Campus Protests and the Divestment Movement with Tyler Austin Harper | Ep. 16

They delve into specific instances where these movements have influenced policy changes, discussing the tensions between activism and open inquiry. The conversation highlights recent cases where protests have either stifled or spurred debates about institutional investment ethics and the balance between social justice and academic discourse.Finally, they discuss the politicization of the humanities, examining how political biases can shape curricula and impact scholarly discourse.In This Episode:Politicization in response to humanities' defundingThe challenges in balancing university finance and missionHow universities are inconsistent when handling student protestsThe complexities of university divestment and geopoliticsDiversity and inclusion frameworks in modern academiaFollow Tyler on X here: https://twitter.com/Tyler_A_HarperAbout Tyler:Tyler Austin Harper is a literary scholar working at the intersection of the history of science, philosophy, and environmental studies. His book, “The Paranoid Animal: Human Extinction Before the Bomb,” is under contract with Princeton University Press. It examines how British literary figures, scientists, and social theorists engaged with the concept of human extinction prior to the nuclear age. Specifically, his work argues that the period between 1800 and 1945 witnessed a shift from fatalistic visions of the end of humanity—dominant during the Romantic Era and influenced by theories of geological catastrophism—toward a new, post-Darwinian conception of human extinction in which threats to the species were reimagined as risks that could be mitigated by technological intervention, prefiguring current debates about AI, nuclear war, and climate change. His scholarly work has been published in Modern Language Quarterly, Science Fiction Studies, Syndicate, and Paradoxa.Harper is a contributing writer at The Atlantic. His public writing on politics, culture, race, and technology has appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Jacobin, and other outlets.
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