Check out why the University of Pennsylvania received a D grade in our Report Card below.
The University of Pennsylvania is a private university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with an undergraduate enrollment size of 9,962. The university is located in an urban setting within the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area—also known as Delaware Valley. It has a large Greek life influence. Students at the University of Pennsylvania can attend sporting events within the university and the Philadelphia area, visit numerous museums and entertainment centers, enjoy live music at the World Cafe Live, and explore our nation&#8217;s history on the streets of Philadelphia. Their official mascot is the Fighting Quaker. Members of the University of Pennsylvania community are referred to as “Quakers.&#8221;
The University of Pennsylvania offers nearly 100 majors across four schools. Notable former students include business magnate and investor Elon Musk, singer-songwriter John Legend, business magnate and investor Warren Buffett, and fashion designer and businesswoman Tory Burch.

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “C” grade by <a href="https://www.whatwilltheylearn.com/schools/2758">What Will They Learn?</a> which takes into account the university’s educational prowess. Factors include composition, literature, foreign language, U.S. government or history, economics, mathematics, and natural science.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-79" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06151308/c-e1671667169543.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

What Will They Learn? Academic Score

The University of Pennsylvania receives an “A+” grade for the Average Salary of Recent Graduates. As of 2021, alumni with 0-5 years of experience after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania with a bachelor’s degree make $78,300 on average according to <a href="https://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/bachelors">Payscale</a>.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-92" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/09164724/a-plus-e1671666966981.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Average Salary of Recent Graduates

The University of Pennsylvania receives an “A+” grade for the Average Salary of Graduates Mid-Career. As of 2021, alumni with 10+ years of experience after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania with a bachelor’s degree make $153,100 on average according to <a href="https://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/bachelors">Payscale</a>.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-92" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/09164724/a-plus-e1671666966981.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Average Salary of Graduates Mid-Career

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “B” grade for Mandated Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity Training for Staff. The <a href="https://diversity.seas.upenn.edu/faculty-resources-page/">university</a> does not appear to require any equity, inclusion, or diversity training for staff. However, they do strongly encourage multiple training options. Training options include:
&#8220;Penn Center for Teaching and Learning (CLT) Resources:
<ul>
<li>Inclusive &amp; Equitable Teaching</li>
<li>Inclusive Practices &amp; Course Design</li>
<li>Racial Equity &amp; Course Review</li>
<li>Literature on Inclusion Across the Disciplines</li>
</ul>
Weingarten Center Resources:
<ul>
<li>Resources for Your Courses</li>
<li>Working with Disability Services</li>
<li>Refer a Student to Weingarten</li>
</ul>
Higher Ed Resources:
<ul>
<li>How STEM Instructors Can Build More Inclusive Classrooms</li>
<li>How Do I Write an Inclusive Syllabus?</li>
<li>Cultivating a Sense of Belonging for Graduate Students</li>
<li>Better Classroom Experiences, Better Grades</li>
<li>Engaging STEM Faculty in Culturally Responsive Workshops</li>
<li>Toward Inclusive STEM Classrooms: What Personal Role Do Faculty Play?</li>
<li>Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in STEM</li>
</ul>
Gender-Inclusive Classrooms:
<ul>
<li>Trans Inclusion in the Classroom&#8221;</li>
</ul>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-82" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06154915/b-e1671667012553.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Mandated Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity Training for Staff

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “C” grade for having a Bias Reporting System but not a Bias Response Team. Bias Reporting Systems and Response Teams are systems or teams of faculty, staff, and sometimes law enforcement.
According to <a href="https://speechfirst.org/bias-reporting-systems/">SpeechFirst</a>, students are “encouraged to report ‘bias incidents’ to these boards (or teams) in the name of inclusion and tolerance, but it’s often unclear what the school considers ‘bias’ in the first place. Overly broad or vague definitions of bias put all kinds of speech at risk of being reported – even unpopular speech which is protected by the First Amendment.”
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-79" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06151308/c-e1671667169543.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Bias Reporting System or Bias Response Team

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “B” grade for the Ratio of Right-Leaning Clubs to Left-Leaning Clubs. Out of a list of 20 clubs (10 from each side), <a href="https://pennclubs.com/">the university</a> has three right-leaning clubs compared to four left-leaning clubs. Penn for Liberty, Students Supporting Israel, and Federalist Society are the three right-leaning clubs. Young Democratic Socialists of America, Lambda Alliance, Reproductive Justice Working Group, and PennFems are the four left-leaning clubs.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-82" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06154915/b-e1671667012553.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Ratio of Right-Leaning Clubs to Left-Leaning Clubs

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “C” grade due to having no active Turning Point USA chapter. The university has not denied a Turning Point USA chapter on campus.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-79" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06151308/c-e1671667169543.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Denied Turning Point USA Chapter

The University of Pennsylvania receives an “F” grade for the Amount of Foreign Funding Received. According to <a href="https://sites.ed.gov/foreigngifts/">College Foreign Gift Reporting</a>, the total amount of foreign funding the university has received is $154,857 per current undergraduate student. Oftentimes, foreign parties will convey their influence by funding certain courses, activities, professors, and organizations on campus. In certain cases, universities must abide by restrictions dictated by foreign parties to receive funding. In addition, there have been <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/top-universities-took-billions-in-unreported-foreign-funds-u-s-finds-11603226953">reports</a> that claim that universities underreport foreign funding. The figure above only takes into account reported foreign funding.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-83" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06163659/f-e1671666890828.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Amount of Foreign Funding Received

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “D” grade for Required Equity, Diversity, or Inclusion Courses for Students. <a href="https://www.college.upenn.edu/gen-ed">The university&#8217;s</a> general education program includes a &#8220;Cultural Diversity in the U.S.&#8221; requirement. According to the university, &#8220;College students are required to take at least one course to develop the skills necessary for understanding the population and culture of the United States as it becomes increasingly diverse. Through historical inquiry, the study of cultural expressions and the analysis of social data, students will develop their ability to examine issues of diversity with a focus on race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class and religion. The goal is to equip graduates with the ability to become perceptive and engaged members of society.&#8221;
<a class="waffle-rich-text-link" href="https://courses.upenn.edu/" data-sheets-formula-bar-text-link="https://courses.upenn.edu/" data-sheets-formula-bar-text-style="font-size:13px;color:#1155cc;font-weight:normal;text-decoration:underline;font-family:''docs-Calibri'';font-style:normal;text-decoration-skip-ink:none;"> Courses in this category</a> include, but are not limited to, &#8220;Latinx Environmental Justice,&#8221; &#8220;Health and Social Justice,&#8221; &#8220;Black Queer Traditions,&#8221; and &#8220;Folklore and Sexuality.&#8221; It is possible to bypass these courses and similar courses for options like &#8220;Constitutional Law,&#8221; but the number of left-leaning courses severely outweighs the number of unbiased options, making bypassing somewhat difficult.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-85" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06165831/d-e1671666996995.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Required Equity, Diversity, or Inclusion Courses for Students

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “C” grade for Segregated Dormitories, Graduations, and Classes. The university has two segregated Living Learning Communities (<a href="https://residential-services.business-services.upenn.edu/gender-inclusive-housing">Gender Inclusive Housing</a> and <a href="https://www.collegehouses.upenn.edu/about/dubois">W.E.B. DuBois College House</a>). The university also hosts <a href="https://lauder.house.upenn.edu/announcement/2021-lavender-graduation">Lavender Graduation</a>, a segregated graduation ceremony.
The university does not have any segregated classes.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-79" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06151308/c-e1671667169543.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Segregated Dormitories, Graduations, and Classes

The University of Pennsylvania receives an “A” grade for Protests and Canceling Speakers. Since 2021, no instances of protests, speech cancelations, or violence/attempted violence against speakers have occurred.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-84" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06164434/a-e1671667004869.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Protests and Canceling Speakers

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “C” grade for Mask and Vaccine Mandates. Although the <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/04/penn-lifts-covid-vaccine-requirement-students-faculty-staff#:~:text=Penn%20has%20lifted%20its%20COVID,the%202021%2D22%20school%20year." target="_blank" rel="noopener">university</a> recommends that students, staff, and faculty wear masks and get vaccinated, it is no longer mandated as of April 2023.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-79" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06151308/c-e1671667169543.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Mask and Vaccine Mandates

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “B” grade for the Percent of Students Graduating with STEM Degrees. According to the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data Center (<a href="https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/use-the-data">IPEDS</a>), as of 2020, 11.03% of the current undergraduate student population graduate with a Science, Technology, Engineering, or Mathematics (STEM) degree. Across the United States, students who graduate with STEM degrees tend to earn more on average than their other student counterparts.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-82" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06154915/b-e1671667012553.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Percent of Students Graduating with STEM Degrees

The University of Pennsylvania receives a “D” grade for Crime Rates in University City or Town. According to the <a href="https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2018/crime-in-the-u.s.-2018">Federal Bureau of Investigation</a>, the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania violent crime rate was 908.68 per 100,000 people in 2018, higher than the 2018 national average of 380.56 per 100,000 people. While campus safety is of utmost importance, it is also pertinent to consider the crime rates of the surrounding town or city as students often tend to venture off campus, especially after their freshman year.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-85" src="https://cdn.deanslist.org/be/2022/12/06165831/d-e1671666996995.png" alt="" width="80" height="80" />

Crime Rates in University City or Town

University of Pennsylvania

Check out why the University of Pennsylvania received a D grade in our Report Card below.

The University of Pennsylvania is a private university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with an undergraduate enrollment size of 9,962. The university is located in an urban setting within the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area—also known as Delaware Valley. It has a large Greek life influence. Students at the University of Pennsylvania can attend sporting events within the university and the Philadelphia area, visit numerous museums and entertainment centers, enjoy live music at the World Cafe Live, and explore our nation's history on the streets of Philadelphia. Their official mascot is the Fighting Quaker. Members of the University of Pennsylvania community are referred to as “Quakers."

