AYA - Assembly Spring 2002

Assembly LX: Free Speech, Free Expression and Free Inquiry at Yale
Friday, April 26 through Saturday, April 27, 2002
First Assembly Session

Of Values and Priorities: History and Practice of Free Speech at Yale

Note: a full audio recording of the opening session is available at www.aya.yale.edu/assembly/s02/gbpres.htm. Please refer to these recordings for full details and also direct other alumni to this site to listen to the recordings.

Early Friday afternoon following the luncheon, Maureen O. Doran '71 MSN welcomed delegates to the 60th AYA Assembly and introduced Assembly chair Mark Greenwold '66. In his opening remarks, Greenwold referenced the report of the Woodward committee, which was formulated in 1972 and remains the defining document for the university's policies regarding freedom of speech:

"The primary function of a university is to discover and disseminate knowledge by means of research and teaching. To fulfill this function a free interchange of ideas is necessary not only within its walls but with the world beyond as well. It follows that the university must do everything possible to ensure within it the fullest degree of intellectual freedom. The history of intellectual growth and discovery clearly demonstrates the need for unfettered freedom, the right to think the unthinkable, discuss the unmentionable, and challenge the unchallengeable. To curtail free expression, strikes twice at intellectual freedom, for whoever deprives another of the right to state unpopular views necessarily also deprives others of the right to listen to those views." (See the full text of the report at http://www.aya.yale.edu/assembly/s02/woodward.pdf.)

Greenwold then posed the following questions:

He also discussed at some length the tensions that arise between free speech and other values that may conflict with free speech.