Glossary

Forms or tactics

Boycott: A refusal to pay for, consume, or use a product or service. Can include refusing to participate in a specific activity (e.g. eating at a campus restaurant, attending class) or refusing to engage in a certain relationship (e.g. with an organization or person). Often spans multiple days.

Disruption: Actions that intentionally impede or slow down the normal course of events. Can involve a blockade or slowdown.

Hunger strike: A refusal to eat, often spanning multiple days

Information distribution: Protesters physically distribute paper, flyers, or other informational materials to other people.

March: A protest that starts in one location and travels elsewhere, typically along a planned route. May include intentional movement that participants describe as a march or procession. Often co-occure with rallies.

Occupation: Protesters refuse to leave a location. May take the form of a camp or sit-in.

Petition: A formal written request appealing to authority, typically signed by many people and often spanning multiple dates. May be formatted as a letter, and may be electronic (e.g. email, online form). Often occurs alongside another protest form.

Picketing: Standing outside a venue where something significant occurs, often in an effort to persuade the targeted party to meet demands or cease operations. Typically related to labor or public policy issues, and often spans multiple days.

Press conference: A press conference held by protesters.

Rally: Many people gather in one place, often with at least one speaker. Rallies and demonstrations often co-occur with or include other actions (e.g. marches or symbolic actions) and may feature speeches or other ways of addressing those present, such as reading demands.

Strike or walkout: A refusal to provide a service or product — typically a refusal to work (as in a labor strike), to attend class, or an action that protesters themselves describe as a strike, walkout, or lockout. Often spans multiple days. Lockouts apply when initiated by workers rather than employers.

Symbolic action: A symbolic action that is more than just a slogan — e.g. a die-in, wearing gags as the main action, or athletes kneeling, sitting, or raising a fist during the national anthem. The symbolism is clearly communicated by the participants.

Vigil: Being silent and quietly waiting and/or praying, especially at night, tied to a politicized issue or to a person or group with symbolic political meaning. A moment of silence on its own is not a vigil.

Issues

"All Lives Matter": Slogans or arguments typically used by (counter)protesters to discredit Black Lives Matter. Often also is pro-police.

Accessibility: Support for the freedom of people with disabilities to live independently and participate fully in society and the right to equal and equitable access

Animal rights: Support for moral consideration and legal protections for nonhuman animals, esp from cruel treatment by companies

Anti-Abortion: Opposition to the right and freedom to choose to have an abortion (i.e., intentionally end a pregnancy) and support for the "right to life" for the unborn

Anti-Affirmative Action: Opposition to considering applicants' racial identity in admissions decisions in order to increase representation of students of color

Anti-Colonial or political independence: Includes calls for sovereignty and freedom from imperialist or colonial policies.

Anti-Far rIght: Opposition far-right or alt-right figures (e.g. Milo Yiannopoulos, Ben Shapiro, Charles Murray, Gavin McInnes, Ann Coulter) or organizations — even if the speakers or their supporters do not explicitly identify this way. Includes anti-fascist protests.

Anti-Feminist: Advocates for men's causes, often with a sexist or anti-feminist position.

Anti-Immigrant rights: Opposition to immigration and immigrants. Often, with racist connotations and pro-Trump.

Anti-LGB+: Opposition, discrimination, and hatred toward LGB+ people and sexual orientations

Anti-Racist Issues: All anti-racist issues coded, e.g., racist campus culture, racist police violence, anti-racism (unspecified)

Anti-Trans rights: Against the rights and inclusion of trans and non-binary people and identities. Common example: support for discriminatory bathroom bills.

Anti-Trump: Protesters oppose Trump, referring to him explicitly or referencing him (e.g. the President). Anti-Trump protests often raise multiple issues simultaneously, esp immigration.

Anti-War: Opposition to militarization or military spending. Often applied to protests around Palestinian liberation.

Anti-White supremacy: Opposition to white supremacists (self-identified or as identified by protesters) and their causes, e.g., defending Confederate flags

Cultural appropriation: Opposition to the (mis)use of stereotypical, disrespectful, and exploitative language, behavior, clothing, or traditions of a marginalized culture or group, especially Native American/ Indigenous school mascots.

