Amna Khalid

is an Associate Professor in the Department of History at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. She specializes in modern South Asian history, the history of medicine and the global history of free expression. 

 

Born in Pakistan, Amna completed her Bachelors Degree at Lahore University of Management Sciences. She went on to earn an M.Phil. in Development Studies and a D.Phil. in History from Oxford University.  

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Amna is the author of multiple book chapters on the history of public health in nineteenth-century India, with an emphasis on the connections between Hindu pilgrimages and the spread of epidemics. 

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Growing up under a series of military dictatorships, Amna has a strong interest in issues relating to censorship and free expression. She speaks frequently on academic freedom, free speech and campus politics at colleges and universities as well as at professional conferences. Her essays and commentaries on these issues have appeared in a wide range of outlets, including The Chronicle of Higher Education, The Conversation, The Daily Beast, Inside Higher Ed, The New Republic, Times Higher Education and Washington Monthly. She hosts a podcast and accompanying blog called "Banished," which explores censorship in the past and present. 

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Amna was a Fellow at the University of California National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement during the 2022-2023 academic-year, along with her Carleton colleague Jeff Snyder​. They focused on threats to academic freedom in Florida, the state at the epicenter of the conservative movement to encourage state intervention in public school classrooms. Based on interviews Khalid and Snyder conducted with Florida faculty members, they submitted an amicus brief  supporting the plaintiffs who are challenging the Stop WOKE Act. 

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