FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THE AFTERMATH OF SEPTEMBER 11: HOW HAS TERRORISM CHANGED THE CLIMATE OF FREE SPEECH AT AMERICA’S UNIVERSITIES?

Loyola Marymount University Sponsors Panel Of International Experts On February 16

February 9, 2004 –Terrorism and its effect on academic freedom at universities in America and worldwide will be examined during the third annual Dilemmas of Democracy: Academic Freedom after September 11. The discussion will take place at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles on Monday, February 16, beginning at 10 a.m. in University Hall 1000.

The nation’s leading academic scholars will gather at the event, sponsored by LMU’s Institute for Leadership Studies, which will feature dual panel discussions: “Academic Freedom: How Much Has Changed?” and “Academic Freedom Today.” Both events are free and open to the public.
The day also features an invitation-only dinner with keynote speaker Paul Sniderman, professor and chair of the Political Science department at Stanford, winner of the Mellon Fellowship, the Guggenheim Fellowship, the E.E. Schattschneider Award - awarded annually for the best dissertation in the field of American politics, and the Woodrow Wilson Foundation Prize of the American Political Science Association for best book published in political science, considering all fields.

The panel for these discussions is truly an all-star team of those who both teach and work on the “front lines” of academic freedom issues, including:

• Alan Charles Kors, the president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. FIRE is one of the top organizations on academic freedom in the country.
• David M. Rabban, former General Counsel to the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and autho
• John Akker, executive director of the Network for Education and Academic Rights, a watchdog group that facilitates academic freedom worldwide
• Robert M. O’Neil, professor of law and director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression at the University of Virginia, chairman of the Council for America’s First Freedom, and chair of the AAUP Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure
• Donald A. Downs, professor of law, political science, and journalism at the University of Wisconsin, Madison
• Thomas L. Haskell, professor of history at Rice University
• M. Susan Lindee, professor of history and sociology of science at the University of Pennsylvania
  

Suzanne O’Brien, assistant professor of history at LMU, and Rebecca Acevedo, assistant professor of modern languages and literatures at LMU, will serve as panel chairs.

Next year’s Dilemmas of Democracy conference will gather experts to discuss “Is the Presidency Dangerous to Democracy?” The event will be held on President’s Day. For further information, please contact Evan Gerstmann at 310.338.3004.

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