The University of Pennsylvania offers nearly 100 majors across four schools. Notable former students include business magnate and investor Elon Musk, singer-songwriter John Legend, business magnate and investor Warren Buffett, and fashion designer and businesswoman Tory Burch.

university-of-pennsylvania

anthea-butler

Anthea Butler

University of Pennsylvania Professor <a href="https://rels.sas.upenn.edu/people/anthea-butler" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anthea Butler</a> penned an MSNBC <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/olympics-2024-apology-christians-last-supper-elon-musk-mike-johnson-rcna164008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">opinion editorial</a> responding to the controversial 2024 Olympics&#8217; opening ceremony where “transgender” performers mocked Leonardo da Vinci’s depiction of The Last Supper.
Butler offered the following explanation in light of the sacrilegious production:
“[I]t wasn’t about the Last Supper at all. The so-called re-enactment was a scene of a bacchanal, a fest of the Greek god Dionysus …  Thell that, though, to those unable to see the scene outside the lens of their conservative religious convictions … Tolerance, sadly, isn’t what conservatives are noted for, especially since many of them deemed the 2024 Olympics ‘woke.’”
She further claimed that Christians have a “limited” worldview that “doesn’t consider views that fall outside their faith.”
Butler has a history of demonizing Christianity, including this quote from <a href="https://www.amazon.com/White-Evangelical-Racism-Politics-Morality/dp/1469661179?asin=B08JG7NHXQ&amp;revisionId=37269deb&amp;format=1&amp;depth=1">her book</a>, “White Evangelical Racism: The Politics of Morality in America” :
“White Evangelical Racism tells a concise history of the evangelical movement and—here is the hard part—the racist and racial elements that imbue its beliefs, practices, and social and political activism. It is racism that binds and blinds many white American evangelicals to the vilification of Muslims, Latinos, and African Americans … Racism is a feature, not a bug, of American evangelicalism.”
In response to the outrage among religious conservatives after viewing the Olympics ceremony, Butler <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/olympics-2024-apology-christians-last-supper-elon-musk-mike-johnson-rcna164008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wrote</a>:
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-3773" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11-1024x791.png" alt="" width="640" height="494" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11-1024x791.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11-300x232.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11-768x594.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11-1200x927.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11.png 1299w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
Butler’s faculty profile shows her on leave for the 2024-25 academic year.
Please send tips and updates on Anthea Butler to <a href="mailto:Watchlists@tpusa.com">Watchlists@tpusa.com</a>. 
&nbsp;
Updated &#8211; August 6, 2024 
_____________
<a href="https://africana.sas.upenn.edu/people/anthea-butler" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anthea Butler</a> is an Associate Professor of African and Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where she also serves as Interim Chair of the Department of Religious Studies.
Identity Politics
Butler advocates for professors to strike on the job in order to promote social justice causes. First tweeting her support for an NBA-style<a href="https://www.sportsnet.ca/nba/article/emotional-frustrated-raptors-discussed-boycott-wake-jacob-blake-shooting/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> strike</a> to protest “police violence,” Butler then created her own strike aimed at school and university staff called “Scholar Strike.” 
<a href="https://www.scholarstrike.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Instructing</a> professors and faculty members of colleges and universities to walk out of their positions and teaching duties for two days, Scholar Strike intends to “call awareness to the racial climate in America, and the rash [sic] of police shootings and racialized violence.” As a result, hundreds of academics<a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/28/professors-plan-strike-racial-justice"> pledged</a> to join the strike.
In a 2020 Twitter thread, Butler also<a href="https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=15673" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> describes</a> conservatives as “craven and evil.” She levels<a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/ivy-league-professor-award-carson-coon-of-the-year" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> attacks</a> against Dr. Ben Carson as the  “the coon of the year” over comments he made regarding the confederate flag.<a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ben-Carson" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Dr. Ben Carson</a> is a renowned neurosurgeon who served as the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under the Trump Administration.
Butler believes that conservative candidates continue to receive support en masse from evangelicals due to fear.<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/white-evangelicals-love-trump-aren-t-confused-about-why-no-ncna1046826" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Writing</a> for NBC News, Butler accuses conservatives of voting in order to preserve what political power they still have. Historically a dominant force, Butler states, evangelicals turn to authoritarians like Trump in order to protect themselves from societal change. She continues, stating that this is not a unique phenomenon, as Evangelicals have a long history of supporting racist movements and institutions.
The core of Butler’s popular authorship is her allegations of the overlap between evangelicalism and white supremacy, having written a book entitled,<a href="https://uncpress.org/book/9781469661179/white-evangelical-racism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> White Evangelical Racism</a> explaining this indictment. Interviewing on “Act. tv,” she<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMZpsrYGLeA&amp;ab_channel=act.tv" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> claims</a> that the history of Christianity in the United States is interwoven with the institution of slavery and support of the Ku Klux Klan.
During the same interview, Butler claims that evangelicals believe that police are “ordained” by God to kill black people.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter wp-image-1130 size-large" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617-1024x360.png" alt="" width="580" height="204" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617-1024x360.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617-300x106.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617-768x270.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617-1200x422.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617.png 1299w" sizes="(max-width: 580px) 100vw, 580px" />
In a <a href="https://twitter.com/AntheaButler/status/1351922696989380609" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tweet</a> from January 2021, Butler repeated a claim from the same book that racism is inherent in evangelicals.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-full wp-image-1131 aligncenter" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Screen-Shot-2021-03-03-at-12.11.16-PM.png" alt="" width="490" height="196" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Screen-Shot-2021-03-03-at-12.11.16-PM.png 490w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Screen-Shot-2021-03-03-at-12.11.16-PM-300x120.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 490px) 100vw, 490px" />
In 2013, Butler went as far as to claim that a “white-racist” is the god<a href="https://antheabutler.com/americas-racist-god/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> worshipped</a> by this country.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter wp-image-1132 size-large" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377-1024x363.png" alt="" width="580" height="206" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377-1024x363.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377-300x106.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377-768x273.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377-1200x426.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377.png 1299w" sizes="(max-width: 580px) 100vw, 580px" />
Anthea Butler served as a<a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/people/ncr-exclusive-campaign-names-three-dozen-catholics-biden-co-chairs" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> co-chair</a> of “Catholics for Biden” in 2020.
________________ 
Published Spring 2021

University of Pennsylvania Professor <a href="https://rels.sas.upenn.edu/people/anthea-butler" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anthea Butler</a> penned an MSNBC <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/olympics-2024-apology-christians-last-supper-elon-musk-mike-johnson-rcna164008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">opinion editorial</a> responding to the controversial 2024 Olympics' opening ceremony where “transgender” performers mocked Leonardo da Vinci’s depiction of The Last Supper.

Butler offered the following explanation in light of the sacrilegious production:
“[I]t wasn’t about the Last Supper at all. The so-called re-enactment was a scene of a bacchanal, a fest of the Greek god Dionysus …  Thell that, though, to those unable to see the scene outside the lens of their conservative religious convictions … Tolerance, sadly, isn’t what conservatives are noted for, especially since many of them deemed the 2024 Olympics ‘woke.’”
She further claimed that Christians have a “limited” worldview that “doesn’t consider views that fall outside their faith.”

Butler has a history of demonizing Christianity, including this quote from <a href="https://www.amazon.com/White-Evangelical-Racism-Politics-Morality/dp/1469661179?asin=B08JG7NHXQ&amp;revisionId=37269deb&amp;format=1&amp;depth=1">her book</a>, “White Evangelical Racism: The Politics of Morality in America” :
“White Evangelical Racism tells a concise history of the evangelical movement and—here is the hard part—the racist and racial elements that imbue its beliefs, practices, and social and political activism. It is racism that binds and blinds many white American evangelicals to the vilification of Muslims, Latinos, and African Americans … Racism is a feature, not a bug, of American evangelicalism.”
In response to the outrage among religious conservatives after viewing the Olympics ceremony, Butler <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/olympics-2024-apology-christians-last-supper-elon-musk-mike-johnson-rcna164008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wrote</a>:

<img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-3773" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/pwl-11-1024x791.png" alt="" width="640" height="494" />

Butler’s faculty profile shows her on leave for the 2024-25 academic year.

Please send tips and updates on Anthea Butler to <a href="mailto:Watchlists@tpusa.com">Watchlists@tpusa.com</a>. 

&nbsp;
Updated - August 6, 2024
_____________
<a href="https://africana.sas.upenn.edu/people/anthea-butler" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anthea Butler</a> is an Associate Professor of African and Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where she also serves as Interim Chair of the Department of Religious Studies.

Identity Politics

Butler advocates for professors to strike on the job in order to promote social justice causes. First tweeting her support for an NBA-style<a href="https://www.sportsnet.ca/nba/article/emotional-frustrated-raptors-discussed-boycott-wake-jacob-blake-shooting/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> strike</a> to protest “police violence,” Butler then created her own strike aimed at school and university staff called “Scholar Strike.” 

<a href="https://www.scholarstrike.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Instructing</a> professors and faculty members of colleges and universities to walk out of their positions and teaching duties for two days, Scholar Strike intends to “call awareness to the racial climate in America, and the rash [sic] of police shootings and racialized violence.” As a result, hundreds of academics<a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/28/professors-plan-strike-racial-justice"> pledged</a> to join the strike.

In a 2020 Twitter thread, Butler also<a href="https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=15673" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> describes</a> conservatives as “craven and evil.” She levels<a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/ivy-league-professor-award-carson-coon-of-the-year" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> attacks</a> against Dr. Ben Carson as the  “the coon of the year” over comments he made regarding the confederate flag.<a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ben-Carson" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Dr. Ben Carson</a> is a renowned neurosurgeon who served as the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under the Trump Administration.

Butler believes that conservative candidates continue to receive support en masse from evangelicals due to fear.<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/white-evangelicals-love-trump-aren-t-confused-about-why-no-ncna1046826" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Writing</a> for NBC News, Butler accuses conservatives of voting in order to preserve what political power they still have. Historically a dominant force, Butler states, evangelicals turn to authoritarians like Trump in order to protect themselves from societal change. She continues, stating that this is not a unique phenomenon, as Evangelicals have a long history of supporting racist movements and institutions.

The core of Butler’s popular authorship is her allegations of the overlap between evangelicalism and white supremacy, having written a book entitled,<a href="https://uncpress.org/book/9781469661179/white-evangelical-racism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> White Evangelical Racism</a> explaining this indictment. Interviewing on “Act. tv,” she<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMZpsrYGLeA&amp;ab_channel=act.tv" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> claims</a> that the history of Christianity in the United States is interwoven with the institution of slavery and support of the Ku Klux Klan.

During the same interview, Butler claims that evangelicals believe that police are “ordained” by God to kill black people.

<img class="aligncenter wp-image-1130 size-large" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-95-e1614798264617-1024x360.png" alt="" width="580" height="204" />

In a <a href="https://twitter.com/AntheaButler/status/1351922696989380609" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tweet</a> from January 2021, Butler repeated a claim from the same book that racism is inherent in evangelicals.

<img class="size-full wp-image-1131 aligncenter" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Screen-Shot-2021-03-03-at-12.11.16-PM.png" alt="" width="490" height="196" />

In 2013, Butler went as far as to claim that a “white-racist” is the god<a href="https://antheabutler.com/americas-racist-god/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> worshipped</a> by this country.

<img class="aligncenter wp-image-1132 size-large" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Copy-of-PWL-Quote-Template-96-e1614798976377-1024x363.png" alt="" width="580" height="206" />

Anthea Butler served as a<a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/people/ncr-exclusive-campaign-names-three-dozen-catholics-biden-co-chairs" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> co-chair</a> of “Catholics for Biden” in 2020.
________________
Published Spring 2021

jonathan-katz

Jonathan Katz

<a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/people/jonathan-d-katz">Dr. Jonathan Katz</a> is an Associate Professor of Associate Professor of Practice and the History of Art at the <a href="https://www.upenn.edu/">University of Pennslyvania</a>. According to his university biography, Katz’s positions deal with the “intersections of art history and queer history.”
In a 2016 article, Professor Katz<a href="http://www.buffalo.edu/ubnow/stories/2016/06/katz-orlando.html"> blamed</a> conservatives for the Pulse Nightclub shooting that claimed 49 lives. He wrote, “What we are trying to do here is camouflage the root of the problem, which is a long history of violent political rhetoric and homophobic policies by Republican officials and their conservative allies.”
Rather than Islamic Terrorism, he argued that anti-gay bigotry from the Christian right is a greater threat than ISIS.
Katz had previously<a href="https://www.catholicleague.org/the-american-taliban-catholic-league-2/"> referred</a> to The Catholic League, the nation’s largest Catholic civil rights organization, as “the American Taliban.”

