A Duke professor is making a bold statement about free speech with a new book likely to touch a nerve among many Muslims.
Gary Hull, director of the Program on Values and Ethics in the Marketplace and a lecturing fellow in sociology, released a book Monday featuring depictions of the Prophet Muhammad, the founder of Islam. Alongside the book’s historical images are cartoons of the Prophet, whose publication in September 2005 in a Danish newspaper sparked protests by Muslims worldwide. Many Islamic traditions forbid visual depictions of the Prophet.
The 48-page self-published collection, “Muhammad: The ‘Banned’ Images,” is a response to an August decision by Yale University Press to remove all images of Muhammad from a book by a Brandeis University professor on reactions to the Danish cartoons, Hull said.
“My primary motive here is to defend reason, Western civilization and individual rights,” Hull said. “It’s just a very public statement in defense of free speech.”
Hull said the decision to remove images of Muhammad from the book is evidence that the United States has “forgotten what the Enlightenment was all about.”
“This is a huge issue. I mean, that’s one of the things that the founders fought for and died for—the right to unfettered speech,” he said.
Hull’s book closes with a statement in support of free speech signed by various supporters, including several professors and the Danish editor responsible for publishing the cartoons. Michael Munger, chair of Duke’s political science department, is among the signatories.
“I’m saying right now, I haven’t seen the book and I would sign it if it were blasphemous pictures of Jesus,” said Munger, adding that he is Catholic.
“The Cartoons That Shook the World,” the book from which the images of Muhammad were removed, examined why the cartoons provoked such violent reactions. Yale University Press removed the book’s images on the advice of experts who said their inclusion might provoke violence. According to The New York Times, more than 200 people were killed in worldwide protests after the cartoons, including one of Muhammad wearing a bomb as a turban, were published in Jyllands-Posten.
Jytte Klausen, the book’s author and a professor of politics at Brandeis University, said she disagrees with Yale University Press’ decision.
“We have to print them in order to find out what we have to talk about,” she said. “There was no threat of violence and we should not give in to the threat of violence.”
Ebrahim Moosa, associate professor of Islamic studies at Duke, said people who are offended might choose to ignore the book or “[Hull] may meet a lot of people who will disagree with him.” Moosa declined to speculate on whether the book might provoke the sort of violent reaction that greeted the cartoons’ initial publication.
Michael Schoenfeld, vice president for public affairs and government relations, said the University supports the academic freedom of its professors, but added that the book is not connected to Duke.
“In general, the standards and the norms of academic freedom are very different in the U.S. than they are in many different countries around the world,” Schoenfeld said. “Our faculty have both the right and responsibility to speak out and debate critical issues as individuals and scholars.”
Schoenfeld wrote in a follow-up e-mail that Duke is not concerned about the impact the book may have on the University’s reputation abroad. Hull said the potential for a violent reaction to the book does not concern him.
“That’s what the FBI and the CIA and the executive branch should be focusing on and investigating and stopping. That’s their job,” he said. “My job is to defend ideas. Their job is to use their guns to defend those who defend ideas.”
Hull said that if individuals throughout history had refrained from talking or writing because they were worried about the consequences, there would have been little progress. He said that while the intent of the book is not to offend Muslims, he is aware that it may do so.
“Everybody is offended by something. The only question here is ‘What’s the proper response?’” he said. “Write your own damn book, draw your own damn cartoons, create your own damn movie. That’s the Enlightenment.”
—Click here to read more from Zachary Tracer's interview with Gary Hull
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.