Shows
BanishedSupercharged since October 7Ken Stern (Director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate) joins Amna and Jeff to discuss these urgent questions: Are campuses hotbeds of antisemitism? How do we define antisemitism in the first place? Is there a difference between antisemitism and anti-Zionism? How have colleges handled the student protests around Gaza? Why are so many higher education institutions facing Title VI lawsuits? What counts as a “hostile” campus environment? How should we educate students about the Israel/Palestine conflict? Show Notes* International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Working Definition of Antisemitism* Kenneth Marcus, director of t...2025-02-1722 min
BanishedWho Speaks the Language of Social Justice?Our friend and colleague Stony Brook sociologist Musa al-Gharbi has a new book out. And it’s a tour-de-force. We Have Never Been Woke is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the economic, political and cultural divides between the haves and the have-nots in the United States. We were delighted to host Musa for a book talk on the Carleton campus last month. He spoke with Amna in front a packed house. This is episode 2. Episode 1 is available here. Show Notes* On the limitations of diversity training, see this piece from Musa, “Diversity is I...2025-02-0817 min
Banished"You Can't Be an Egalitarian Social Climber"Our friend and colleague Stony Brook sociologist Musa al-Gharbi has a new book out. And it’s a tour-de-force. We Have Never Been Woke is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the economic, political and cultural divides between the haves and the have-nots in the United States. We were delighted to host Musa for a book talk on the Carleton campus last month. He spoke with Amna in front a packed house. Here are some of the highlights. More to come in our next episode in about a week’s time. Show Notes* Musa...2025-02-0219 min
BanishedTrouble AheadWe were thrilled to have the opportunity to talk to PEN America’s Jeremy Young about what a second Trump administration holds in store for higher education. It was an informative—and sobering—conversation. Over the next four years, we should be prepared for a tsunami of ideologically-driven threats to academic freedom, campus free expression and the basic integrity of higher education. If you would rather read than listen, there is a transcript attached below. Show NotesPEN America’s *Educational Censorship* page is a terrific resourceOn Christopher Rufo, see Benjamin Wallace-Wells, “How a Cons...2025-01-2119 min
BanishedWhat's at Stake at Columbia University (and beyond)?We saw this clip of Columbia University History Professor Christopher Brown and wanted to share it far and wide. Dr. Brown delivered these remarks on Monday, April 20 at a faculty-led “Rally to Support our Students and Reclaim our University.” He was responding to two events: Columbia President Minouche Shafik’s Congressional Testimony on April 17 and the arrest of more than 100 Columbia students the next day. Professor Brown focuses on what is happening at Columbia but his words serve as a powerful rejoinder to any and all:* grandstanding politicians, who have no real understanding or appreciation of the...2024-04-2506 min
BanishedDiversity Is Great, DEI, Inc. Isn't.We recently appeared on "How Do We Fix It?", a wonderful podcast in search of constructive and practical ideas to address the many problems that plague our age. We had a fantastic time talking to the hosts Richard Davies and Jim Meigs about free speech, academic freedom and campus politics. We discussed DEI, Inc.—what the term means and why we think it’s useful. And we argued that an ascendant discourse of harm is at the heart of today’s threats to campus free expression, from the chilling effects of many DEI initiatives to the even chillier effects of ant...2024-03-3131 min
Banished"Entitled to Judge"Celebrated as the bedrock of democracy, freedom of expression is often seen as an American or western value. Yet the concept has a rich and global history. In the spring of 2023 I offered a course on the global history of free expression. The course tracks the long and turbulent history of freedom of expression from ancient Athens and medieval Islamic societies to the Enlightenment and the drive for censorship in totalitarian and colonial societies. For the final assignment I asked students to write a letter to a person of their choosing reflecting on how their learning in...2023-11-3019 min