<a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/people/jonathan-d-katz">Dr. Jonathan Katz</a> is an Associate Professor of Associate Professor of Practice and the History of Art at the <a href="https://www.upenn.edu/">University of Pennslyvania</a>. According to his university biography, Katz’s positions deal with the “intersections of art history and queer history.”

In a 2016 article, Professor Katz<a href="http://www.buffalo.edu/ubnow/stories/2016/06/katz-orlando.html"> blamed</a> conservatives for the Pulse Nightclub shooting that claimed 49 lives. He wrote, “What we are trying to do here is camouflage the root of the problem, which is a long history of violent political rhetoric and homophobic policies by Republican officials and their conservative allies.”

Rather than Islamic Terrorism, he argued that anti-gay bigotry from the Christian right is a greater threat than ISIS.

Katz had previously<a href="https://www.catholicleague.org/the-american-taliban-catholic-league-2/"> referred</a> to The Catholic League, the nation’s largest Catholic civil rights organization, as “the American Taliban.”

screen-shot-2022-11-02-at-4-27-29-pm

Screen Shot 2022-11-02 at 4.27.29 PM

<a href="https://mshp.med.upenn.edu/people/nadia-dowshen-md-mshp" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nadia Dowshen</a> is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. She is also the co-founder of the Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania’s (CHOP) Sexuality and Gender Development Clinic. According to her university profile, the clinic provides medical and psychosocial support to more than 500 gender variant children and adolescents.
The Post Millennial reports that Dr. Dowshen <a href="https://thepostmillennial.com/chops-gender-clinic-founder-says-age-is-just-a-number-when-advocating-for-double-mastectomies-for-healthy-14-year-old-girls" target="_blank" rel="noopener">testified before the Pennsylvania Health Committee</a> in a September 2020 hearing titled “Appropriate Care Models for Transgender Adolescents.” During the hearing, Representative David Zimmerman asked Dowshen what would be the youngest age that her clinic would refer a girl for a double mastectomy, or the removal of a girl&#8217;s healthy breasts.
Dowshen replied that the majority of bilateral mastectomies performed at the clinic are performed on girls ages 16 through 18 but that she would refer children “as young as age 14.” She justified her decision by saying:
“I think it’s really important to remember that age is a number. As an adolescent medicine and development specialist, we know that where a child is cognitively and socially is more important than the exact number of their age.” 
Dr. Dowshen also commented on puberty blockers for children, stating “the major medical intervention that is considered fully reversible is puberty blocking medication.” <a href="https://thepostmillennial.com/watch-chop-gender-clinic-co-founder-praises-rachel-levines-initiatives-for-medical-transition-of-minors" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Post Millennial</a> reports that puberty blockers can cause brain swelling, vision loss, stunted growth, cognitive issues, and bone density loss, among other problems. When combined with cross-sex hormones, they can lead to sterility and a lack of sexual function.
During the Q&amp;A portion of the hearing, Dr. Dowshen admitted that the clinic <a href="https://thepostmillennial.com/childrens-hospital-of-philadelphia-perform-medical-gender-transition-on-minors-in-foster-care" target="_blank" rel="noopener">accepts referrals from youth homeless shelters and the foster care system.</a> When asked by Representative Pamela A. Delissio how children “find their way” to the Gender and Sexuality Development Clinic, Dowshen replied:
“We are really getting referrals from a variety of resources. We’re also getting a lot more referrals from other institutions … Sometimes from within the foster care system, the mental health system, through homeless shelters for youth.” 
Dr. Dowshen co-published an op-ed for the Philadelphia Inquirer titled <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20211227195726/https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/transgender-athletes-sports-ban-pennsylvania-new-jersey-20210610.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“‘They just want the chance to play’: Reject transgender sports bans.”</a> The article states:
“The authors of bills to deny trans youth these opportunities say they want to protect other children and, particularly, prevent transgender girls from having what they say is an unfair advantage over other girls.” 
Dowshen then argues that there are not biological differences between girls and boys in sports:
“But these claims are based on misunderstandings of biology and hormones, have not been backed by any concrete examples of unfair athlete advantage, and are irrelevant to K-12 school sports.”
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; November 2, 2022

<a href="https://mshp.med.upenn.edu/people/nadia-dowshen-md-mshp" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nadia Dowshen</a> is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. She is also the co-founder of the Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania’s (CHOP) Sexuality and Gender Development Clinic. According to her university profile, the clinic provides medical and psychosocial support to more than 500 gender variant children and adolescents.

The Post Millennial reports that Dr. Dowshen <a href="https://thepostmillennial.com/chops-gender-clinic-founder-says-age-is-just-a-number-when-advocating-for-double-mastectomies-for-healthy-14-year-old-girls" target="_blank" rel="noopener">testified before the Pennsylvania Health Committee</a> in a September 2020 hearing titled “Appropriate Care Models for Transgender Adolescents.” During the hearing, Representative David Zimmerman asked Dowshen what would be the youngest age that her clinic would refer a girl for a double mastectomy, or the removal of a girl's healthy breasts.

Dowshen replied that the majority of bilateral mastectomies performed at the clinic are performed on girls ages 16 through 18 but that she would refer children “as young as age 14.” She justified her decision by saying:
“I think it’s really important to remember that age is a number. As an adolescent medicine and development specialist, we know that where a child is cognitively and socially is more important than the exact number of their age.” 
Dr. Dowshen also commented on puberty blockers for children, stating “the major medical intervention that is considered fully reversible is puberty blocking medication.” <a href="https://thepostmillennial.com/watch-chop-gender-clinic-co-founder-praises-rachel-levines-initiatives-for-medical-transition-of-minors" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Post Millennial</a> reports that puberty blockers can cause brain swelling, vision loss, stunted growth, cognitive issues, and bone density loss, among other problems. When combined with cross-sex hormones, they can lead to sterility and a lack of sexual function.

During the Q&amp;A portion of the hearing, Dr. Dowshen admitted that the clinic <a href="https://thepostmillennial.com/childrens-hospital-of-philadelphia-perform-medical-gender-transition-on-minors-in-foster-care" target="_blank" rel="noopener">accepts referrals from youth homeless shelters and the foster care system.</a> When asked by Representative Pamela A. Delissio how children “find their way” to the Gender and Sexuality Development Clinic, Dowshen replied:
“We are really getting referrals from a variety of resources. We’re also getting a lot more referrals from other institutions … Sometimes from within the foster care system, the mental health system, through homeless shelters for youth.” 
Dr. Dowshen co-published an op-ed for the Philadelphia Inquirer titled <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20211227195726/https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/transgender-athletes-sports-ban-pennsylvania-new-jersey-20210610.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“‘They just want the chance to play’: Reject transgender sports bans.”</a> The article states:
“The authors of bills to deny trans youth these opportunities say they want to protect other children and, particularly, prevent transgender girls from having what they say is an unfair advantage over other girls.” 
Dowshen then argues that there are not biological differences between girls and boys in sports:
“But these claims are based on misunderstandings of biology and hormones, have not been backed by any concrete examples of unfair athlete advantage, and are irrelevant to K-12 school sports.”
&nbsp;
Published - November 2, 2022

screen-shot-2022-12-09-at-8-36-47-am

Screen Shot 2022-12-09 at 8.36.47 AM

<a href="https://ldi.upenn.edu/fellows/fellows-directory/elle-lett-phd-ma/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Elle Lett</a>, Ph.D., is an Associate Fellow and MD Candidate in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. According to his university profile, Lett is a transgender woman who “applies the theory and principles of Black feminism to understanding the health impacts of systemic racism, transphobia, and other forms of discrimination on oppressed groups in the United States.”
Lett is also a <a href="https://www.appliedtransstudies.org/about/fellows" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fellow at the Center for Applied Transgender Studies (CATS)</a>, “the leading academic organization dedicated to scholarship on the social, cultural, and political conditions of transgender lives.” According to the <a href="https://www.appliedtransstudies.org/about" target="_blank" rel="noopener">center’s website</a>, their mission is to inform “policy-making and public discourse in ways that improve quality of life for the transgender community.”
Lett was quoted in a September 2021 article for STAT titled, <a href="https://www.statnews.com/2021/09/23/health-equity-tourists-white-scholars-colonizing-health-disparities-research/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“‘Health equity tourists’: How white scholars are colonizing research on health disparities.”</a> The paper discusses how the field of health equity research has grown in recent years, but argues “researchers with little or no background or training in health research, often white and already well-funded, are rushing in to scoop up grants and publish papers.”
Lett states, “For this to be ethical and just, it requires you to redistribute some of your privilege and benefit.”
The article goes on to discuss a study, led by a white author, that “documented the lack of black medical school faculty.” STAT claims the study had similar findings to a study published three years earlier by black researchers, including Lett. In response to this, Lett says:
“It is troubling that a white man, who has had every privilege conferred on him, is writing a paper about the plight of Black academics. He is extracting from our pain for his career advancement.”
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; December 9, 2022

<a href="https://ldi.upenn.edu/fellows/fellows-directory/elle-lett-phd-ma/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Elle Lett</a>, Ph.D., is an Associate Fellow and MD Candidate in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. According to his university profile, Lett is a transgender woman who “applies the theory and principles of Black feminism to understanding the health impacts of systemic racism, transphobia, and other forms of discrimination on oppressed groups in the United States.”

Lett is also a <a href="https://www.appliedtransstudies.org/about/fellows" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fellow at the Center for Applied Transgender Studies (CATS)</a>, “the leading academic organization dedicated to scholarship on the social, cultural, and political conditions of transgender lives.” According to the <a href="https://www.appliedtransstudies.org/about" target="_blank" rel="noopener">center’s website</a>, their mission is to inform “policy-making and public discourse in ways that improve quality of life for the transgender community.”

Lett was quoted in a September 2021 article for STAT titled, <a href="https://www.statnews.com/2021/09/23/health-equity-tourists-white-scholars-colonizing-health-disparities-research/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“‘Health equity tourists’: How white scholars are colonizing research on health disparities.”</a> The paper discusses how the field of health equity research has grown in recent years, but argues “researchers with little or no background or training in health research, often white and already well-funded, are rushing in to scoop up grants and publish papers.”

Lett states, “For this to be ethical and just, it requires you to redistribute some of your privilege and benefit.”

