SOCIAL JUSTICE

Attempts To Upend Viewers’ Notions Of What It Meant To Be Enslaved ‘The Underground Railroad’

5Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Attempts To Upend Viewers’ Notions Of What It Meant To Be Enslaved ‘The Underground Railroad’

Speaking on NPR’s Fresh Air, Barry Jenkins, the director of “The Underground Railroad,” noted that “before making this show … I would have said I’m the descendant of enslaved Africans.” “I think now that answer has evolved,” he continued. “I am the descendant of blacksmiths and midwives and herbalists and spiritualists.” As a scholar interested in how modern representations of enslavement shape our understanding of the past, I am struck by the ways Jenkins seeks to change the way viewers think about – and talk about – Black American history. In doing so, he takes the baton from scholars, activists and artists who have, for decades, attempted to shake up Americans’ understanding of slavery. Much of this work has centered on reimagining slaves not as objects who were acted upon, but as in...

Not The Groups You Might Think But Racial Groups Suffer Disparate Consequences After Unfair Police Treatment

5Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Not The Groups You Might Think But Racial Groups Suffer Disparate Consequences After Unfair Police Treatment

George Floyd’s high-profile death has become synonymous with unfair police treatment. His death has sparked discussions surrounding police reform and the long-term consequences for people who experience violent contact with police. But what does research say more generally about unfair treatment by police? One of the biggest questions that researchers like my colleague and I examine is whether different groups of individuals – young people, racial and ethnic minorities and those from poorer socioeconomic backgrounds – are more likely than their respective counterparts to report police treatment that they perceive to be unfair. We focus on perceptions of police interaction because research has long contended that “citizens’ perceptions of police stops may be considered just as important...

Cost For Child Care And Preschool – US Parents Pay Nearly Double The ‘Affordable’ Cost

12May

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Cost For Child Care And Preschool – US Parents Pay Nearly Double The ‘Affordable’ Cost

President Joe Biden wants to make child care more affordable across the U.S. Under his American Families Plan, proposed in April 2021, the federal government would subsidize the costs of child care to the tune of US$225 billion annually. Lower-income families could access child care free of charge, while middle-class families would pay no more than 7% of their income. CC BY-ND Additionally, the plan seeks to make free, high-quality preschool available for all 3- and 4-year-olds. Almost 60% of parents say preschool and day care expenses are a financial strain. Currently, child care eats up 14% of the incomes of middle-class working families – for example, those with a household income of $50,000-$100,000 for a family of four – according to the Center for American Progress, a prog...

How Video Evidence Can Be Differently Interpreted In Courts – From Rodney King To George Floyd

10May

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

How Video Evidence Can Be Differently Interpreted In Courts – From Rodney King To George Floyd

News media coverage of Derek Chauvin’s trial for the murder of George Floyd highlighted the role of video as a “star witness.” Jurors in this trial saw footage from cellphones, police body cameras, dashboard cameras and surveillance cameras. In his closing arguments, prosecuting attorney Steve Schleicher even told the jurors, “Believe your eyes. What you saw, you saw.” For the past eight years I have been studying the use of video as evidence both in international human rights courts and tribunals and in state and federal courts in the U.S. As a media scholar, I pay close attention to how people interpret video as evidence. One of the things I have found is that the argument “seeing is believing” is not as intuitive as it sounds. ‘Who do you believe?’ On March 3, 1991, a Los Angeles resid...

Black Women Continue To Face High Unemployment As Labor Market Sees Modest Gains

5May

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Black Women Continue To Face High Unemployment As Labor Market Sees Modest Gains

The unemployment rate for Black women in February was 8.9 percent, and for Latinas it was 8.5 percent. For White women, it was 5.2 percent. Chabeli Carrazana Originally published by The 19th While the labor market made modest gains in February, Black women continue to be left behind. They were the only group of women who saw their unemployment rate rise significantly in February — up to 8.9 percent from 8.5 percent in January — and the only group of women that lost workers in the labor force. Some 11,000 Black women left the workforce last month, while other groups added thousands of workers, according to new data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday. Overall, the economy added 379,000 jobs last month — a slight bump in what has been months of stalled growth. Since Sep...

