Gathering on zoom

A day of reflection

• Meenakshi Narain (Brown University (US))

History of Racism in America

• Bradley Graupner

Bradley Graupner (Linguistic Anthropologist) will discuss how we can understand the contemporary context from a brief overview of the history relevant to this moment. That will include early colonialism, the emergence of whiteness as a concept and for what reasons, the colonial era developments and rebellions in how they shaped institutionalization of racial supremacy, the American colonies, the formation of the United States, and Slavery through Jim Crow. This will touch on the intersection of race and racism with class and inequality, ethnicity and nationalism, all vis-à-vis power and politics as the latter is generally considered. He will emphasize how historical structures and resistance adapts and changes vis-à-vis institutionalization to maintain power dynamics. Graupner's training is in anti-colonial struggles via racism, land rights, civil rights, gender rights, sexual orientation rights, axiological and epistemological rights vis-à-vis history of the Black Liberation Movement, and Native American Religious Traditions. He has been engaged in anti-racism and anti-colonial struggles since 2003. Graupner is on the board of directors fo the Chicago SNCC History Project which established the first Civil Rights archive in the world that is open to the public at the Carter G. Woodson regional library in the Vivian G. Harsh Collection of African American History. He assists with creating and curating an ongoing collection of oral histories from Civil Rights organizers for the archive. In 2016, he also created the decolonizing library at the Oceti Sakowin camp for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe when participating in their uprising against the violation of their treaty rights related to the Dakota Access Pipeline.

Addressing Structural Racism Underlying Protests

• Laura Pitter

Laura Pitter is deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s US Program. Her bio is available at: https://www.hrw.org/about/people/laura-pitter Links to some of her prior work on the topic of her presentation are listed below: US: Address Structural Racism Underlying Protests Prosecute Officers in Floyd Death; End Police Violence Against Protesters: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/06/02/us-address-structural-racism-underlying-protests The Case for Reparations in Tulsa, Oklahoma A Human Rights Argument: Report: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/05/29/case-reparations-tulsa-oklahoma#_Toc41573959; Shorter press release which provides a summary: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/05/29/us-provide-reparations-1921-tulsa-race-massacre The above report on reparations stemmed from an in depth, two year investigation we did into policing, poverty and racial inequality in Tulsa that is somewhat of a microcosm for these issues in the US. Here is a link to the 216 page report, “‘Get on the Ground!’: Policing, Poverty, and Racial Inequality in Tulsa, Oklahoma,” https://www.hrw.org/report/2019/09/12/get-ground-policing-poverty-and-racial-inequality-tulsa-oklahoma/case-study-us; Shorter press release which provides a summary:https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/09/12/us-how-abusive-biased-policing-destroys-lives

A Conversation on Awareness and Change - "How can we do better?"

• Savanna Rae Starko (Vanderbilt University (US))
• Kevin Black (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
• Sarah Marie Demers Konezny (Yale University (US))
• Sarah Eno (University of Maryland (US))
• Anadi Canepa (Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (US))
• Wren Vetens (University of Wisconsin Madison (US))
• Meenakshi Narain (Brown University (US))
• Indara Suarez (Boston University (US))
• Salvatore Rappoccio (The State University of New York SUNY (US))
• Bo Jayatilaka (Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (US))

Moderators: Anadi Canepa, Savanna Starko