Please join us on Thursday, November 9, 12-1pm for a "What I Am Thinking About Now" presentation from Zach Sell, Ruth J. Simmons Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice at Brown University.

Please join us on Tuesday, November 7, 12-1pm for a "What I Am Thinking About Now" presentation by CSREA Associate Director Stéphanie Larrieux, (Ph.D. American Studies, Brown ’08) entitled “The Future is Now: What Science Fiction Film Reveals About Ourselves.”

You are cordially invited to a special "Meet & Greet" breakfast event with critically acclaimed and award winning science fiction writer and critic, Samuel R. Delany. Renown for his imaginative world building and critical insight, Delany's works address race, sexuality, and social issues, as well as perception, language, and the complexities of the human experience.

"Writing from El Nié: Racexile and the Poetics of Dominicanidad in Diaspora"
Through a historicized reading of Dominican literature of exile and diaspora, this talk explores the ways diasporic Dominican blacks interpellate the nation(s) and archives, reclaiming el nié—neither here nor there— a space of belonging.

Please join us on Thursday, October 26 from 1:00pm - 2:00pm for an informal of discussion with Professor Ronald Aubert, Provost Visiting Professor in Public Health and CSREA, titled "Using Public Data to study Race and Socioeconomic factors and Health Outcomes."

Please join us on Wednesday, October 25, 12-1pm for a "What I Am Thinking About Now" presentation from Colin Channer, Assistant Professor of Literary Arts at Brown University, titled "Wheel and come again: poems from a second collection—perhaps."

Jennifer Ho will discuss concepts relating to the ambiguity of race—the ways in which our understanding of racial categories exceeds the boundaries society places around them, particularly by looking at Asian Americans who cannot be neatly typed into boxes: those who are multiracial, transracial adoptees, and existing as an Asian body at a time when race is often talked about in black and white terms.

In her book "Good White People," philosopher Shannon Sullivan examines the attempts that liberal whites make to distance themselves from the history of white supremacy and differentiate themselves from other, ostensibly more racist, white people. This effort, while understandable, serves to distract them from focusing on efforts to end racial injustice. How might the events in Charlottesville and their aftermath heighten this focus on being "good" and perhaps undercut white anti-racist activism?

This presentation will untangle some of the complex relationships between race and class in contemporary white identity in the U.S. Beginning with an examination of how good white liberals often use intra-race class differences to establish their racial goodness, Sullivan then will challenge the false universalism built into the concept of white privilege.

This teach in will examine what DACA is, how it impacted undocumented immigrant communities, and why it was repealed. Panelists will also consider how activists and others are managing the uncertainty and attempting to impact the laws and public opinion on the issue of DACA.

Opening Remarks

Richard M. Locke, Brown University Provost