The article goes on to discuss a study, led by a white author, that “documented the lack of black medical school faculty.” STAT claims the study had similar findings to a study published three years earlier by black researchers, including Lett. In response to this, Lett says:
“It is troubling that a white man, who has had every privilege conferred on him, is writing a paper about the plight of Black academics. He is extracting from our pain for his career advancement.”
&nbsp;
Published - December 9, 2022

screen-shot-2022-12-13-at-5-48-16-pm

Screen Shot 2022-12-13 at 5.48.16 PM

Political Science Professor <a href="https://live-sas-www-polisci.pantheon.sas.upenn.edu/people/standing-faculty/anne-norton" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anne Norton</a> was featured on the StopAntisemitism Twitter account after the announcement of her Norton’s <a href="https://live-sas-www-polisci.pantheon.sas.upenn.edu/node/9810" target="_blank" rel="noopener">new course</a> called “Why Palestine Matters to America.”
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-3883" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.42.40 PM.png" alt="" width="680" height="95" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.42.40 PM.png 680w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.42.40 PM-300x42.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 680px) 100vw, 680px" />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Shocking new low at UPenn &#8211; Anne Norton is set to teach a class on “Why Palestine Matters to America.”
The same Anne Norton that claims Jews play the victim card and calls for physical violence &#8211; “kneecap then”.
Why has this barbaric antisemite not been fired by UPenn? <a href="https://t.co/vv3qZjAGam">https://t.co/vv3qZjAGam</a> <a href="https://t.co/7SUPvu3acR">pic.twitter.com/7SUPvu3acR</a>
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) <a href="https://twitter.com/StopAntisemites/status/1856150222381941066?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 12, 2024</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
In October, the Twitter account belonging to Eyal Yakoby <a href="https://x.com/eyakoby/status/1845981387741860343?s=46" target="_blank" rel="noopener">republished</a> a post liked by <a href="https://x.com/annenortonnow?lang=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Norton</a> that said, “Playing the victim is what Jews are best at.”
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-3884" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.44.23 PM.png" alt="" width="381" height="522" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.44.23 PM.png 381w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.44.23 PM-219x300.png 219w" sizes="(max-width: 381px) 100vw, 381px" />
Norton was featured in an <a href="https://jewishunpacked.com/when-professors-cross-the-line-into-antisemitism-on-social-media/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">article</a> by Yakoby wherein he discussed Norton and other UPenn professors who used their personal social media accounts to promote “hatred for the Jewish people.” In particular, Norton was quoted telling her audience “Please don’t amplify” allegedly speaking about the Hamas’ massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023. The <a href="https://www.ajc.org/IsraelHamasWar" target="_blank" rel="noopener">violent terrorist attack</a> included rape, kidnapping, slaughtering infants, and burning victims alive.
Norton also made headlines in May 2024 when the media arm of Stop Antisemitism <a href="https://stopantisemitism.org/as-week/anne-norton/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">published</a> a profile revealing her leftist views on Israel. Additionally, Norton was named in a 2023 <a href="https://nypost.com/2023/12/13/news/upenns-anne-norton-losing-professorship-over-anti-israel-posts/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">article</a> by the New York Post that said top donors were divesting from the university due to her outspoken antisemitic views. The Post said:
“Investors…confirmed to the Post they are in talks with UPenn to cut ties with Norton following a string of controversial posts and tweets, including endorsing a post claiming Jewish people are best at ‘playing the victim.’ The [donors] have sponsored Norton through [her] President’s Distinguished Professorship since 2018.” 
As of publication, the University of Pennsylvania has neither released a statement denouncing Norton’s views. 
Please send tips and updates on Anne Norton to <a href="mailto:Watchlists@tpusa.com">Watchlists@tpusa.com</a>. 
Published &#8211; November 19, 2024 
_________________
<a href="https://live-sas-www-polisci.pantheon.sas.upenn.edu/people/standing-faculty/anne-norton" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anne Norton</a> is the Stacey and Henry Jackson President’s Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. According to her university profile, Norton’s research interests include “identity and history, gender and race, colonialism and post-colonialism, and tradition and revolution.”
Professor Norton has been outspoken about her support for the student-led <a href="https://www.fossilfreepenn.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fossil Free Penn</a> club. In November 2019, she <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/11/fossil-free-penn-fossil-fuels-ivy-league-upenn-philadelphia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">signed an open letter supporting the group</a> after the club interrupted a Board of Trustees meeting and demanded a town hall meeting with leadership about fossil fuel divestment.
The letter reads:
“While not all of us agree on every tactic the students may employ, we as faculty urge our colleagues and University administrators to hear them out, engage them constructively, and take much bolder action.”
It continues:
“Further, we believe that Penn should join the list of universities that have divested from fossil fuels, signaling an institutional commitment to the goals set forth by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in October 2018.” 
In April 2022, Norton <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2022/04/49-penn-faculty-support-ffp-encampment" target="_blank" rel="noopener">signed another letter</a> in support of Fossil Free Penn — the activist group had camped out for six days on campus to urge the university “to take a leadership role in stabilizing the world’s climate.” The letter says: “We believe that student activists are right to call for Penn to do more and we support their peaceful protest.”
In June 2021, Professor Norton signed a “statement of concern” titled <a href="https://www.newamerica.org/political-reform/statements/statement-of-concern/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“The Threats to American Democracy and the Need for National Voting and Election Administration Standards.”</a> The letter was circulated by New America, a liberal think tank, and signed by professors from across the country. The statement says:
“State legislatures have advanced initiatives that curtail voting methods now preferred by Democratic-leaning constituencies, such as early voting and mail voting. Republican lawmakers have openly talked about ensuring the “purity” and “quality” of the vote, echoing arguments widely used across the Jim Crow South as reasons for restricting the Black vote.” 
The letter acknowledges it is “always far better for major democracy reforms to be bipartisan,” but argues that in the “current hyper-polarized political context such broad bipartisan support is sadly lacking.” The statement ends with a call to action:
“We urge members of Congress to do whatever is necessary &#8211; including suspending the filibuster &#8211; in order to pass national voting and election administration standards that both guarantee the vote to all Americans equally, and prevent state legislatures from manipulating the rules in order to manufacture the result they want.”
Published &#8211; December 13, 2022

Political Science Professor <a href="https://live-sas-www-polisci.pantheon.sas.upenn.edu/people/standing-faculty/anne-norton" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anne Norton</a> was featured on the StopAntisemitism Twitter account after the announcement of her Norton’s <a href="https://live-sas-www-polisci.pantheon.sas.upenn.edu/node/9810" target="_blank" rel="noopener">new course</a> called “Why Palestine Matters to America.”

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-3883" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.42.40 PM.png" alt="" width="680" height="95" />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Shocking new low at UPenn - Anne Norton is set to teach a class on “Why Palestine Matters to America.”
The same Anne Norton that claims Jews play the victim card and calls for physical violence - “kneecap then”.

Why has this barbaric antisemite not been fired by UPenn? <a href="https://t.co/vv3qZjAGam">https://t.co/vv3qZjAGam</a> <a href="https://t.co/7SUPvu3acR">pic.twitter.com/7SUPvu3acR</a>

— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) <a href="https://twitter.com/StopAntisemites/status/1856150222381941066?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 12, 2024</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

In October, the Twitter account belonging to Eyal Yakoby <a href="https://x.com/eyakoby/status/1845981387741860343?s=46" target="_blank" rel="noopener">republished</a> a post liked by <a href="https://x.com/annenortonnow?lang=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Norton</a> that said, “Playing the victim is what Jews are best at.”

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-3884" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Screenshot-2024-11-19-at-3.44.23 PM.png" alt="" width="381" height="522" />

Norton was featured in an <a href="https://jewishunpacked.com/when-professors-cross-the-line-into-antisemitism-on-social-media/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">article</a> by Yakoby wherein he discussed Norton and other UPenn professors who used their personal social media accounts to promote “hatred for the Jewish people.” In particular, Norton was quoted telling her audience “Please don’t amplify” allegedly speaking about the Hamas’ massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023. The <a href="https://www.ajc.org/IsraelHamasWar" target="_blank" rel="noopener">violent terrorist attack</a> included rape, kidnapping, slaughtering infants, and burning victims alive.

Norton also made headlines in May 2024 when the media arm of Stop Antisemitism <a href="https://stopantisemitism.org/as-week/anne-norton/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">published</a> a profile revealing her leftist views on Israel. Additionally, Norton was named in a 2023 <a href="https://nypost.com/2023/12/13/news/upenns-anne-norton-losing-professorship-over-anti-israel-posts/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">article</a> by the New York Post that said top donors were divesting from the university due to her outspoken antisemitic views. The Post said:

“Investors…confirmed to the Post they are in talks with UPenn to cut ties with Norton following a string of controversial posts and tweets, including endorsing a post claiming Jewish people are best at ‘playing the victim.’ The [donors] have sponsored Norton through [her] President’s Distinguished Professorship since 2018.” 

As of publication, the University of Pennsylvania has neither released a statement denouncing Norton’s views. 

Please send tips and updates on Anne Norton to <a href="mailto:Watchlists@tpusa.com">Watchlists@tpusa.com</a>. 
Published - November 19, 2024
_________________
<a href="https://live-sas-www-polisci.pantheon.sas.upenn.edu/people/standing-faculty/anne-norton" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Anne Norton</a> is the Stacey and Henry Jackson President’s Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. According to her university profile, Norton’s research interests include “identity and history, gender and race, colonialism and post-colonialism, and tradition and revolution.”

Professor Norton has been outspoken about her support for the student-led <a href="https://www.fossilfreepenn.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fossil Free Penn</a> club. In November 2019, she <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/11/fossil-free-penn-fossil-fuels-ivy-league-upenn-philadelphia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">signed an open letter supporting the group</a> after the club interrupted a Board of Trustees meeting and demanded a town hall meeting with leadership about fossil fuel divestment.

The letter reads:
“While not all of us agree on every tactic the students may employ, we as faculty urge our colleagues and University administrators to hear them out, engage them constructively, and take much bolder action.”
It continues:
“Further, we believe that Penn should join the list of universities that have divested from fossil fuels, signaling an institutional commitment to the goals set forth by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in October 2018.” 
In April 2022, Norton <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2022/04/49-penn-faculty-support-ffp-encampment" target="_blank" rel="noopener">signed another letter</a> in support of Fossil Free Penn — the activist group had camped out for six days on campus to urge the university “to take a leadership role in stabilizing the world’s climate.” The letter says: “We believe that student activists are right to call for Penn to do more and we support their peaceful protest.”

