Recently, I had the privilege of traveling to Chicago for the American Sociological Association meetings. The theme this year was “Reimagining the Future of Work” in no doubt an effort to confront the challenges and opportunities that GenAI will bring both to the discipline and society. I also attended the preconference workshop hosted by the ASA Teaching and Learning Section titled “Teaching Sociology in Times of Austerity, Backlash, Technological Change, and Political Polarization.”

The full day of panel discussions and roundtables left me simultaneously energized for the coming semester and feeling a deep sense of anxiety and alarm regarding my discipline. The latter sentiment was in regard to the experiences of colleagues in states that have enacted policies limiting academic freedom. These policies have created a chilling effect in which colleges and universities struggle to stay on the “right side” of often vague laws and may overcompensate in order to do so.

Hearing how sociology professors in the state of Florida and Ohio have stopped using and in some cases are barred from including words such as “racism” or “diversity” in their curriculum is surreal given the fact that one of the main tenets of sociological inquiry is to illuminate social inequalities. Rendering something invisible is a handy way to suggest it doesn’t exist. Obviously these professors still teach about social patterns such as racism, but now get creative in their word choices and discuss the multiple impacts of “racial differences” in social life.

The whole conference left me with two main questions.

1. First of all, what can I do as a Sociology professor at a small community college in Northern Michigan, where by the nature of political outcomes, I am free to discuss social facts as they are? One form of resistance I have employed recently is directly pointing out to students when I am teaching material that is barred in other states. I am usually met with stunned faces and often arguments that the material should be taught throughout the K-12 system as opposed to in an optional general education course.
2. The second broader question I have been pondering is how this is all related to or will be impacted by the rise of GenAI in society? Increasingly colleges and universities are implementing or requiring the use of certain GenAI or institutional GenAI programs, let alone the student use that has been occurring as means to complete or “supplement” personal work. What is at the crossroads of cracking down on academic freedom and the increased use of GenAI, an often biased technology that has been shown to hamper critical thinking skills? I obviously do not have an answer to this question other than we must do what we have always done. We must continue to inspire curiosity and inquiry and to try to arm students with the tools to challenge oppressive systems. AI may very well be a helpful assistant in this mission as long as this role is understood by our students.