Economy and inequality: Connects economic issues (e.g. wages, cost of housing) to broader unfairness in the economy. Often includes advocacy for a higher minimum or living wage, austerity measures, and the role universities play in urban development and gentrification.

Environmental issues: Support for environmental issues, esp divestment of assets from fossil fuels. Also concerns such as climate crisis, opposition to oil pipelines, and corporate abuse. Includes the spring 2017 March for Science following the Trump presidential inauguration.

Faith-based discrimination: Against the mistreatment of a person or group based on their religion or because they are atheists. Includes protests against Islamophobia or anti-semitism, which may also have a racial or ethnic component.

Foreign policy: Laws and policies of a national government concerning international issues (not typically immigration into the country).

Free speech: Protesters call for 'free speech,' 'freedom of speech,' or 'freedom of expression,' or invoke the First Amendment.

Gun control: Support for regulations and restrictions on gun ownership, access, and use, usually to protect people from gun violence. Typically, opposition to school shootings and solidarity with those victimized.

Gun owner rights: Support for gun access and ownership and against restrictive regulations, often in the name of the Second Amendment.

Hate crimes and violence (not racial issues): Opposition to crimes, violence, and abuse motivated by hatred and bias against a real or percieved identity (on any basis except race)

Hate crimes and violence (racial issues): Opposition to crimes, violence, and abuse motivated by racial hatred or bias

Hate speech (not racial issues): Opposition to communication intended to incite violence or harm, or what protesters identify as discriminatory or prejudicial speech. Includes slurs and hateful speech. May be in person, written, or online. Often overlaps with racist campus climate.

Hate speech (racial issues): Opposition to communication intended to incite violence or harm, or what protesters identify as discriminatory or prejudicial speech. Includes slurs and hateful speech. May be in person, written, or online. Often overlaps with racist campus climate.

Human rights: References to or claims about (usually international) human rights law — e.g. Palestinian human rights, Armenian human rights.

Indigenous issues: Includes opposition to cultural appropriation, racist mascots, other stereotypes, and genocides of indigenous peoples as well as support for sovereignty, governance, and reconciliation.

K-12 education: Support for primary and secondary public education, such as funding

Labor and work: Support for issues such as labor rights and protections, unionization and unions, worker organizing, and a higher minimum or living wage.

Memorials and anniversaries: Often references to civil rights protests. Typically not the only issue raised.

Other Anti-Racist Issue: Opposition to racism, racial injustice, bigotry, discrimination, or the mistreatment of named racial or ethnic groups. Anti-racist issues identify power imbalances between marginalized racialized groups/people of color and dominant racial groups/white people.

Police violence and injustice (non-racial issues): Concerns about police or law enforcement — e.g. militarization of domestic police, over-aggression toward protesters, or abuse by campus security. Also includes prison issues, such as the use of prison labor for campus jobs. Protesters do not frame these as racial issues.

Police violence and injustice (racial issues): Opposition to racist police and law enforcement practices, such as racist police brutality especially against African Americans, racist profiling and harrasment by police, disproportionate arrests and criminalization of Black and Indigenous peoples.

Political corruption: Opposition to misconduct by governments and government officials. Political corruption is the use of official power to violate rules for illegitimate personal enrichment (e.g. bribery, extortion, cronyism, embezzlement). Malfeasance is broader — intentional wrongful or unlawful conduct by government officials or public employees, including misuse of power to repress political opponents.

Prisons and incarceration: Opposition to the racism, violence, and injustice of mass incarceration of Black and Brown.

Pro-Affirmative Action: Support for considering applicants' racial identity in admissions decisions in order to increase representation of students of color

Pro-Choice: Support for the right and freedom to choose to have an abortion (intentionally end a pregnancy) and to exercise personal control over ones own body, especially reproductive health, without government restrictions

Pro-Far rIght: Support for far-right or alt-right figures (e.g. Milo Yiannopoulos, Ben Shapiro, Charles Murray, Gavin McInnes, Ann Coulter) or organizations — even if the speakers or their supporters do not explicitly identify this way.

Pro-Feminism and women's rights: Support for feminism and women's rights and freedoms, including political, economic, and bodily autonomy

Pro-Immigration: Support for immigration and immigrants' rights and dignity.

