Cultural Critique

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Abstracting and indexing

The journal is abstracted and indexed in the following bibliographic databases: [2]

Israeli scholar discrimination controversy

Amidst the Israel–Hamas war in 2024 Cultural Critique was forced to issue a public apology for rejecting a contribution by an Israeli scholar solely on the basis of his assumed institutional affiliation in Israel. The journal had rejected the scholar's submission in a letter which stated, "We regret to inform you that we cannot consider your submission for publication due to the journal's commitment to BDS guidelines, which includes 'withdrawing support from Israel's ... cultural and academic institutions.'" [3] [4] The scholar replied that, as the biography attached to his submission had made clear, he had no affiliation to Israeli institutions, and argued that Cultural Critique had turned his paper down solely on the basis of his nationality; this despite even the BDS guidelines themselves explicitly opposing the boycott of individuals. [3] [5] Cultural Critique reportedly replied that they could not verify his non-Israeli affiliation and would only reconsider his rejection should he provide evidence of this being the case. [3]

Following publicity as well as a threat of legal action against its publisher, the University of Minnesota, for violating anti-discrimination legislation and Minnesota's anti-BDS law, [3] [4] as well as a porported investigation by the United States Department of Education Office for Civil Rights, [3] both the University of Minnesota and Cultural Critique apologized for the incident. The journal claimed to have "mistakenly excluded from consideration an article submitted by a scholar on the basis of their university affiliation." [4] Cultural Critique announced that should the author choose to resubmit his piece, it would now be reviewed "using our normal processes." [4]

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References

  1. "Cultural Critique". University of Minnesota Press.
  2. "Cultural Critique". MIAR: Information Matrix for the Analysis of Journals. University of Barcelona . Retrieved 2020-02-23.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Eggers, Charlie. "University of Minnesota-Published Academic Journal Asserts BDS Guidelines to Reject Israeli Scholar's Work". The Minnesota Republic. Retrieved 2024-05-31.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Maltz, Judy (2024-05-31). "University of Minnesota academic journal apologizes for boycotting Israeli scholar". Haaretz. Retrieved 2024-05-31.
  5. Weissman, Miri (5 May 2024). "Scholar claims academic journal rejects his work over BDS stance". Israel Hayom. Retrieved 2024-05-31.