In June 2021, Professor Norton signed a “statement of concern” titled <a href="https://www.newamerica.org/political-reform/statements/statement-of-concern/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“The Threats to American Democracy and the Need for National Voting and Election Administration Standards.”</a> The letter was circulated by New America, a liberal think tank, and signed by professors from across the country. The statement says:
“State legislatures have advanced initiatives that curtail voting methods now preferred by Democratic-leaning constituencies, such as early voting and mail voting. Republican lawmakers have openly talked about ensuring the “purity” and “quality” of the vote, echoing arguments widely used across the Jim Crow South as reasons for restricting the Black vote.” 
The letter acknowledges it is “always far better for major democracy reforms to be bipartisan,” but argues that in the “current hyper-polarized political context such broad bipartisan support is sadly lacking.” The statement ends with a call to action:
“We urge members of Congress to do whatever is necessary - including suspending the filibuster - in order to pass national voting and election administration standards that both guarantee the vote to all Americans equally, and prevent state legislatures from manipulating the rules in order to manufacture the result they want.”
Published - December 13, 2022

screen-shot-2022-12-28-at-10-11-54-am

Screen Shot 2022-12-28 at 10.11.54 AM

<a href="https://hss.sas.upenn.edu/people/beans-velocci">Beans Velocci</a>, who uses the pronouns ‘they/them’, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of History and Sociology of Science and Core Faculty in Gender, Women’s and Sexuality Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.
Velocci describes her work as using “queer, trans, and feminist methods to interrogate classification systems and how they become regarded as biological truths, primarily in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century United States and its colonial and white supremacist context.”
In a Penn Today article titled, “<a href="https://penntoday.upenn.edu/news/going-beyond-binary-historical-explorations-sex-and-gender">Going beyond the binary in historical explorations of sex and gender</a>,” Velocci describes how she first became interested in the field. She recounts being in an undergraduate course and reading a book called “Herculine Barbin,”—“a memoir of a person described as a ‘hermaphrodite.’” Velocci says:
“And it was in that moment that I was like, ‘There’s not something wrong with me. The issue is that gender is constructed!’” 
Velocci says she began plotting a career path with the goal, “to be a historian and destroy the gender binary with history and primary source analysis.”
When asked by Penn Today about the relevancy of her work, Velocci says:
“I don’t have the privilege to not be relevant; state legislators are making it impossible not to be. I hope the conversations we have in class help my students think about and make sense of what’s going on in the world right now.” 
In June 2020, Velocci wrote an article titled “<a href="https://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2020/06/04/these-uncertain-times/">These Uncertain Times</a>.” In this piece, she argues that much of what the news and social media classify as ‘uncertain’ is rather ‘inconvenient knowledge’ or ‘manufactured ignorance’ that someone is benefitting from. To provide an example, she claims:
“The US government acknowledging that people aren’t so easily classified as male and female would, at the very least, mean they would have to find something to do other than legislate against trans people trying to pee in public (maybe they could have spent that time preparing for a pandemic instead).” 
Velocci argues that “Covid-19 is disproportionately killing black and brown people” and “the Trump administration has spent the pandemic thus far artificially lowering the caseload numbers by refusing to make testing widely accessible (how’s that for manufactured ignorance).” She claims:
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-large wp-image-2736 aligncenter" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308-1024x678.png" alt="" width="640" height="424" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308-1024x678.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308-300x199.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308-768x508.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308-1200x794.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308.png 1299w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; December 28, 2022

<a href="https://hss.sas.upenn.edu/people/beans-velocci">Beans Velocci</a>, who uses the pronouns ‘they/them’, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of History and Sociology of Science and Core Faculty in Gender, Women’s and Sexuality Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Velocci describes her work as using “queer, trans, and feminist methods to interrogate classification systems and how they become regarded as biological truths, primarily in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century United States and its colonial and white supremacist context.”

In a Penn Today article titled, “<a href="https://penntoday.upenn.edu/news/going-beyond-binary-historical-explorations-sex-and-gender">Going beyond the binary in historical explorations of sex and gender</a>,” Velocci describes how she first became interested in the field. She recounts being in an undergraduate course and reading a book called “Herculine Barbin,”—“a memoir of a person described as a ‘hermaphrodite.’” Velocci says:
“And it was in that moment that I was like, ‘There’s not something wrong with me. The issue is that gender is constructed!’” 
Velocci says she began plotting a career path with the goal, “to be a historian and destroy the gender binary with history and primary source analysis.”

When asked by Penn Today about the relevancy of her work, Velocci says:
“I don’t have the privilege to not be relevant; state legislators are making it impossible not to be. I hope the conversations we have in class help my students think about and make sense of what’s going on in the world right now.” 
In June 2020, Velocci wrote an article titled “<a href="https://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2020/06/04/these-uncertain-times/">These Uncertain Times</a>.” In this piece, she argues that much of what the news and social media classify as ‘uncertain’ is rather ‘inconvenient knowledge’ or ‘manufactured ignorance’ that someone is benefitting from. To provide an example, she claims:
“The US government acknowledging that people aren’t so easily classified as male and female would, at the very least, mean they would have to find something to do other than legislate against trans people trying to pee in public (maybe they could have spent that time preparing for a pandemic instead).” 
Velocci argues that “Covid-19 is disproportionately killing black and brown people” and “the Trump administration has spent the pandemic thus far artificially lowering the caseload numbers by refusing to make testing widely accessible (how’s that for manufactured ignorance).” She claims:

<img class="size-large wp-image-2736 aligncenter" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Copy-of-PWL-QUOTES-1-e1672247642308-1024x678.png" alt="" width="640" height="424" />

&nbsp;
Published - December 28, 2022

screen-shot-2023-07-07-at-12-18-47-pm

Screen Shot 2023-07-07 at 12.18.47 PM

<a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/people/mae-eskenazi" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mae Eskenazi</a> is a Graduate Associate in the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Department at the University of Pennsylvania.
Eskenazi is teaching a fall 2023 course titled, “Intro to Disability Studies.” According to the course description, this class “fuses disability studies, queer theory, Black feminist theory, visuality studies, film theory, and disabled artistic practices.”
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3048" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.12.12-PM.png" alt="" width="605" height="773" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.12.12-PM.png 605w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.12.12-PM-235x300.png 235w" sizes="(max-width: 605px) 100vw, 605px" />
<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/06/disability-studies-new-fall-course" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Pennsylvanian</a> reports, “Eskenazi said that the questions explored through the course remain extremely relevant to the contemporary world, particularly amid the COVID-19 pandemic, current financial precarity, and ‘ongoing racialized and gendered logics of colonialism and imperialism.’” Additional <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/penn-disability-studies-course-to-fuse-visuality-studies-queer-black-feminist-and-film-theory/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">course topics</a> include crip theory, the AIDS epidemic, and sensorial artistic practice, among others.
When discussing the course, Eskenazi stated:
“Disability, debilitation, and illness are facets of everydayness, so I hope that this course removes disability from the visual spectacle that it causes and instead posits lived experiences of disability and debilitation into everyday life for the students who are studying.” 
According to Eskenazi’s university profile, she is a “transgender person” who uses they/them pronouns. Her profile reads,
“Mae Eskenazi (they/them) is a visual artist and ritualist whose interdisciplinary approach extends across sculpture, lens-based media, installation, plant medicine, and performance. Calling upon lineages of disabled/trans carework, Mae is interested in the enmeshment of BDSM, the medical industrial complex, mobility, and disability as it relates to biopolitical surveillance, control, and dichotomies of pain/pleasure. 
Curious about the invocation of the somatic and haptic, their work situates itself within questions of grief, memory, and collective amnesia as it unfolds beyond teleological temporalities within trans, disabled, chronically ill, and queer life.” 
Her <a href="https://www.meskenazi.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">personal website</a> features several pieces of her “work,” including the “(Im)Mobility Appendage.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3049" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.43.36-PM.png" alt="" width="605" height="453" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.43.36-PM.png 605w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.43.36-PM-300x225.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 605px) 100vw, 605px" />
The description reads,
“(Im)Mobility Appendage is a live performance that explores the tension between the visible wound and the tacit wound. Over the course of one hour, viewers watch a kneeling figure get pierced twenty-six times followed by each piercing being strung to the wall like outstretched wings. The performance calls upon viewers to actively bear witness to the intimacy and eroticization of pain.” 
Eskenazi’s other works include projects titled “The Tetherings” and “Offerings to Bob Flanagan” among other less family-friendly projects that can be found on her website.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3050" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.27-PM.png" alt="" width="609" height="536" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.27-PM.png 609w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.27-PM-300x264.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 609px) 100vw, 609px" />
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3051" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.55-PM.png" alt="" width="612" height="536" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.55-PM.png 612w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.55-PM-300x263.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 612px) 100vw, 612px" />
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; July 7, 2023

<a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/people/mae-eskenazi" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mae Eskenazi</a> is a Graduate Associate in the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Department at the University of Pennsylvania.

Eskenazi is teaching a fall 2023 course titled, “Intro to Disability Studies.” According to the course description, this class “fuses disability studies, queer theory, Black feminist theory, visuality studies, film theory, and disabled artistic practices.”

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3048" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.12.12-PM.png" alt="" width="605" height="773" />

<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/06/disability-studies-new-fall-course" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Pennsylvanian</a> reports, “Eskenazi said that the questions explored through the course remain extremely relevant to the contemporary world, particularly amid the COVID-19 pandemic, current financial precarity, and ‘ongoing racialized and gendered logics of colonialism and imperialism.’” Additional <a href="https://www.thecollegefix.com/penn-disability-studies-course-to-fuse-visuality-studies-queer-black-feminist-and-film-theory/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">course topics</a> include crip theory, the AIDS epidemic, and sensorial artistic practice, among others.

When discussing the course, Eskenazi stated:
“Disability, debilitation, and illness are facets of everydayness, so I hope that this course removes disability from the visual spectacle that it causes and instead posits lived experiences of disability and debilitation into everyday life for the students who are studying.” 
According to Eskenazi’s university profile, she is a “transgender person” who uses they/them pronouns. Her profile reads,
“Mae Eskenazi (they/them) is a visual artist and ritualist whose interdisciplinary approach extends across sculpture, lens-based media, installation, plant medicine, and performance. Calling upon lineages of disabled/trans carework, Mae is interested in the enmeshment of BDSM, the medical industrial complex, mobility, and disability as it relates to biopolitical surveillance, control, and dichotomies of pain/pleasure. 
Curious about the invocation of the somatic and haptic, their work situates itself within questions of grief, memory, and collective amnesia as it unfolds beyond teleological temporalities within trans, disabled, chronically ill, and queer life.” 
Her <a href="https://www.meskenazi.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">personal website</a> features several pieces of her “work,” including the “(Im)Mobility Appendage.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3049" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.43.36-PM.png" alt="" width="605" height="453" />

The description reads,
“(Im)Mobility Appendage is a live performance that explores the tension between the visible wound and the tacit wound. Over the course of one hour, viewers watch a kneeling figure get pierced twenty-six times followed by each piercing being strung to the wall like outstretched wings. The performance calls upon viewers to actively bear witness to the intimacy and eroticization of pain.” 
Eskenazi’s other works include projects titled “The Tetherings” and “Offerings to Bob Flanagan” among other less family-friendly projects that can be found on her website.

