had a program on gayness and decolonialism.
Individuals at Columbia’s Union Theological Seminary want the rehire of a doctor who posted” I’m with Hamas & Hezbollah & Islamic Jihad” on social media shortly after the October 7 strike against Israel.
The students ‘ complaint claims that Mohamed Abdou, a professor of modern Egyptian studies, simply was saying” support of the movement to conquer Palestine.”
At a parliamentary reading in April, Columbia President Minouche Shafik said Abdou” does not work at Columbia again”, the , Columbia Spectator information.
Indeed, Abdou ( pictured ) told a media outlet in mid-May that his teaching contract with Columbia was set to expire at the end of that month anyway.
The petition contends that Columbia’s “targeting” of Abdou “is in line with the general trend,” which states that those of color, particularly Muslims and Arabs, and those who are not protected by senior employment are most prone to the McCarthyist backlash against pro-Palestinian speech.
The Union Theological Seminary has been a meeting place and center of growth for numerous liberal movements in religion and its intersection with the public square, according to the petition. ” Black Theology, Latin American Liberationist Theology, Womanism, Feminism, and Queer Dogmas have grown in the Compressive community, and individuals come here for the opportunity to voyage into how their beliefs may be active in the world around them”.
This past spring Abdou taught the graduate-level” Decolonial-Queerness and Abolition in SWANA” ( “SWANA” being a “decolonial” term for” South West Asian/North African” ), a course on” (neo ) colonial/ ( neo ) imperial Euro-American informed modernity”.
According to the course outline, the group delved into
]… ] the continuing impact, since 1492, of a ( neo ) colonial/ ( neo ) imperial Euro-American informed modernity animated by ( neo ) liberal-Enlightenment values ( free will/humanity, secularism, racial capitalism ) and individualist identity politics on past and contemporary conceptualizations of family, kinship, and friendship in Black, Indigenous, and People of Color ( BIPOC ) communities within the context of settler-colonial societies ( as the U. S. /Canada ) as well as in postcolonial nations and regions ( as Southwest Asia, Africa, and the Middle East ) that arguably never underwent adequate decolonization.
The program was highlighted earlier this year by , The Daily Wire as one of the more “bizarre” 2024 college spring quarter services.
For more insight into Abdou’s opinions, test out @thestustustudio’s video compilation of his notes at this season’s “CUNY 4 Palestine Teach-in”.
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Photograph: Jessica Schwalb/X
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