October 28th, 2015
The undersigned faculty, staff, emeriti, and graduate students of the Department of Asian Studies oppose Senate Bill 11, the campus carry law that is scheduled to go into effect on August 1st, 2016. We believe that the presence of concealed firearms on our campus – particularly in classrooms, faculty offices, dormitories, and social spaces – is a threat to academic freedom, freedom of speech, and freedom of expression. The presence of firearms in any conversation does nothing but create an uneven field of play. Many of us teach courses that encourage our students to discuss and conduct research on difficult topics, such as social and gender inequality, communal and political violence, and conflicts over land and resources: our students and faculty must be able to discuss such subjects without fear or intimidation. We are also concerned that the implementation of this law will only bring the reputation of the University of Texas at Austin to ruin – we will lose colleagues to other universities or to early retirement because of this. Neither will we be able to recruit excellent faculty and students to our campus. There is no evidence to support the claim that the presence of firearms on our campus will make us safer, and greater access to weapons can only result in tragedy. We hereby urge the Task Force and our administrators to ensure that concealed weapons are barred from campus buildings.
Signed,
Joel P. Brereton, Professor
Gregory Max Bruce, Ph.D. candidate
Joni Carpenter, Undergraduate Academic Adviser
Kirsten Cather, Associate Professor
Chikako Cooke, Lecturer
Jeannie Cortez, Administrative Assistant
Oliver Freiberger, Associate Professor
Andrea Gutierrez, Ph.D. student
Shahnaz Hassan, Lecturer
Junko Hatanaka, Lecturer
Heather Hindman, Associate Professor
Camilla Hsieh, Senior Lecturer
Madeline Hsu, Associate Professor
Hillary Langberg, Ph.D. candidate
Katie Lazarowicz, Ph.D. student
Kathleen Longwaters, Ph.D. candidate
Gail Minault, Professor Emerita
Neha Mohan, Administrative Assistant
Paula Newberg, Professor
Patrick J. Olivelle, Professor Emeritus
Daniel Rudmann, Ph.D. candidate
Tomoko Sakuma, Lecturer
Gautami Shah, Senior Lecturer
Jishnu Shankar, Senior Lecturer
Martha Ann Selby, Professor and Chair
David Sena, Lecturer
Naoko Suito, Senior Lecturer
Wen-Hua Teng, Senior Lecturer
Jennifer Tipton, Executive Assistant/Office Manager
Chien-Hsin Tsai, Assistant Professor
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