qUCL ONLINE 'The Gender Critical Movement Is the Biggest Threat to Academic Freedom in a Generation'

The rumors are true: academic freedom really is under attack. But the threat doesn’t come from students or from “cancel culture”––it comes from university administrators, an insurgent anti-intellectual media, and powerful celebrity professors. The so-called “gender critical” movement has made the most significant attacks on academic freedom, and has normalized a set of political tools: GC academic activists have normalized threats of private legal action against students critical of their work, while senior administrators use institutional procedures to protect them, and threaten retaliatory action against student critics. Yet these sorts of actions, and the victory laps taken across the liberal UK media, are only the most spectacular facet of a wide campaign of intimidation against trans students and workers, and our allies, that is being played out in universities across the UK: abuse of institutional procedures, legal intimidation of students, media whitewashing, and social media swarming. Developing and extending methods of feminist analysis from authors such as Jennifer Doyle and Sara Ahmed, this lecture both describes the systematic threats to academic freedom posed by anti-trans activism, and identifies some possible methods for collective redress.

All are welcome to attend this online lecture and to participate in the Q&A. Please familiarise yourself with qUCL's Virtual Code of Conduct.

Recording of the lecture