BanishedThe Sunshine State Descends into Darkness (Again)Worse than McCarthyism? In this episode of Banished, we explore the all-out assault on academic freedom in higher education in Florida. Turns out there’s a long history of campus witch-hunts in the state. We spoke with Robert Cassenello (history professor at University of Central Florida), Paul Ortiz (history professor at the University of Florida), James Grossman (executive director of the American Historical Association) and Ellen Schrecker (professor emerita at Yeshiva University). Episode transcript available here. References & Links:* Will Florida's "Stop WOKE Act" Hold Up in Court?, Banished podcast episode, November 1, 2022. * Stacy Braukman, Co...2023-01-2313 min
BanishedWill Florida's "Stop WOKE Act" Hold Up in Court?Banished returns with a special episode on the status of a lawsuit challenging Florida’s “Stop WOKE Act.” To understand how this law threatens open inquiry and academic freedom, Amna talked to the two co-plaintiffs, University of South Florida history professor Adriana Novoa and University of South Florida senior Sam Rechek. For help with the legal arguments, Amna spoke with Adam Steinbaugh, attorney with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit banished.substack.com/subscribe2022-11-0121 min
BanishedWhose Tacos?Tucker Carlson claimed that tacos are American. Rick Bayless was attacked for appropriating Mexican cuisine. Jamie Oliver hired a team of cultural appropriation specialists to advise him when writing recipes, to make sure he didn’t run afoul of the new culinary orthodoxy.What’s going on in the restaurant world and at our dinner tables? Who exactly owns a cuisine, and why do we get so proprietary when it comes to food? On this week’s Banished, Amna Khalid talks with Constanza Ocampo-Raeder, professor of anthropology at Carleton College, about food, national cuisines and the politics of cul...2022-06-1233 min
Banished'Shakespeare, Thou Hast Been Cancelled'Amna Khalid talks with Laura Bates, Professor of English at Indiana State University and founder of Shakespeare in Shackles — a prison program for those in solitary confinement — about the Bard’s decline in the modern curriculum. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit banished.substack.com/subscribe2022-05-2728 min
Banished"Oh Danny, Is This the End?"One of the most popular musicals of all time, Grease seems to have fallen from grace. Most recently, two schools in Australia were planning to stage a joint production of the musical this year, but shelved it when students complained that the content of the musical was “offensive.”Why has the musical come under fire? Is it time to retire it? On this week’s Banished, Amna Khalid speaks with Scott Miller, founder and artistic director of New Line Theater, an alternative musical theater company in St. Louis. This is a public episode. If you'd l...2022-05-1224 min
BanishedEXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: St. Olaf College Punishes Professor for Inviting Peter Singer to CampusEarlier this year, St. Olaf College’s Institute for Freedom and Community invited controversial bioethicist Peter Singer for a virtual conversation titled “The Point of View of the Universe.” This was an invitation in keeping with the mission of the institute, which is to explore “diverse ideas about politics, markets, and society” and “challenge presuppositions, question easy answers, and foster constructive dialogue.” Shortly after the event was announced, St. Olaf’s disability office sent out a campus-wide email, stating that it: “unequivocally reject[s] Peter Singer’s views on people with disabilities, which are harmful to our values, mission and ongoing efforts...2022-04-2729 min
BanishedIn the Eye of the StormIn fall 2021, the philosophy department at Rhodes College invited the bioethicist Peter Singer to speak to the school. A controversial and important figure, the New Yorker has called Singer the “world’s most influential living philosopher,” and in 2005, Time Magazine named him one of most influential people alive.But as one of the world’s foremost utilitarian philosophers, some of Singer’s positions have earned him detractors. In the build-up to his talk on “Pandemic Ethics,” several Rhodes students and faculty waged a campaign to have him disinvited on the grounds that “his reprehensible beliefs … deny the very humanity of p...2022-04-2051 min
BanishedCOVID-19: Lab Leak Or Natural Leap?In February 2020, The Lancet, a leading British medical journal, published a statement by more than two dozen scientists condemning the hypothesis that COVID-19 had leaked from a Chinese lab — effectively halting scientific inquiry along those lines. But a handful of researchers refused to rule out the so-called “lab-leak” theory and soon found themselves shunned and ostracized by their colleagues.Alina Chan, a molecular biologist and then-postdoctoral fellow at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, was one such researcher. This week on Banished, host Amna Khalid talks with Chan about the politicization of science.More from Boo...2022-04-0730 min
