Please join us for a reading, discussion, and book signing with Martín Espada, celebrated poet and Professor of English at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. He will be reading from his latest collection of poems, Vivas to Those Who Have Failed.

As the 2016 presidential election enters the final stage, race continues to be a major theme of the campaign. Nationally recognized scholars of race and politics Tricia Rose and James Morone will discuss the implications of race in the context of the presidential campaign and the longer term political consequences.

Presented by the Taubman Center for American Politics and Policy.

Please join us on Tuesday, April 26 at 12 - 1pm for a "What I Am Thinking About Now" presentation from Elena Shih, Assistant Professor of American Studies and Ethnic Studies, and Faculty Fellow at the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice. Her talk is titled: "Transnational Racial Formations of Freedom: Civilian Vigilantism, Ethical Consumption, and Global Human Trafficking Rescue"

In his new book The Fight to Vote, Waldman tell the story of the struggle to win a meaningful right to participate in American democracy. It is a story of politics as well as social movements. Because it spans the whole 240 years of American history, it uses widely disparate sets of sources. From the Founding-era documents ... to the archives of the women's suffrage and African American civil rights movement ... to today's court pleadings, the story is accessible to all students. Remarkably, so much of it is now available online -- much more so than just two years ago, when Waldman wrote The Second Amendment: A Biography.

In his new book, The Fight to Vote, Waldman takes a succinct and comprehensive look at a crucial American struggle: the drive to define and defend government based on “the consent of the governed,” offering a current, readable history of voting rights in the United States. Waldman traces the full story from the Founders’ debates to today’s challenges: a wave of restrictive voting laws, partisan gerrymanders, and the flood of campaign money unleashed by Citizens United. Amid this topsy-turvy election season, Waldman’s book is a needed reminder that voting rights have never been – and are still not – a guarantee.

Please join us on Friday, April 15 for a research seminar and dialogue with Professor Kyla Wazana Tompkins and Professor Elizabeth Hoover titled “The Whiteness of Food Movements”.

Please join us on Tuesday, April 12 at 12 - 1pm for a "What I Am Thinking About Now" presentation from Professor Andre Willis, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, titled "Whiteness as God: Towards a Theo-Political Understanding of American Democracy".

“What I Am Thinking About Now” is an on-going informal workshop/seminar series to which faculty and graduate students are invited to present and discuss recently published work and work in progress. All are invited to attend and participate.

Please join us on Friday, March 25 (lunch provided at 11 am), for "How Structural Racism Works: Peeling Back the Layers: Racial Inequality in a New South City", a Conversation with Dr. Robert Korstad, Professor of Public Policy and History at Duke and Associate Director of the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity. Robert Korstad will focus on the role of wealth as a driver of structural racism. The event will take place in the Stephen Robert '62 Campus Center, 75 Waterman Street in Peterutti Lounge. Doors will open at 11:00 am and lunch will be available.

Please join us on Thursday, March 24, at 6:00 pm for "How Structural Racism Works: Wealth and Structural Racism," a lecture by Duke Professor of Economics Dr. William Darity, Jr., Samuel DuBois Cook Professor of Public Policy at Sanford School of Public Policy. The lecture will focus on how wealth inequality works intersectionally to generate other significant inequalities. Lecture will be followed by a conversation between William Darity, Jr. and Tricia Rose, Director, Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America.