Academic Freedom and the Obligation to Earn it
44 Pages Posted: 16 Oct 2003
Abstract
The article begins with a brief overview of the history of the concept of academic freedom in the United States. It then considers two principal cases suggesting that professors have no special constitutional right to academic freedom. Indeed, the cases suggest that academic freedom exists primarily in academic institutions as entities rather than in individual faculty members. Academic freedom exists, as a matter of contract and campus culture, because university faculty are perceived as seekers and tellers of truth. To continue to earn academic freedom, universities and their faculty should be accountable as seekers and tellers of truth. Within a particular institution's mission, the truth searching should engage important social issues and be sharpened by interactions between conflicting approaches and philosophies.
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