BanishedNapoleon in ExileIf you’re a solver of crossword puzzles, you probably know that Napoleon was exiled to the island of Elba. But that was just the beginning. Historians Peter Hicks and Rafe Blaufarb tell us the full story. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit banished.substack.com/subscribe2022-03-3125 min
BanishedThe SkepticMichael Shermer, founding publisher of Skeptic magazine and host of the podcast The Michael Shermer Show, was a regular writer for Scientific American for 18 years. With more than 200 monthy columns under his belt, he was hoping to match Stephen Jay Gould’s record run of 300 at Natural History and was due to hit his target within a few years. In December, 2018, however, he was abruptly let go.In this episode of Banished, Amna Khalid talks to Shermer about the souring of his relationship with SciAm, the importance of skepticism and the rise of censoriousness in recent years. 2022-03-1018 min
BanishedThe Cartoon is Mightier Than the SwordBadiucao is a Chinese political dissident and artist who self-exiled to Australia in 2009. In the buildup to the Beijing Olympics, he was catapulted into the limelight for a series of protest posters that at first glance seem like advertisements for the Games. On closer inspection, however, the images are a scathing visual commentary on the Chinese government’s human rights violations and the role of the Olympic Games in legitimizing the regime. In this episode of Banished, Amna Khalid speaks with Badiucao about his work, his activism and his life as a dissident. This is a pu...2022-02-2429 min
BanishedDoes Free Speech Discriminate?Over the past five years or so, free speech — like so many other topics — has been weaponized for use in the culture wars. Far right media sources have embraced the free speech mantle, arguing that liberals and progressives who dominate higher education are silencing conservative voices. For many Republicans, “free speech” means having the right to express an opinion, regardless of how unfounded and unsubstantiated it may be. As a consequence, many on the left now incorrectly view free speech as a right-wing ideal.In this episode of Banished, Amna Khalid discusses the history and legacy of free speec...2022-02-1032 min
BanishedCommon Sense, UnmaskedMichael Phillips has taught history at Collin College in Texas for the past 14 years, but after speaking out about the school’s anti-masking policy his contract was not renewed. Which makes him the fourth faculty member to lose his job there since Neil Matkin assumed the role of College President in 2015.Amna Khalid spoke with Phillips about what led to his firing, and about academic freedom more generally in American higher education. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit banished.su...2022-02-0527 min
BanishedThe Subversiveness of HumorDuring her visit back to Pakistan in December, Banished host Amna Khalid spoke with Salima Hashimi — artist, curator, activist and former principal of the National College of Arts, the premier Art school of Pakistan. They discussed the state of free expression in Pakistan under the 11-year military regime of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who was a key ally of the United States in the Cold War; how things are now under a democratically elected government; and how she sees cancellation attempts to constrain free speech in the U.S. This is a public episode. If you'd like to...2022-01-2836 min
BanishedWhy the Seuss Estate Pulled Six of Its Own BooksIn the age of “cancel culture,” it comes as no surprise that the publishing industry is cowering before demands to remove “problematic” books. Dr. Seuss’s estate recently announced that it will no longer allow the publication and licensing of six of his books because of the racist and stereotypical imagery used for minority groups.Should these books no longer be published? Does a single stereotypical representation justify the pulling of a book? And who gets to decide? On this episode of Banished, Amna Khalid discusses Dr. Seuss’s life and legacy with Brian Jay Jones, author of Becoming D...2022-01-1335 min
BanishedThe Bother With BabyBroadway-bound songsmith Frank Loesser wrote “Baby It’s Cold Outside” as a call-and-response duet for he and his wife to perform at parties. Several years later, the tune made its way into a movie and soon took the Christmas canon by storm. But is it a “rapey” relic of a bygone era that should be buried permanently in the winter snow? Amna Khalid investigates.Happy New Year! In the warm and generous spirit of the holidays, we’re offering 30% off a subscription to Booksmart Studios until the end of the year. You’ll get extra written content and access to...2021-12-3020 min