Isolated Success Stories Suggest Community And Officer Buy-In Might Be Key To American Cities Long Struggle To Reform Their Police

30Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Isolated Success Stories Suggest Community And Officer Buy-In Might Be Key To American Cities Long Struggle To Reform Their Police

The guilty verdicts delivered against Derek Chauvin on April 20, 2021, represented a landmark moment – but courtroom justice cannot deliver the sweeping changes most Americans feel are needed to improve policing in the U.S. As America continues to grapple with racism and police killings, federal action over police reform has stalled in Congress. But at the state level there is movement and steps toward reform are underway in many U.S. cities, including Philadelphia; Oakland, California; and Portland, Oregon. Many of these efforts are geared toward ending specific practices, such as the granting of qualified immunity, through which officers are shielded from civil lawsuits, and the use of certain police neck holds and no-knock warrants. Mayors and city councils nationwide have also pushed...

Young Asian American Adults Are The Only Racial Group With Suicide As Their Leading Cause Of Death, So Why Is No One Talking About This?

2Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE, VIDEO REELS

Young Asian American Adults Are The Only Racial Group With Suicide As Their Leading Cause Of Death, So Why Is No One Talking About This?

Racially motivated violence looks like the mass shootings that killed Xiaojie Tan, Daoyou Feng, Chung Park, Hyun Grant and Suncha Kim in Atlanta on March 16, 2021. Racially motivated violence also looks like suicide, which is defined as a deliberate act of self-directed violence in order to cause injury to oneself that results in death. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the United States. When broken down by race, suicide is the first leading cause of death among Asian American young adults age 15-24. This is true of no other racial group in this age range in America. Despite this disparity, very little attention is paid by society and by gatekeeping institutions like academe and private and public funding...

It’s Hard Work But Compassionate Courage Moves Beyond ‘Cancel Culture’ To Challenge Systemic Racism

14Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

It’s Hard Work But Compassionate Courage Moves Beyond ‘Cancel Culture’ To Challenge Systemic Racism

It is common to read news of someone getting fired for speaking or acting in ways that harmed members of another race. Our current call-out culture often advocates publicly shaming and humiliating wrongdoers, destroying their reputations and making them lose their jobs. Further, this culture prioritizes the impact of people’s words or actions over their intent. In higher education alone, there have been many cases of such call-outs. Greg Patton, a professor at University of Southern California, had to step away from teaching in the MBA program for using a Chinese word that sounded like a racial slur during a Zoom lecture. At Smith College, staff members who were falsely called out for being racist suffered health issues and left the job. UCLA accounting lecturer Gordon Klein was suspend...

Questions America Needs To Ask About Seeking Racial Justice In A Court Of Law – Derek Chauvin Trial

12Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Questions America Needs To Ask About Seeking Racial Justice In A Court Of Law – Derek Chauvin Trial

There is a difference between enforcing the law and being the law. The world is now witnessing another in a long history of struggles for racial justice in which this distinction may be ignored. Derek Chauvin, a 45-year-old white former Minneapolis police officer, is on trial for third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter for the May 25, 2020, death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man. There are three questions I find important to consider as the trial unfolds. These questions address the legal, moral and political legitimacy of any verdict in the trial. I offer them from my perspective as an Afro-Jewish philosopher and political thinker who studies oppression, justice and freedom. They also speak to the divergence between how a trial is conducted, what rules gove...

Black Poets And Writers How They Gave A Voice To ‘Affrilachia’

5Apr

By THEIRL1ADMIN01No Comments

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Black Poets And Writers How They Gave A Voice To ‘Affrilachia’

Appalachia, in the popular imagination, stubbornly remains poor and white. Open a dictionary and you’ll see Appalachian described as a “native or inhabitant of Appalachia, especially one of predominantly Scotch-Irish, English, or German ancestry.” Read J.D. Vance’s “Hillbilly Elegy” and you’ll enter a world that’s white, poor and uncultured, with few, if any, people of color. But as Black poets and scholars living in Appalachia, we know that this simplified portrayal obscures a world that is far more complex. It has always been a place filled with diverse inhabitants and endowed with a lush literary history. Black writers like Effie Waller Smith have been part of this cultural landscape as far back as the 19th century. Today, Black writers and poets continue to explore what it means to ...