As both scholars and community members, we are professionally, intellectually, and morally invested in our University. We deem it our duty to hold our institution accountable for the ethical implications….
As both scholars and community members, we are professionally, intellectually, and morally invested in our University. We deem it our duty to hold our institution accountable for the ethical implications of its own actions, notably its financial investments and their implications around the world. In particular, we take issue with our financial involvements in institutions associated with the State of Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian lands, continued violations of Palestinian human rights, systematic destruction of life and property, inhumane segregation and systemic forms of discrimination.
In 2002, faculty members across various departments called for an end to our investment in all firms that supplied Israel’s military with arms and military hardware. Students, alumni, faculty, and staff agreed to attach their name to a call to remove the State of Israel’s social license in its use of asymmetrical and excessive violence against Palestinian civilians.
We now stand with Columbia University Apartheid Divest, Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine as well as with Jewish Voice for Peace in calling upon the University to take a moral stance against Israel’s violence in all its forms. We demand that the University divest from corporations that supply, perpetuate, and profit from a system that has subjugated the Palestinian people for over 68 years. We note that our position unequivocally stands in support of a non-violent movement privileging human rights as the only means toward finding a political resolution.
We call on our University to recognize its undeniable role in, and influence upon, global systems, a distinguished role that comes with a commensurately weighty measure of moral accountability.
Signatories
- Nadia Abu El-Haj | Anthropology, Barnard
- Lila Abu Lughod | Anthropology, Columbia
- Gil Anidjar | Religion & MESAAS, Columbia
- Zainab Bahrani | Art History & Archaeology, Columbia
- Brian Boyd | Anthropology, Columbia
- Allison Busch | MESAAS, Columbia
- Partha Chatterjee | Anthropology & MESAAS, Columbia
- Hamid Dabashi | MESAAS, Columbia
- E. Valentine Daniel | Anthropology, Columbia
- Katherine Franke | Law, Columbia
- Victoria de Grazia | History, Columbia
- Robert Gooding-Williams | Philosophy & IRAAS, Columbia
- Stathis Gourgouris | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- Farah Griffin | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- Wael Hallaq | MESAAS, Columbia
- Marianne Hirsch | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- Jean Howard | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- Rashid Khalidi | History & MESAAS, Columbia
- Mahmood Mamdani | Anthropology & MESAAS, Columbia
- Joseph Massad | MESAAS, Columbia
- Brinkley Messick | Anthropology & MESAAS, Columbia
- Timothy Mitchell | MESAAS, Columbia
- Rosalind Morris | Anthropology, Columbia
- Frederick Neuhouser | Philosophy, Barnard
- Mae Ngai | History, Columbia
- Gregory Pflugfelder | History & EALAC, Columbia
- Sheldon Pollock | MESAAS, Columbia
- Elizabeth Povinelli | Anthropology, Columbia
- Wayne L. Proudfoot | Philosophy, Columbia
- Anupama Rao | History & Human Rights, Barnard
- Bruce Robbins | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- George Saliba | MESAAS, Columbia
- Dirk Salomons | SIPA, Columbia
- David Scott | Anthropology, Columbia
- Avinoam Shalem | Art History & Archaeology, Columbia
- Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- Neferti Tadiar | Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Barnard
- Michael Taussig | Anthropology, Columbia
- Marc Van De Mieroop | History, Columbia
- Gauri Viswanathan | English & Comparative Literature, Columbia
- Paige West | Anthropology, Barnard
- Michael Harris | Mathematics, Columbia
- Jonathan Crary | Art History & Archaeology, Columbia
- Shamus Khan | Sociology, Columbia
- Zoe Crossland | Anthropology, Columbia
- Steven Gregory | Anthropology, Columbia
- James Schamus | Film, Columbia
- Abeer Shaheen | MESAAS, Columbia
- Elizabeth Bernstein | Sociology, Barnard
- J. Blake Turner | Psychiatry, Columbia
- Lydia Goehr | Philosophy, Columbia
- Danielle Haase-Dubosc | French & Romance Philology, Columbia
- Peter Marcuse | GSAPP, Columbia
- Gray Tuttle | EALAC, Columbia
- Rebecca Jordan-Young | Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies, Barnard
- Josh Whitford | Sociology, Columbia
- Ross Hamilton | English, Barnard
- Nora Awaki | GSAPP, Columbia
- Taylor Carman | Philosophy, Barnard
If you’re a member of the Columbia/Barnard faculty, click here to sign the petition.