BanishedShould More Colleges Drop the ACT and SAT?Last week, Harvard announced it will extend its test-optional admissions policy for at least another four years. The stated reason is that the pandemic has reduced access to test sites — but this decision has added grist to the test-elimination mill. The movement to do away with standardized testing is predicated on the idea that tests are culturally and racially biased, and that they don’t reflect the true abilities of students. Some even refer to them as proxies for privilege.On this episode of Banished, Amna Khalid discusses testing and meritocracy with Jeff Snyder, associate prof...2021-12-2228 min
BanishedOut of Darkness, Into the FireAuthor and professor Ashley Hope Pérez gained prominence for her novel Out of Darkness, which explores themes of segregation, love and family against the backdrop of the 1937 New London School explosion. The book won rave reviews from critics and the Américas Award from the Library of Congress, but has recently become embroiled in controversy after calls to ban it from school libraries. Today on Banished, host Amna Khalid speaks with Pérez about the firestorm surrounding her book, and the rise in concerted efforts from a certain part of the political spectrum to censor literature that might hig...2021-12-0928 min
BanishedFear and Scapegoating in the Time of PandemicsScapegoating particular communities during an epidemic — be it tuberculosis, HIV or COVID-19 — is nothing new. Outbreaks of disease are often accompanied by the demonizing of some portion of humanity that is supposedly the source of the contagion. They are to blame.Must it be this way? Why do we feel the need to point the finger at each other when threatened like this — even when the threat is ultimately not from people but from viruses or bacteria? And what does this sort of blanket indictment during a health crisis have in common with cancel culture? Host Amna Khalid...2021-11-1833 min
BanishedTemptations of the West ReconsideredIf you’ve been listening to Banished, you’ll recall that in just a few short months we’ve talked about attempts to abolish artwork, to repudiate literature and even to eliminate entire curricula throughout the United States. But you may wonder, as I sometimes still do, why me? Why am I, Amna Khalid, pulled toward these topics, compelled by what we casually call “cancel culture”?And so, dear listeners, it feels like the right time to step back — to give you a sense of who I am and why I am deeply disturbed by the censorship and intolera...2021-11-0424 min
BanishedThe Cancellation of Dorian AbbotDorian Abbot, associate professor of geophysical sciences at University of Chicago, was invited to give the prestigious Carlson Lecture at MIT this month. He was going to speak about the insights gained from studying Earth’s climate and how those insights have been used to predict which planets outside the solar system might be habitable. But, following an outcry about his political views about diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives on college campuses — a topic that had nothing to do with what he was going to talk about — MIT cancelled the lecture. Amna Khalid talks to Professor Abbot about what happen...2021-10-2136 min
BanishedRethinking the Canon: What Makes a Classic?This is the second in our occasional series on Rethinking the Canon. Is there value in reading the classics at a time when they are increasingly viewed as unrepresentative texts that don’t speak to the diverse experiences of modern students? This week Amna talks with Roosevelt Montás, senior lecturer in American Studies and English at Columbia University. FULL TRANSCRIPTAMNA KHALID: A liberal education is one that takes the complicated condition of human freedom seriously, and addresses itself to its dilemmas and to the urgency of its lived experience. To think and r...2021-10-1426 min
BanishedThe "Critical Race Theory" Hysteria“Critical Race Theory,” also known as CRT, is a phrase that has become shorthand for just about any classroom instruction on racism, past or present. But what is this fight really about? What are these anti-CRT bills aiming to accomplish, and how will they affect schooling in the US? Amna Khalid discusses the rise of anti-CRT bills with Harvard Law Professor Randall Kennedy; Acadia University Professor Jeffrey Sachs; and former president of the ACLU, Professor Emerita Nadine Strossen of New York Law School.SPEAKER 1: Critical race theory is teaching that white people are bad.SPEAKER 2: We’re...2021-09-2928 min