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3050" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.27-PM.png" alt="" width="609" height="536" />

<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-3051" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Screen-Shot-2023-06-14-at-1.46.55-PM.png" alt="" width="612" height="536" />

&nbsp;
Published - July 7, 2023

screen-shot-2023-09-22-at-2-49-31-pm

Screen Shot 2023-09-22 at 2.49.31 PM

<a href="https://www.english.upenn.edu/people/melissa-e-sanchez" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Melissa Sanchez</a> is the Donald T. Regan Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Pennsylvania. She’s also the Director of the <a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Program in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies</a> and the <a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/center/about" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Center for Research in Feminist, Queer, and Transgender Studies</a>. According to her university profile, Sanchez’s research and literature focuses on “feminism, queer theory, and sixteenth- and seventeenth-century literature.”
Sanchez is the author of three books.“<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Queer-Faith-Promiscuity-Tradition-Cultures/dp/1479840866" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Queer Faith</a>: Reading Promiscuity and Race in the Secular Love Tradition” reassesses “key texts of the pre-history of modern monogamy &#8211; from Paul to Luther, Petrarch to Shakespeare &#8211; to show that writing assumed to promote fidelity in fact articulates the perversity of desire and the elusiveness of self-knowledge.”
Her other books are “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Shakespeare-Queer-Theory/dp/1474256678" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Shakespeare and Queer Theory</a>” and “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Erotic-Subjects-Sexuality-Politics-Literature/dp/0199754756" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Erotic Subjects</a>: The Sexuality of Politics in Early Modern English Literature.” The latter “examines how sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writers used scenarios of erotic violence and cross-gender identification to explore the origins and limits of political allegiance.”
In April 2022, Sanchez participated in one of the School of Arts and Sciences “<a href="https://www.facebook.com/PennSAS/videos/60-second-lecture-melissa-sanchez/1309588992779918/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">60-Second Lectures</a>.” She discussed why the executive board of the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Program (GSWS) changed the name of their research center to the Center for Research in Feminist, Queer and Transgender Studies (FQT Center).
“This change was meant to signal a more inclusive understanding of who our center is for, and more explicitly to demonstrate the center’s and the program’s commitment to solidarity with all women and all sexual and gendered minorities across campus.” 
Sanchez said GSWS and the FQT Center have a particular focus on “trans affirmative policies.” She discusses her opinion on the supposed lack of all-gender bathrooms on campus and the difficulty of accessing gender-affirming care. Sanchez claimed:
“These conditions in higher education are but a piece of a national climate in which the human rights and dignity of trans, non-binary and gender nonconforming persons are at best neglected and at worse willfully violated.” 
After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Sanchez was quoted in an article titled, “‘<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2022/07/abortion-penn-philadelphia-supreme-court-roe-wade-upenn" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A gut punch</a>’ Penn community reacts to uncertainty of abortion rights in Pennsylvania.” Sanchez stated:
“The ruling was like a gut punch, and in other ways it was exactly what I was expecting and exactly what’s been coming for decades. [This ruling is] not so much like a turning point as a culmination of what’s been happening since the 1970s. It’s more like a nail in the coffin.” 
Sanchez is also an outspoken supporter of <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/11/fossil-free-penn-fossil-fuels-ivy-league-upenn-philadelphia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">divesting from fossil fuels</a>. In November 2019, students from Fossil Free Penn interrupted the University’s Board of Trustees meeting to demand that administrators agree to a town hall meeting with students about fossil fuel divestment. In the wake of this incident, several faculty—including Sanchez—signed an open letter to the university that stated, in part:
“At the very least, the University leadership should agree to the town hall that the students are calling for and commit to a candid and open-minded deliberative dialogue on this uniquely pressing issue. Further, we believe that Penn should join the list of universities that have divested from fossil fuels, signaling an institutional commitment to the goals set forth by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in October 2018.”
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; September 22, 2023

<a href="https://www.english.upenn.edu/people/melissa-e-sanchez" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Melissa Sanchez</a> is the Donald T. Regan Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Pennsylvania. She’s also the Director of the <a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Program in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies</a> and the <a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/center/about" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Center for Research in Feminist, Queer, and Transgender Studies</a>. According to her university profile, Sanchez’s research and literature focuses on “feminism, queer theory, and sixteenth- and seventeenth-century literature.”

Sanchez is the author of three books.“<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Queer-Faith-Promiscuity-Tradition-Cultures/dp/1479840866" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Queer Faith</a>: Reading Promiscuity and Race in the Secular Love Tradition” reassesses “key texts of the pre-history of modern monogamy - from Paul to Luther, Petrarch to Shakespeare - to show that writing assumed to promote fidelity in fact articulates the perversity of desire and the elusiveness of self-knowledge.”

Her other books are “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Shakespeare-Queer-Theory/dp/1474256678" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Shakespeare and Queer Theory</a>” and “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Erotic-Subjects-Sexuality-Politics-Literature/dp/0199754756" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Erotic Subjects</a>: The Sexuality of Politics in Early Modern English Literature.” The latter “examines how sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writers used scenarios of erotic violence and cross-gender identification to explore the origins and limits of political allegiance.”

In April 2022, Sanchez participated in one of the School of Arts and Sciences “<a href="https://www.facebook.com/PennSAS/videos/60-second-lecture-melissa-sanchez/1309588992779918/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">60-Second Lectures</a>.” She discussed why the executive board of the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Program (GSWS) changed the name of their research center to the Center for Research in Feminist, Queer and Transgender Studies (FQT Center).
“This change was meant to signal a more inclusive understanding of who our center is for, and more explicitly to demonstrate the center’s and the program’s commitment to solidarity with all women and all sexual and gendered minorities across campus.” 
Sanchez said GSWS and the FQT Center have a particular focus on “trans affirmative policies.” She discusses her opinion on the supposed lack of all-gender bathrooms on campus and the difficulty of accessing gender-affirming care. Sanchez claimed:
“These conditions in higher education are but a piece of a national climate in which the human rights and dignity of trans, non-binary and gender nonconforming persons are at best neglected and at worse willfully violated.” 
After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Sanchez was quoted in an article titled, “‘<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2022/07/abortion-penn-philadelphia-supreme-court-roe-wade-upenn" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A gut punch</a>’ Penn community reacts to uncertainty of abortion rights in Pennsylvania.” Sanchez stated:
“The ruling was like a gut punch, and in other ways it was exactly what I was expecting and exactly what’s been coming for decades. [This ruling is] not so much like a turning point as a culmination of what’s been happening since the 1970s. It’s more like a nail in the coffin.” 
Sanchez is also an outspoken supporter of <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/11/fossil-free-penn-fossil-fuels-ivy-league-upenn-philadelphia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">divesting from fossil fuels</a>. In November 2019, students from Fossil Free Penn interrupted the University’s Board of Trustees meeting to demand that administrators agree to a town hall meeting with students about fossil fuel divestment. In the wake of this incident, several faculty—including Sanchez—signed an open letter to the university that stated, in part:
“At the very least, the University leadership should agree to the town hall that the students are calling for and commit to a candid and open-minded deliberative dialogue on this uniquely pressing issue. Further, we believe that Penn should join the list of universities that have divested from fossil fuels, signaling an institutional commitment to the goals set forth by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in October 2018.”
&nbsp;
Published - September 22, 2023

screen-shot-2023-11-03-at-4-06-54-pm

Screen Shot 2023-11-03 at 4.06.54 PM

<a href="https://mec.sas.upenn.edu/people/huda-fakhreddine" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Huda Fakhreddine</a> is an Associate Professor of Arabic Literature at the University of Pennsylvania.
Professor Fakhreddine helped organize the <a href="https://nelc.sas.upenn.edu/events/2023/09/22/palestine-writes-literature-festival" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Palestine Writes Literature Festival</a> that was held on the University of Pennsylvania campus in September 2023. After the university came under fire for hosting the event, Fakhreddine said the festival’s promoters “reject the suggestion that we would invite or engage anyone who is antisemitic or endorses antisemitism.”
Fakhreddine shared her frustration with the “conflation between criticism of Israel and antisemitism.” She added, “The assumption that supporting Palestinians means antisemitic sentiment is ignorant and racist.”
However, festival participant Refaat Alareer was featured in <a href="https://www.campusreform.org/article/upenn-reportedly-sponsored-palestinian-writer-who-joked-about-hamas-burning-baby-in-oven-after-it-allegedly-ignored-warnings-/24292" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Campus Reform</a> after he “took to X to mock the Jewish baby that Hamas terrorists cooked alive in an oven during the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks.”
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3242" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM-1024x502.png" alt="" width="640" height="314" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM-1024x502.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM-300x147.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM-768x376.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM-1200x588.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM.png 1302w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
<a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/09/12/are-most-jews-evil-top-us-university-hosting-palestine-literature-festival-featuring-avid-anti-zionists/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Algemeiner</a> notes that Alareer has shared antisemitic sentiments on his X/Twitter account since 2018, when he tweeted, “Are most Jews evil? Of course they are.”
On October 16, 2023, Fakhreddine <a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/10/18/israeli-jew-has-bastardized-judaism-pro-palestinian-rally-upenn-descends-antisemitism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">participated in a walkout</a> at the University of Pennsylvania to “protest the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.” Fakhreddine spoke at the walk-out rally, stating:
“Israel is the epitome of antisemitism … it desecrates the memory of the Holocaust victims. It humiliates every Jewish person.” 
<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/09/penn-palestine-writes-literature-festival-magill-statement" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Pennsylvanian</a> reports that participants in the rally also criticized University President M. Elizabeth Magill’s statement on the conflict. Magill’s statement referred to the Hamas attacks as a “terrorist assault” and clarified the university’s stance on the Palestine Writes Literature Festival:
“The University did not, and emphatically does not, endorse these speakers or their views. While we did communicate, we should have moved faster to share our position strongly and more broadly with the Penn community.” 
In <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/10/penn-walkout-palestine-rally-march-magill" target="_blank" rel="noopener">response to Magill’s comments</a>, Fakhreddine said, “[The statement] was a complete shock to me. I could not fathom that in the midst of actual literal genocide being broadcasted live on the air, [Magill] had time and energy to write that letter without a single mention of Palestine.”
On October 27, 2023, Fakhreddine posted a petition titled “<a href="https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfklLdVWlH1yNSK3T4mINpIhbx8T6uiBxReVOMhTNb9EbitRQ/viewform" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Academics Against the Assault on Gaza</a>” on her <a href="https://twitter.com/FakhreddineHuda/status/1717946669004710374" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter account</a>, with the message “Sign and Circulate.” The letter states:
“We are concerned academics watching with horror as Israel subjects 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, more than half of them refugees, to industrial-scale violence of unfathomable proportions, to war crime after grotesque war crime, to siege and starvation.”
“We say, ‘Enough!’ No to another forced mass displacement of Palestinians! No to fascist incitement! No to the sadistic collective punishment of a captive population! No to this nihilistic and gainless war!” 
Fakhreddine <a href="https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfOnCRPGqU6IMiq9p_2xthefc9g8R_3UE0UOpXc6nlAO_FL_g/viewform" target="_blank" rel="noopener">circulated another statement</a> on <a href="https://twitter.com/FakhreddineHuda/status/1714944831649182082" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter</a> that stated:
“Israel is a racist apartheid regime. It hates innocence so kills children. It hates the truth so kills journalists. It hates nature so uproots olive trees.”
It concludes:
“We, the undersigned, take this opportunity to stand with our people in Gaza, in particular, and Palestine in general, in solidarity with their legendary resilience and their struggle in defense of their historical right to their land. We salute their courageous stance against the forces of colonization, fascism, and racism.” 
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; November 3, 2023

<a href="https://mec.sas.upenn.edu/people/huda-fakhreddine" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Huda Fakhreddine</a> is an Associate Professor of Arabic Literature at the University of Pennsylvania.

Professor Fakhreddine helped organize the <a href="https://nelc.sas.upenn.edu/events/2023/09/22/palestine-writes-literature-festival" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Palestine Writes Literature Festival</a> that was held on the University of Pennsylvania campus in September 2023. After the university came under fire for hosting the event, Fakhreddine said the festival’s promoters “reject the suggestion that we would invite or engage anyone who is antisemitic or endorses antisemitism.”

