<p>Ken 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? </p><p><strong>Show Notes</strong></p><p>* International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance <a target="_blank" href="https://holocaustremembrance.com/resources/working-definition-antisemitism">Working Definition of Antisemitism</a></p><p>* Kenneth Marcus, director of the Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, <a target="_blank" href="https://youtu.be/Bf1gml2xx3c?si=91H67W0bkJPFjd63">explains</a> why universities and colleges should adopt the IHRA definition</p><p>* Ken Stern, bio (<a target="_blank" href="https://www.bard.edu/search/people/?id=4256">Bard</a>; <a target="_blank" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_S._Stern">Wikipedia</a>); see also this <em>New Yorker </em><a target="_blank" href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/persons-of-interest/the-problem-with-defining-antisemitism">profile</a></p><p>* Stern, <a target="_blank" href="https://utppublishing.com/doi/book/10.3138/9781487507367"><em>The Conflict over the Conflict: The Israel/Palestine Campus Debate</em></a><em> </em>(University of Toronto Press, 2020)</p><p>* Bard College <a target="_blank" href="https://bcsh.bard.edu/kenneth-stern/">Center for the Study of Hate</a></p><p>* On quotas for Jewish students in higher education, see Jerome Karabel, <a target="_blank" href="https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Chosen.html?id=1Nf3FxMIEB8C"><em>The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton</em></a></p><p>* Stern complements Wesleyan President Michael Roth for how he handled student protests—see Roth’s <em>New York Times </em>op-ed from the fall of 2024, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/02/opinion/college-president-campus-political.html?unlocked_article_code=1.wE4.gdgn.fHQ1JljlM3KF&smid=url-share">“I’m a College President, and I Hope My Campus Is Even More Political This Year”</a></p><p>* Here is <a target="_blank" href="https://cpost.uchicago.edu/publications/cpost_understanding_campus_fears_after_october_7_and_how_to_reduce_them/">the poll</a> that Stern mentions about how Jewish and Muslim students understand the phrase “from the river to the sea”</p><p>* full text of the 1964 <a target="_blank" href="https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/civil-rights-act">Civil Rights Act</a>, including Title VI</p><p>* 2004 “Dear Colleague” <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ed.gov/sites/ed/files/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/religious-rights2004.pdf">Letter</a> on Title VI and Title IX Religious Discrimination in Schools and Colleges from the Office of Civil Rights </p><p>* On how the Office of Civil Rights currently defines a “hostile environment,” see this 2023 “Dear Colleague” <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ed.gov/sites/ed/files/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-202311-discrimination-harassment-shared-ancestry.pdf">Letter</a> on Shared Ancestry </p><p>* Donald J. Trump, <a target="_blank" href="https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-combating-anti-semitism/">Executive Order on Combating Anti-Semitism</a>, December 11, 2019</p><p>* Here is the op-ed where Jared Kushner declares that “Anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism”: <a target="_blank" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/11/opinion/jared-kushner-trump-anti-semitism.html?unlocked_article_code=1.v04.Tqn-.YdgNVavzGDyC&smid=url-share">“President Trump Is Defending Jewish Students,”</a> <em>New York Times</em>, December 11, 2019</p><p>* Donald J. Trump, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/01/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-takes-forceful-and-unprecedented-steps-to-combat-anti-semitism/">Executive Order on Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism</a>, January 29, 2025. See also this White House <a target="_blank" href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/01/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-takes-forceful-and-unprecedented-steps-to-combat-anti-semitism/">“Fact Sheet”</a> and Len Gutkin’s <a target="_blank" href="https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/the-review/2025-02-03">dispatch</a> on the E.O. in the <em>Chronicle of Higher Education</em></p><p>* The U.S. Department of Education maintains a list of pending Title VI cases <a target="_blank" href="https://ocrcas.ed.gov/open-investigations?field_ois_state=All&field_ois_discrimination_statute=All&field_ois_type_of_discrimination=711&items_per_page=100&field_ois_institution=&field_ois_institution_type=752&field_open_investigation_date_1=&field_open_investigation_date_2=&field_open_investigation_date=&field_open_investigation_date_3=">here</a></p><p>* <em>Crimson </em>coverage of Harvard’s decision to adopt the IHRA definition available <a target="_blank" href="https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/1/21/harvard-settles-antisemitism-lawsuits/">here</a> and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/1/23/harvard-faculty-react-antisemitism-settlements/">here</a></p><p>* on publishing <em>Mein Kampf </em>in Germany in 2016 for the first time since World War II, see coverage in the <em>Guardian </em><a target="_blank" href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/04/mein-kampf-hitler-eine-kritische-edition-review">here</a> and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/03/first-mein-kampf-reprint-germany-since-war-sixth-print-run-hitler">here</a> </p><p>* On how Whitefish, Montana responded to a proposed march by white supremacists in 2016/17, see this <em>New York Times </em>article, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/05/us/politics/nazi-whitefish-charlottesville.html?unlocked_article_code=1.wE4.va-_.iyB7GqsxxMsW&smid=url-share">“How a Small Town Silenced a Neo-Nazi Hate Campaign” </a></p><p>* We have written several pieces on student activism and the War in Gaza—see:</p><p>* <a target="_blank" href="https://www.jeffreyaaronsnyder.com/_files/ugd/5c295d_3538938aba6a49baa047be6eb18b9bfe.pdf">“Colleges Are Cracking Down on Free Speech in the Name of ‘Inclusion’”</a></p><p>* <a target="_blank" href="https://www.jeffreyaaronsnyder.com/_files/ugd/5c295d_085a46a208ee45c2b3ac71b57322d363.pdf">“Student Activism is Integral to the Mission of Academe”</a> &</p><p>* <a target="_blank" href="https://www.educationnext.org/campus-protests-dont-undermine-the-college-mission/">“Campus Protests Don’t Undermine the College Mission”</a></p><p>* The<strong> </strong><em>Chronicle of Higher Education</em> has had some great coverage of the debates surrounding the IHRA definition; see <a target="_blank" href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/colleges-use-his-antisemitism-definition-to-censor-he-calls-it-a-travesty">here</a>, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.chronicle.com/blogs/letters/article-about-origins-of-working-definition-of-antisemitism-was-misleading">here</a> and <a target="_blank" href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/for-colleges-defining-antisemitism-hasnt-gotten-any-easier">here</a> </p><p>* on “hate speech” laws, see Nadine Strossen’s superb 2018 book,<em> </em><a target="_blank" href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/hate-9780190859121?cc=us&lang=en&#"><em>HATE: Why We Should Resist it With Free Speech, Not Censorship</em></a></p><p>* On the perils of confusing criticism of a government with attacks against a particular nationality, ethnicity or race, see this <em>Chronicle Review</em> <a target="_blank" href="https://www.jeffreyaaronsnyder.com/_files/ugd/5c295d_5dd20a43b0dc459cafd21fbee22c0ef1.pdf">piece</a> about the censorship of a Chinese artist at George Washington University in 2022</p><p>* For a data-driven analysis of the state of antisemitism in the U.S. on campuses and beyond, see this <a target="_blank" href="https://www.slowboring.com/p/misunderstanding-antisemitism-in">piece</a> by Stony Brook University sociologist Musa al-Gharbi</p><p></p> <br/><br/>This is a public episode. 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