Hillary Zedlitz is a Ph.D. student at the University of Michigan who studies political science and  religion and politics. Hillary is also a member of the Graduate Employees’ Organization, a grad student union, who went on strike during the pandemic to protest the university reopening plans and policing policies.

On a micro level, we get into why the strike happened and how the university handled things (poorly) after the fact. And on a macro level, we explore how labor is exploited in academia, why more graduate students should belong to a union, and how unions can protect their members. Plus, we talk about why students athletes should definitely unionize, why that, unfortunately, will probably never happen, Obama’s anti-union sentiments, religious extremism and comparative politics, using research to explore who you are as a person, the effect that politics is having on religion (which may not be what you expect), what facilitates a sense of religious belonging, and how we can have healthy political conversations.

Resources:

• www.geo3550.org
• “From Politics to the Pews” by Michele Margolis

Until We Get Canceled is a Crate Original from Crate Media