Fakhreddine shared her frustration with the “conflation between criticism of Israel and antisemitism.” She added, “The assumption that supporting Palestinians means antisemitic sentiment is ignorant and racist.”

However, festival participant Refaat Alareer was featured in <a href="https://www.campusreform.org/article/upenn-reportedly-sponsored-palestinian-writer-who-joked-about-hamas-burning-baby-in-oven-after-it-allegedly-ignored-warnings-/24292" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Campus Reform</a> after he “took to X to mock the Jewish baby that Hamas terrorists cooked alive in an oven during the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks.”

<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3242" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-02-at-4.17.20-PM-1024x502.png" alt="" width="640" height="314" />

<a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/09/12/are-most-jews-evil-top-us-university-hosting-palestine-literature-festival-featuring-avid-anti-zionists/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Algemeiner</a> notes that Alareer has shared antisemitic sentiments on his X/Twitter account since 2018, when he tweeted, “Are most Jews evil? Of course they are.”

On October 16, 2023, Fakhreddine <a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/10/18/israeli-jew-has-bastardized-judaism-pro-palestinian-rally-upenn-descends-antisemitism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">participated in a walkout</a> at the University of Pennsylvania to “protest the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.” Fakhreddine spoke at the walk-out rally, stating:
“Israel is the epitome of antisemitism … it desecrates the memory of the Holocaust victims. It humiliates every Jewish person.” 
<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/09/penn-palestine-writes-literature-festival-magill-statement" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Pennsylvanian</a> reports that participants in the rally also criticized University President M. Elizabeth Magill’s statement on the conflict. Magill’s statement referred to the Hamas attacks as a “terrorist assault” and clarified the university’s stance on the Palestine Writes Literature Festival:
“The University did not, and emphatically does not, endorse these speakers or their views. While we did communicate, we should have moved faster to share our position strongly and more broadly with the Penn community.” 
In <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/10/penn-walkout-palestine-rally-march-magill" target="_blank" rel="noopener">response to Magill’s comments</a>, Fakhreddine said, “[The statement] was a complete shock to me. I could not fathom that in the midst of actual literal genocide being broadcasted live on the air, [Magill] had time and energy to write that letter without a single mention of Palestine.”

On October 27, 2023, Fakhreddine posted a petition titled “<a href="https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfklLdVWlH1yNSK3T4mINpIhbx8T6uiBxReVOMhTNb9EbitRQ/viewform" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Academics Against the Assault on Gaza</a>” on her <a href="https://twitter.com/FakhreddineHuda/status/1717946669004710374" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter account</a>, with the message “Sign and Circulate.” The letter states:
“We are concerned academics watching with horror as Israel subjects 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, more than half of them refugees, to industrial-scale violence of unfathomable proportions, to war crime after grotesque war crime, to siege and starvation.”
“We say, ‘Enough!’ No to another forced mass displacement of Palestinians! No to fascist incitement! No to the sadistic collective punishment of a captive population! No to this nihilistic and gainless war!” 
Fakhreddine <a href="https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfOnCRPGqU6IMiq9p_2xthefc9g8R_3UE0UOpXc6nlAO_FL_g/viewform" target="_blank" rel="noopener">circulated another statement</a> on <a href="https://twitter.com/FakhreddineHuda/status/1714944831649182082" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter</a> that stated:
“Israel is a racist apartheid regime. It hates innocence so kills children. It hates the truth so kills journalists. It hates nature so uproots olive trees.”
It concludes:
“We, the undersigned, take this opportunity to stand with our people in Gaza, in particular, and Palestine in general, in solidarity with their legendary resilience and their struggle in defense of their historical right to their land. We salute their courageous stance against the forces of colonization, fascism, and racism.” 
&nbsp;
Published - November 3, 2023

screen-shot-2023-11-07-at-9-06-24-am

Screen Shot 2023-11-07 at 9.06.24 AM

<a href="https://creative.writing.upenn.edu/people/ahmad-almallah" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ahmad Almallah</a> is a Palestinian poet and artist in Residence in the Creative Writing and English departments at the University of Pennsylvania.
On October 16, 2023, Almallah <a href="https://www.jns.org/upenn-fire-your-antisemitic-professors/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">participated in a walkout</a> on the University of Pennsylvania’s campus to “protest the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.” Almallah was the first faculty member to speak at the rally and shared that he had missed two of his classes to be present at the event.
Professor Almallah led chants of “from the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” and “resistance is justified, when you are occupied.” <a href="https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/upenn-palestine-rally-what-the-editorials-wont-post/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Times of Israel</a> writes,
“The former implies a desire for a Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, and, consequently, the erasure of the State of Israel entirely. The latter seems to justify Palestinian terrorism without qualification, be it bombing civilians on buses or murdering entire families in Israeli villages.” 
Almallah told the crowd:
“When for 17 years, a piece of earth was removed from the world, only to sustain the slow murder of its jailed population … its mothers who have been giving birth to human animals, according to the other side. SHAME!” 
He concluded his speech by shouting “Intifada, intifada, intifada,” which has long been a Palestinian call to murder Jews and Jewish Israelis. The protest lasted roughly seven hours, with protesters waving Palestinian flags and <a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/10/18/israeli-jew-has-bastardized-judaism-pro-palestinian-rally-upenn-descends-antisemitism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">chanting slogans</a> such as, “Israel, Israel, you can’t hide, we caught you in genocide.”
Almallah told <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/10/penn-walkout-palestine-rally-march-magill" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Pennsylvanian</a> he wanted to participate in the event because he wanted to “do something to reaffirm [his] humanity.” He also told the newspaper, “I feel as though I am a lonely Palestinian, that nobody has reached out from the institution or extended any words of sympathy to me.”
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; November 7, 2023

<a href="https://creative.writing.upenn.edu/people/ahmad-almallah" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ahmad Almallah</a> is a Palestinian poet and artist in Residence in the Creative Writing and English departments at the University of Pennsylvania.

On October 16, 2023, Almallah <a href="https://www.jns.org/upenn-fire-your-antisemitic-professors/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">participated in a walkout</a> on the University of Pennsylvania’s campus to “protest the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.” Almallah was the first faculty member to speak at the rally and shared that he had missed two of his classes to be present at the event.

Professor Almallah led chants of “from the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” and “resistance is justified, when you are occupied.” <a href="https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/upenn-palestine-rally-what-the-editorials-wont-post/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Times of Israel</a> writes,
“The former implies a desire for a Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, and, consequently, the erasure of the State of Israel entirely. The latter seems to justify Palestinian terrorism without qualification, be it bombing civilians on buses or murdering entire families in Israeli villages.” 
Almallah told the crowd:
“When for 17 years, a piece of earth was removed from the world, only to sustain the slow murder of its jailed population … its mothers who have been giving birth to human animals, according to the other side. SHAME!” 
He concluded his speech by shouting “Intifada, intifada, intifada,” which has long been a Palestinian call to murder Jews and Jewish Israelis. The protest lasted roughly seven hours, with protesters waving Palestinian flags and <a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/10/18/israeli-jew-has-bastardized-judaism-pro-palestinian-rally-upenn-descends-antisemitism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">chanting slogans</a> such as, “Israel, Israel, you can’t hide, we caught you in genocide.”

Almallah told <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2023/10/penn-walkout-palestine-rally-march-magill" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Pennsylvanian</a> he wanted to participate in the event because he wanted to “do something to reaffirm [his] humanity.” He also told the newspaper, “I feel as though I am a lonely Palestinian, that nobody has reached out from the institution or extended any words of sympathy to me.”

&nbsp;
Published - November 7, 2023

screen-shot-2023-11-07-at-11-09-12-am

Screen Shot 2023-11-07 at 11.09.12 AM

<a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/people/sophie-lewis" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Sophie Lewis</a> is a visiting scholar at the Center for Research in Feminist, Queer, and Transgender Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. According to her university profile, her scholarship “operates in the spheres of trans feminist cultural criticism and queer social reproduction theory, and [her] interests include utopian critiques of the family, Marxist feminisms, Black radicalism and antiwork theory.” Lewis authored “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Abolish-Family-Manifesto-Care-Liberation/dp/1839767197" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation</a>” which makes the case for family abolition. She also wrote “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Full-Surrogacy-Now-Feminism-Against/dp/1786637294" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family</a>” which advocates for higher rates of surrogacy to “overthrow” the family.
After Hamas terrorists attacked Israel in October 2023, Lewis <a href="https://www.campusreform.org/article?id=24238" target="_blank" rel="noopener">signed a statement</a> titled, “Writers in Solidarity with Palestine.” The letter begins, “We are writers who unequivocally stand with Palestine and its fight for liberation against the illegal occupation of ‘Israel’ and the violent settler colonial apartheid state.”
Some of the letter’s claims include: 
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“The west is actively backing the ongoing settler colonial project that endorses either a slow or fast genocide, but is genocide either way.”</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“Any form of Palestinian resistance is in no way equivalent to the daily violence of ‘Israeli’ settlers, the IOF (‘Israeli’ Occupying Forces), and the entire ‘Israeli’ state apparatus. Palestinian resistance exists because settler colonial occupation exists.” </li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“The resistance is an ongoing response to a long history of ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.” </li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“Politicians at all levels of government internationally, primarily those in the west, are deliberately weaponizing islamophobic and orientalist language in order to manufacture consent for genocide in Palestine, heighten surveillance and policing domestically, and suppress any manner of showing solidarity with Palestine.” </li>
</ul>
The writers end with several “calls to action” for the signatories and their institutions, including: 
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“To stand in firm, vocal, and unwavering solidarity with Palestinian resistance against their occupation until liberation, by amplifying Palestinian voices in a time of mass disinformation and silencing; and by openly discussing the occupation in your workplace, home, on social media, in your work.” </li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“To boycott all other literary institutions who profess Zionist affiliations.” </li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“To engage with the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, a Palestinian-led movement to end international support for ‘Israel’s’ oppression of Palestinians and all institutions complicit in ‘Israeli’ apartheid and settler colonialism.” </li>
</ul>
The statement has since been removed but can still be found on <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20231019194337/https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UVp2E4VoBgXTOYDs6BAAWI8fiaEUqFLOHoN50LKy4oI/edit" target="_blank" rel="noopener">internet archives</a>.
Lewis also shared the following on her <a href="https://twitter.com/reproutopia?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter account</a>:
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3273" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.25-AM-1024x500.png" alt="" width="640" height="313" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.25-AM-1024x500.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.25-AM-300x146.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.25-AM-768x375.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.25-AM.png 1196w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3274" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.33-AM-1024x459.png" alt="" width="640" height="287" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.33-AM-1024x459.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.33-AM-300x134.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.33-AM-768x344.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.33-AM.png 1196w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
Please send any information regarding Sophie Lewis to <a href="mailto:watchlists@tpusa.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">watchlists@tpusa.com</a>.
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; November 7, 2023

<a href="https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/people/sophie-lewis" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Sophie Lewis</a> is a visiting scholar at the Center for Research in Feminist, Queer, and Transgender Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. According to her university profile, her scholarship “operates in the spheres of trans feminist cultural criticism and queer social reproduction theory, and [her] interests include utopian critiques of the family, Marxist feminisms, Black radicalism and antiwork theory.” Lewis authored “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Abolish-Family-Manifesto-Care-Liberation/dp/1839767197" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation</a>” which makes the case for family abolition. She also wrote “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Full-Surrogacy-Now-Feminism-Against/dp/1786637294" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family</a>” which advocates for higher rates of surrogacy to “overthrow” the family.

