The Race & Pedagogy Institute at the University of Puget Sound is dedicated to integrating academic assets of our campus into reciprocal partnerships with local community knowledge and experience to educate students and teachers at all levels to think critically about race, to cultivate terms and practices for societal transformation, and to act to eliminate racism. Our series Race Matters: Continuing the Conversation aligns with programming we have held on campus for staff in the recent years called Race Matters: Lunch & Learns. These spaces are meant to allow for courageous conversations about race, with the expertise of RPI leadership to support and guide. Our latest series, which will occur on Wednesdays at 6pm, in June & July, is continuing the conversation after the RPI guided, and campus collaborated, Teach In which occurred on June 3, 2020. Our Teach In was entitled: We Can’t Breathe: 400 Years of Institutionalized Violence, and it reached over 500 people virtually and received feedback that asked us “What’s Next?”

This is what’s next. Please join us in these conversation spaces. One-hour sessions, led by various faculty and staff from across campus, and supported by Race & Pedagogy leadership, these spaces provide interdisciplinary approaches to discussing race. Additionally, we are setting aside select weeks for processing in racial affinity groups; in those spaces we will process the trauma that is occurring before us, and our role in dismantling racism. We will be sure to promote these sessions clearly with the specific racial identity designated in the title.

Kind regards,

LaToya Brackett, African American Studies and Race & Pedagogy Institute

Adriana Flores, Collins Memorial Library

Samuel Kigar, Religious Studies

This guide will be filled with resources from each of the Race Matters discussions in June & July 2020. Browse the tabs to find the resources for each discussion, which will be organized chronologically by date of discussion.

If you'd like to contact us, please email racematters@pugetsound.edu. 

If you'd like to learn more, click here to visit our webpage.