Pro-Israel: Support for the existence of the state of Israel, the Israeli government, and/or Zionist ideology. Often justified in terms of Jewish safety and identity, national sovereignty, and national defense.

Pro-LGB+: Support for rights, freedoms, and liberation for LGB+ people and a variety of sexual orientations

Pro-Palestine: Support for Palestine, Palestinians, and boycotts and divestments of Israel. May overlap with human rights or anti-war/peace framings. Protesters may use related language such as 'anti-Israeli apartheid.'

Pro-Police (non-racial issues): Support of police or any law enforcement agents or agencies.

Pro-Police (racial issues): Support of police while deying that racism is a problem or rejecting antiracist concerns. May overlap with All Lives Matter.

Pro-Trans rights: Includes gender identity (e.g. non-binary). Example: opposition to discriminatory bathroom bills.

Pro-Trump: Support for Donald Trump as a politician, presidential candiddate, or president and for his presidential administration.

Pro-White supremacy: Overt advocacy for white superioirty and pro-white claims, typically made by off-campus groups and white supremacist, far-right figures (e.g. Richard Spencer). May be overtly derogatory toward people of color, Jewish people, or Muslims.

Public funding for higher education: Protesters focus on state, provincial, or federal government funding.

Racist campus climate: How people of color experience attending classes, living, spending time, or working at a university — especially others' negative attitudes and behaviors toward them (e.g. disrespect, microaggressions, feeling unsafe) as people of color.

Racist symbols: Opposition to racist symbols such as statues, building names, flags, and mascots that honor enslavers, the Confederacy, eugenicists, those involved in genocide of Indigneous peoples, and leaders of other racist and colonial projects. Includes graffiti (e.g. a Nazi symbol).

Sexual assault and violence: Opposition to unwanted sexual contact and interaction against the will of anyone involved and without their explicit, voluntary consent.

Social services and welfare: Support for social services and financial assistance provided by government Includes public transit.

Traditional marriage and families: Advocates that legal marriage or parenting (e.g. adoption) should only be accessible to heterosexual couples who conform to normative (cis) gender identities; often argued on religious grounds.

Tuition and aid: Typically, protesters focus on the university. Also includes student debt.

University administration (non-racial issues): Issues related to how university leaders make decisions and the process of decision-making, which may involve faculty, administrators, and students. Can include allocation of money (e.g. investment or divestment), hiring policies, and support services.

University administration (racial issues): A racialized issue related to how university leaders make decisions and the process of decision-making, which may involve faculty, administrators, and students. Can include underrepresentation in hiring and support services offered.

Targets

_No target: Used when protesters have no identified individual or group that they oppose, such as a protest to show solidarity with another group or person.

_Other target: Unspecified events or people, a particular event, or people at an event. Also includes student clubs or organizations and religious institutions such as churches.

Domestic government: Government at the local, state, or national level, including juries in court trials. Also includes a government official when they are the ultimate decision-maker of a government policy using the power granted by their office (e.g. a president taking executive action). Encompasses named entities or general bodies asked to act, such as a city council, grand jury, or legislators.

Ethnic/racial group

Foreign government

Individual: The target is an individual when the protest concerns that individual's past actions prior to an official role, calls for their resignation or apology, or calls for individual actions apart from their official duties. When protesters name a university president or government official as the ultimate decision-maker of a policy, the target is the university or government instead.

Intergovernmental organization: For example, the United Nations.

Medical facility/organization: If the target is Planned Parenthood, both this option and 'Non-governmental organization' apply.

Non-governmental organization: Not-for-profit organizations. If the target is Planned Parenthood, both this option and 'Medical facility/organization' apply.

Other minority group: A group not defined by its race or ethnicity.

Police: Used when the protest issue is related to police violence, racism in policing, corruption in policing, etc. If the target is campus police, 'University/school' also applies.

Political party: A political party that is not currently in power. When the protest targets the political party that is in power, 'Domestic government' applies instead.

Private/business

University/school: When a university leader is the ultimate decision-maker of a university policy or other university-related issue, the target is the university. If the protest is about an individual's current or past actions or position specifically, the target is the individual.