From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation
The eruption of mass protests in the wake of the police murders of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and Eric Garner in New York City have challenged the impunity with which officers of the law carry out violence against Black people and punctured the illusion of a postracial America. The Black Lives Matter movement has awakened a new generation of activists. In this stirring and insightful analysis, activist and scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor surveys the historical and contemporary ravages of racism and persistence of structural inequality such as mass incarceration and Black unemployment. In this context, she argues that this new struggle against police violence holds the potential to reignite a broader push for Black liberation.
MODERATOR
Dr. Carmen Rojas is the president and CEO of Marguerite Casey Foundation. Under her leadership, the foundation launched the prestigious Freedom Scholar award, and since starting in 2020 granted more than $165M in funding to dozens of organizations doing the hard work of shifting power to those people who have long been excluded from having it. Prior to MCF, Dr. Rojas was the cofounder and CEO of the Workers Lab, an innovation lab that partners with workers to develop new ideas that help them succeed and flourish.
PANELIST
.png)
Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is a Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. She is a scholar of racism and inequality in U.S. housing policies in addition to studying radical politics and Black social movements in the 20th and 21st centuries. She is the author of three books, including the award-winning From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation and Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership. She is a contributing writer for The New Yorker.
Nikkita Oliver (they/them) is a Seattle-based creative, community organizer, abolitionist, educator, and attorney. Working at the intersections of arts, law, education, and community organizing Nikkita strives to create experiences which draw us closer to our humanity and invites us to imagine what we hope to see in the future. Nikkita is the executive director of Creative Justice, an arts-based alternative to incarceration and a healing engaged youth-led community-based program. Nikkita speaks and performs for events at universities and conferences, and facilitates trainings on equity, law and justice, education, and arts activism all over the United States.
.png)