9/11 IN THE ACADEMIC COMMUNITY
Documentary Preview & Press Release
August 5, 2013

Coming this fall, “9/11 in the Academic Community,” a Winner of the University of Toronto Film Festival, is a unique film that documents academia’s treatment of critical perspectives on 9/11 by exploring the taboo that shields the American government’s narrative from scholarly examination. Through a powerful reflection on intellectual courage and the purpose of academia, the film aims at changing intellectual discourse on 9/11 and the War on Terror.

All efforts are being made to make this film available by this October. Please widely distribute the following preview:

As well as probing the repercussions several scholars have endured due to their investigation of 9/11, this documentary provides an analysis of impairments in professional inquiry, ranging from the failure to critically reflect on terms functioning as thought-stoppers (such as “conspiracy theory”) to the structural approach that restricts inquiry to the broad implications of 9/11 while shutting out enquiry into the events of the day itself. Morton Brussel, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, has stated: “The main thesis of the film concerns the silence of the academic community on this vital issue. I think it is extremely important and very well produced.”

As 9/11 served as the rationale for the Global War on Terror, the expansion of the military and intelligence complex, the invasion of other countries in violation of international law, and the curtailing of civil liberties, the film provides an inspiring demonstration of intellectual courage that will cause many scholars to reflect on the academy’s role and strength to dismantle the war system. As Alvin A. Lee, President Emeritus of McMaster University, has stated in his endorsement of the film: academics should “stand sufficiently outside society intellectually to see, understand, and interpret what is going on.”

Adnan Zuberi
Director and Producer
9/11 in the Academic Community

This documentary confronts the academy’s uncritical response to the
defining event of our times. It is an essential viewing for everyone in academe.

Lance deHaven-Smith
Professor of Public Administration and Policy at Florida State University
Former President of the Florida Political Science Association

As an academic, I found the film to accurately describe how
academics tend to deal with controversial issues.

Hendrik Van den Berg
Professor of Economics at University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Former Foreign Service Officer, U.S. Department of State

See the Endorsements Section for more Statements of Support for “9/11 in the Academic Community”