing and shooting of students and faculty, daily impeding of students and faculty from getting to classes, denial of student permits to attend universities, and revoking of visas to visiting scholars and researchers that characterizes academic life in Palestine. If a boycott of academic institutions is considered unfair, what does one call the methodical destruction of an educational system?

Read on at Electronic Intifada

Here for my reply to Chancellor Drake's message condemning the academic boycott (jazaks 'Nabulsi' for posting). I emailed it to the Chancellor last month but never got a reply.

How DePaul is terrified of the "F-word"

By Evan Lorendo (Senior student at DePaul)

We came to DePaul’s graduation to hold banners saying, “Tenure for Finkelstein and Larudee” and we came to support the twenty five or so graduating seniors that were to hand the president, Fr. Denis Holtschneider, a letter of disapproval instead of shaking his hand. Our plan was to hold the signs up for as long as we could, but to do it silently so we would not be disruptive; and this was actually my biggest fear-not getting the message across with tact. My fears quickly went away as I noticed that the graduation was only fractionally as formal as I expected. There were signs, banners, and airhorns- it seemed more like a party than a graduation and the administration accepted this because the moment was about the students, not DePaul.

We were there as each name was read, A-Z, holding our signs and cheering after each graduate handed the president a letter. The process worked like clockwork- the announcer would read a card, the student would walk across stage, shake the president’s hand/ give him a letter, wave to the camera, and then the next person was up. One by one each graduating senior was allowed to express themselves any way they wanted to, be it having their middle name announced, wearing sunglasses, dancing in front of the camera, hugging the president, or slapping him on the behind. Everything was fair game because this was the student’s graduation. But halfway through the letter ‘S’, there was a long pause. As a bystander, there was an obvious problem and you could see it on the announcer’s face. The student had handed the announcer a card that read ‘Norman Finkelstein’ and she did not know if she should read it or not. Finally you could read her lips on the two jumbotrons- “I can’t read this”. So the student leaned over into the microphone and screamed the words- ‘Norman Finkelstein’. At that moment you could see the demeanor of every administrator on stage change. The student made her point.

Continue article here

Go DePaul students! I greatly respect all you have done to defend and support Prof. N. Finkelstein. Student activism at its best.