This December and January, 50 protestors are facing arraignment for their May 15, 2024 arrests at a University of California Irvine (UCI) protest opposing the Gaza genocide. The hushed arraignments of student protestors and their supporters is just one node in the network of quiet repression spindling across university campuses this past fall, which includes banning students from campus and using punishments to chill student speech.
One of those set to be arraigned is Dr. Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, who was arrested while supporting student protests, effectively nullifying her university-required de-escalation training by the violent force of her arrest. As a global studies scholar of comparative racializations in North America and South Africa, Tiffany Willoughby-Herard is well-versed in the trajectories of liberatory movements. Known for her award-winning scholarship and beloved for her dedicated mentoring of junior scholars, Dr. Willoughby-Herard is one of several faculty members across the country who have been arrested or otherwise sanctioned while doing just what they were hired to do. …..more