BanishedExpanding the Canon: Are 'Great Books' Obsolete?Is there value in reading the classics at a time when they are increasingly viewed as tools of oppression and white supremacy? Do they speak to non-white students? Dr. Anika Prather, founder and principal of the Living Water School in Maryland and lecturer at Howard University in DC talks to Amna Khalid about the deep history of the significance of classics for Black Americans.Click here for the full-length, subscriber-only interview. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit banished.substack...2021-09-0127 min
BanishedThe Evolution of 'Woke'What does it mean to be woke? Has the word problematic become problematic? Lexicon Valley’s John McWhorter talks to Amna Khalid about the fraught vocabulary of modern censorship. * FULL TRANSCRIPT *AMNA KHALID: From Booksmart Studios, this is Banished. And I’m Amna Khalid.NEWSCASTER: Republicans are always denouncing so-called “cancel culture.”BBC GUEST 1: I think that nobody should lose their job because of what they believe in. I think that’s the issue—BBC GUEST 2: —but that’s what “cancel culture” is!POLITICIAN: “Cancel culture” is eroding the very foundation of who w...2021-08-1829 min
BanishedAlice Walker Has Been CancelledWe are approaching the 40th anniversary of The Color Purple, a novel that garnered critical acclaim, won Alice Walker the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and brought her sudden literary scrutiny. Both the book and its subsequent feature film adaptation elicited a flurry of criticism, frequently from within the Black community.Accused of reinforcing stereotypes of Black men as inherently violent, Walker was viewed by some as a race traitor. And for reasons that include depictions of rape, incest, homosexuality, violence and explicit language, The Color Purple has consistently remained on the American Library Association’s list of fr...2021-08-0423 min
Banished'If It's In The World, It's For Me'In Episode One of Banished, we covered the controversy around Victor Arnautoff's murals, “Life of Washington” — a series of 13 paintings that cover the entrance and the hallway of George Washington High School in San Francisco. One of the voices in the episode was Professor Dewey Crumpler, an artist who was commissioned to paint so-called “response” murals to Arnautoff’s in the late 1960s when “Life of Washington” first became controversial. In this extended interview, Crumpler waxes lyrical not just about the mural controversy, but also about the place of art in society.“The most important place for young pe...2021-07-3020 min
BanishedWhitewashing History?In the mid-1930s, Russian-born muralist Victor Arnautoff was commissioned by the New Deal’s Public Works of Art Project to paint a series of frescoes at sites around the San Francisco Bay Area. One of his more ambitious undertakings covered 1,600 square feet of wall space inside the lobby and stairwells of George Washington High School, depicting scenes from Washington’s life as a military leader and statesman. Parts of the work portray a slaughtered Native American and enslaved African-Americans, which Arnautoff — a Communist whose art was an outgrowth of his activism — deliberately foregrounded.Whatever his inte...2021-07-2230 min
BanishedThe Scarlet C: The New Mob Mentality?Until about a year or so ago, most of us felt understandably smug when measuring our modern selves next to our ancient ancestors. We are manifestly more advanced — scientifically, morally and, it can be said, rather literally, since we now know that the universe is expanding. We’ve clearly taken considerable steps along the misty path of improvement. Just look around!This rosy view of humanity as carried along by a steady current of progress is known among those in my profession as "whig history," after those who cast their lot with Britain's parliament, as opposed to its...2021-06-3000 min
BanishedIntroducing Banished with Amna KhalidBanished is about our reassessment of the many people, ideas, objects and even works of art that conflict with modern sensibilities. What can we learn about our present obsession with cancel culture by examining history, and what might it mean for freedom of expression?Amna Khalid is professor of history at Carleton College. Born in Pakistan, Amna earned an M.Phil. in Development Studies and a D.Phil. in History from Oxford University. Growing up under a series of military dictatorships, Amna has a strong interest in issues relating to censorship and free expression. She speaks frequently o...2021-06-2501 min