After Hamas terrorists attacked Israel in October 2023, Lewis <a href="https://www.campusreform.org/article?id=24238" target="_blank" rel="noopener">signed a statement</a> titled, “Writers in Solidarity with Palestine.” The letter begins, “We are writers who unequivocally stand with Palestine and its fight for liberation against the illegal occupation of ‘Israel’ and the violent settler colonial apartheid state.”

Some of the letter’s claims include: 
<ul>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“The west is actively backing the ongoing settler colonial project that endorses either a slow or fast genocide, but is genocide either way.”</li>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“Any form of Palestinian resistance is in no way equivalent to the daily violence of ‘Israeli’ settlers, the IOF (‘Israeli’ Occupying Forces), and the entire ‘Israeli’ state apparatus. Palestinian resistance exists because settler colonial occupation exists.” </li>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“The resistance is an ongoing response to a long history of ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.” </li>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“Politicians at all levels of government internationally, primarily those in the west, are deliberately weaponizing islamophobic and orientalist language in order to manufacture consent for genocide in Palestine, heighten surveillance and policing domestically, and suppress any manner of showing solidarity with Palestine.” </li>
</ul>
The writers end with several “calls to action” for the signatories and their institutions, including: 
<ul>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“To stand in firm, vocal, and unwavering solidarity with Palestinian resistance against their occupation until liberation, by amplifying Palestinian voices in a time of mass disinformation and silencing; and by openly discussing the occupation in your workplace, home, on social media, in your work.” </li>
</ul>
<ul>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“To boycott all other literary institutions who profess Zionist affiliations.” </li>
 	<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">“To engage with the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, a Palestinian-led movement to end international support for ‘Israel’s’ oppression of Palestinians and all institutions complicit in ‘Israeli’ apartheid and settler colonialism.” </li>
</ul>
The statement has since been removed but can still be found on <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20231019194337/https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UVp2E4VoBgXTOYDs6BAAWI8fiaEUqFLOHoN50LKy4oI/edit" target="_blank" rel="noopener">internet archives</a>.

Lewis also shared the following on her <a href="https://twitter.com/reproutopia?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Twitter account</a>:

<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3273" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.25-AM-1024x500.png" alt="" width="640" height="313" />

<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3274" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screen-Shot-2023-11-01-at-10.39.33-AM-1024x459.png" alt="" width="640" height="287" />

Please send any information regarding Sophie Lewis to <a href="mailto:watchlists@tpusa.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">watchlists@tpusa.com</a>.

&nbsp;
Published - November 7, 2023

screen-shot-2024-02-14-at-12-10-43-pm

Screen Shot 2024-02-14 at 12.10.43 PM

<a href="https://www.asc.upenn.edu/people/faculty/dwayne-booth" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dwayne Booth</a> is a Lecturer at the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. Booth, who goes by the pen name Mr. Fish, joined the faculty in 2015 and has been a cartoonist for 20 years.
Booth came under fire after the <a href="https://freebeacon.com/campus/penn-lecturer-is-behind-grotesque-anti-semitic-cartoons/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Washington Free Beacon</a> discovered political cartoons about the Israel-Hamas war that were posted on his website. The Free Beacon reports:
“[Booth] has published several anti-Semitic cartoons since Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, including one that depicts Zionists sipping Gazan blood from wine glasses, a version of the ancient blood libel employed in anti-Semitic propaganda that accused Jews of using the blood of Christian children for baking matzah and other rituals.” 
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3421" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-14-at-9.56.23-AM-1024x820.png" alt="" width="640" height="513" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-14-at-9.56.23-AM-1024x820.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-14-at-9.56.23-AM-300x240.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-14-at-9.56.23-AM-768x615.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-14-at-9.56.23-AM.png 1122w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
Another cartoon shows Jews in a Nazi concentration camp holding signs with slogans such as “Free Palestine” and “Gaza, The World’s Biggest Concentration Camp.”
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3422" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM-1024x775.png" alt="" width="640" height="484" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM-1024x775.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM-300x227.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM-768x582.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM-1200x909.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM.png 1252w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" /> 
Several more examples of Booth’s cartoons can be seen below:
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3423" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM-1024x931.png" alt="" width="640" height="582" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM-1024x931.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM-300x273.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM-768x698.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM-1200x1091.png 1200w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM.png 1232w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3424" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.40-PM-1024x980.png" alt="" width="640" height="613" srcset="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.40-PM-1024x980.png 1024w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.40-PM-300x287.png 300w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.40-PM-768x735.png 768w, https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.40-PM.png 1170w" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px" />
In <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/dwayne-booth-penn-political-cartoons-antisemitism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">response to Booth</a>, Penn’s Interim President J. Larry Jameson wrote:
“I will not, and should not, respond to every event on our campus, but I want it understood that these political cartoons, posted on a personal website, were not taught in the classroom and do not reflect the views of the University of Pennsylvania or me, personally. I find them reprehensible, with antisemitic symbols, and incongruent with our efforts to fight hate.” 
Jameson added:
“At Penn, we have a bedrock commitment to open expression and academic freedom, principles that were unanimously reaffirmed last week by our Faculty Senate Executive Committee. We also have a responsibility to challenge what we find offensive, and to do so acknowledging the right and ability of members of our community to express their views, however loathsome we find them.”
In a follow-up article, the <a href="https://freebeacon.com/campus/penn-president-will-not-act-to-remove-anti-semitic-cartoonist-from-faculty-citing-bedrock-commitment-to-open-expression/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Free Beacon</a> criticized Jameson’s response, saying he made it clear the university would not act to discipline or remove Booth from the faculty:
“Jameson’s tepid response … raises questions about whether the school has implemented meaningful changes in the wake of former president Liz Magill’s dismissal in December and the establishment of a task force on anti-Semitism.” 
In response to the university’s statement, Booth <a href="https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/penn-lecturer-criticized-for-creating-reprehensible-antisemitic-cartoons/3766737/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">defended his comments</a> and argued that work could be “misread.”
“Political artists have always had to grapple with the possibility that a misreading of their work, willing or otherwise, could disrupt the intention and usability of their commentary, thereby complicating the trajectory of whatever debate might follow.” 
“In the case of the international conversation about the current war in Gaza, it will be impossible to have a substantive debate over the specifics and potential outcomes so long as there remains a lazy conflation that makes the State of Israel and the politics that guide its actions as a nation inseparable from Judaism, itself.” 
On February 5, 2024, Booth <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2024/02/penn-lecturer-political-cartoons-antisemitism-controversy" target="_blank" rel="noopener">released a cartoon</a> entitled “Quiet!” which showed Uncle Sam with his hand over a person’s mouth. The caption read, “Critical thinking is bad for America.”
&nbsp;
Published &#8211; February 15, 2024

<a href="https://www.asc.upenn.edu/people/faculty/dwayne-booth" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dwayne Booth</a> is a Lecturer at the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. Booth, who goes by the pen name Mr. Fish, joined the faculty in 2015 and has been a cartoonist for 20 years.

Booth came under fire after the <a href="https://freebeacon.com/campus/penn-lecturer-is-behind-grotesque-anti-semitic-cartoons/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Washington Free Beacon</a> discovered political cartoons about the Israel-Hamas war that were posted on his website. The Free Beacon reports:
“[Booth] has published several anti-Semitic cartoons since Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, including one that depicts Zionists sipping Gazan blood from wine glasses, a version of the ancient blood libel employed in anti-Semitic propaganda that accused Jews of using the blood of Christian children for baking matzah and other rituals.” 
<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3421" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-14-at-9.56.23-AM-1024x820.png" alt="" width="640" height="513" />

Another cartoon shows Jews in a Nazi concentration camp holding signs with slogans such as “Free Palestine” and “Gaza, The World’s Biggest Concentration Camp.”

<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3422" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.04.24-PM-1024x775.png" alt="" width="640" height="484" />
Several more examples of Booth’s cartoons can be seen below:

<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3423" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.25-PM-1024x931.png" alt="" width="640" height="582" />

<img class="alignnone size-large wp-image-3424" src="https://backend.professorwatchlist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Screen-Shot-2024-02-08-at-2.05.40-PM-1024x980.png" alt="" width="640" height="613" />

In <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/dwayne-booth-penn-political-cartoons-antisemitism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">response to Booth</a>, Penn’s Interim President J. Larry Jameson wrote:
“I will not, and should not, respond to every event on our campus, but I want it understood that these political cartoons, posted on a personal website, were not taught in the classroom and do not reflect the views of the University of Pennsylvania or me, personally. I find them reprehensible, with antisemitic symbols, and incongruent with our efforts to fight hate.” 
Jameson added:
“At Penn, we have a bedrock commitment to open expression and academic freedom, principles that were unanimously reaffirmed last week by our Faculty Senate Executive Committee. We also have a responsibility to challenge what we find offensive, and to do so acknowledging the right and ability of members of our community to express their views, however loathsome we find them.”
In a follow-up article, the <a href="https://freebeacon.com/campus/penn-president-will-not-act-to-remove-anti-semitic-cartoonist-from-faculty-citing-bedrock-commitment-to-open-expression/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Free Beacon</a> criticized Jameson’s response, saying he made it clear the university would not act to discipline or remove Booth from the faculty:
“Jameson’s tepid response … raises questions about whether the school has implemented meaningful changes in the wake of former president Liz Magill’s dismissal in December and the establishment of a task force on anti-Semitism.” 
In response to the university’s statement, Booth <a href="https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/penn-lecturer-criticized-for-creating-reprehensible-antisemitic-cartoons/3766737/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">defended his comments</a> and argued that work could be “misread.”
“Political artists have always had to grapple with the possibility that a misreading of their work, willing or otherwise, could disrupt the intention and usability of their commentary, thereby complicating the trajectory of whatever debate might follow.” 
“In the case of the international conversation about the current war in Gaza, it will be impossible to have a substantive debate over the specifics and potential outcomes so long as there remains a lazy conflation that makes the State of Israel and the politics that guide its actions as a nation inseparable from Judaism, itself.” 
On February 5, 2024, Booth <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2024/02/penn-lecturer-political-cartoons-antisemitism-controversy" target="_blank" rel="noopener">released a cartoon</a> entitled “Quiet!” which showed Uncle Sam with his hand over a person’s mouth. The caption read, “Critical thinking is bad for America.”
&nbsp;
Published - February 15, 2024

University of Pennsylvania

Overview:

Fast Facts:

REPORT CARD:

Our Mission

educate

restore

motivate

Support Dean's List

RioSlum Studio

University of Pennsylvania

Overview:

Fast Facts:

REPORT CARD:

Our Mission

educate

restore

motivate

Support Dean's List