Banned Scholars Project

June 28, 2024

From UC Berkeley Public Affairs:  Berkeley Talks: Reconsidering Black America’s relationship to the plantation By Public Affairs June 28, 2024 Follow Berkeley Talks, a Berkeley News podcast that features lectures and conversations at UC Berkeley. See all Berkeley Talks.   Alisha Gaines, a professor of English at Florida State University, gave a talk, “Children of the Plantationocene,” at UC Berkeley in April. Gaines is the first scholar-in-residence of Berkeley’s Banned Book Project.Courtesy of Alisha Gaines In Berkeley Talks episode 203, Alisha Gaines, a professor of English and an affiliate faculty member in African American studies at Florida State University, discusses why it’s important for Black America to “excavate and reconsider”…

April 7, 2024

Professor Michael Cohen and Project Manager Barbara Montano are featured on KCSM 91.1's radio show, "Places and Spaces."

March 27, 2024

From the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation: By Anthony Balas March 26, 2024 The University of California, Berkeley, is making a hopeful case for African American studies amid attacks on academic freedom.  Critical as they are to a healthy democracy, open conversations at public universities on race, history, and freedom are increasingly threatened by an array of attacks—from cuts to funding for humanities departments to legislation that restricts higher education institutions from incorporating topics like racial injustice into curricula.  To Nikki Jones, who is a professor and chair of the Department of African American Studies at UC Berkeley, these attacks can be understood,…

March 27, 2024

UC Berkeley’s African American Studies (AAS) Department launched a groundbreaking project this week with a $100,000 Affirming Multivocal Humanities grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The Banned Scholars Project is a direct response to increasing restrictions on academic freedom, particularly in the fields of critical race theory, DEI and gender studies. It was spearheaded by AAS professors Michael M. Cohen, Tianna S. Paschel and Ula Taylor; department chair Nikki Jones; and managed by staffer Barbara Montano.