Harvard Faculty Holds Widener Library 'Study-In' to Protest Bans on Student Activists | News

About 25 Harvard professors held a silent hearing at Widener Library on Wednesday to protest the library's decision to temporarily ban pro-Palestinian students who held a similar demonstration last month.

During the study-in, Securitas security guards recorded participants' names and Harvard ID numbers and handed out sheets warning of possible punishment under the university's January protest guidelines.

“Libraries are not spaces available for demonstrations or protests,” the papers say. “Violation of these rules may result in possible revocation of library privileges and/or disciplinary action.”

The ID checks and slips largely reflected the library's response to the pro-Palestine study in September. The university said at the time that the students had violated free speech and library use policies, and library staff banned participants from attending Widener for two weeks.

Before Wednesday's rehearsal, at least 10 tenured faculty signatories laid out their plans in a letter sent to Martha J. Whitehead, vice president of the Harvard Library, and University Professor Ann M. Blair, chair of the library system's Faculty Advisory Board.

“We would appreciate it if you would let us know whether you intend to deprive us of access to the academic resources we need for our work (teaching, research, writing) as a result of our decision to read in the library” , the faculty wrote.

The letter and subsequent rehearsal acted as a kind of ultimatum to library administrators: disciplinary teachers should be punished and risk another wave of anger, or withhold punishment and appear to be applying double standards.

Securitas guards in the workroom declined to answer questions — from both protesters and The Crimson — about who hired them to carry out the ID checks. An employee of the library's communications department was also present.

A Securitas security guard records the ID numbers of Harvard University faculty members who participated in a study-in at Widener Library. By Tilly R. Robinson

Harvard spokesman Jason A. Newton wrote in a statement that Harvard and the library system “will continue to gather information about the action that took place today in the Loker Reading Room at Widener Library before deciding on next steps.”

Harvard Law School '05 professor Andrew M. Crespo, who participated in the study, criticized the university's decision to deny protesters access to the library and questioned how a silent protest could be considered disruptive.

“I think that a university has a great interest in ensuring that its libraries are quiet places, that they are places where people can learn and that they are not disturbed,” Crespo said. “But I don’t think sitting quietly at a table and reading a book in a library can be considered disturbing.”

Crespo and the protesters on Wednesday were not the first to question the university's decision.

In recent weeks, several professors and free speech advocacy groups have denounced the library's decision, calling it an interference with free speech. Last week, the co-presidents of Harvard's Council on Academic Freedom signed a Crimson op-ed condemning the decision, and a group of faculty protested the sanctions Friday outside Widener.

Several student organizers affiliated with Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine, an unrecognized coalition of activist groups on campus, were present at the study-in, wearing keffiyehs and working at a table separate from faculty participants.

At least one of the students – who brought a camera to photograph the study-in – falsely identified himself as a Crimson reporter to library staff present at the event until he was confronted by a Crimson reporter.

The student organizer is an editor at Crimson Editorial, but was not at the event in an official capacity for The Crimson and is not a member of The Crimson's news team.

“While I cannot comment on personnel matters, The Crimson takes issues of journalistic ethics very seriously and investigates all allegations of employee misconduct,” Crimson President J. Sellers Hill ’25 wrote in a statement.

A library employee instructed guards to check the IDs of the student protesters, but not the IDs of the Crimson reporters.

At the study-in, faculty demonstrators wore black scarves and read texts about dissent, bureaucracy and censorship – from Franz Kafka's “The Trial” and George Orwell's “1984” to the university-wide statement on the rights and responsibilities of Harvard officials used to justify imposing sanctions on activists who violate protest policies.

When the protesters were asked to hand over their IDs to the guards, they complied, but repeatedly asked why the library was conducting ID checks and whether the guards could clarify which actions were considered protests.

When a postdoctoral fellow was approached by a security guard, he adopted a confused tone.

“But I just read,” said the postdoc. “Do you consider this a demonstration?”

“That’s what I was told,” the guard said.

—Staff writer Tilly R. Robinson can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on X @tillyrobin.

—Staff writer Neil H. Shah can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X @neilhshah15.