The ACLU of Northern California is excited to announce the Free Speech for Equal Justice awardees at UC Berkeley. Through this one-time grant program, the ACLU of Northern California will distribute almost $17,000 among eleven student groups to host speakers who promote equal justice. The speakers include organizers, activists, poets, and academics covering topics on racial justice, immigrants rights, LGBTQ inclusion, and more.
Below is the full list of UC Berkeley awardees, the events they will host, and the grants that they will receive:
Awards
Organization/Speaker: The Berkeley Journal of African American Law and Policy, in conjunction with the Asian American Law Journal, La Raza Law Journal, Journal of Middle Eastern and Islamic Law, and the National Lawyers Guild - Berkeley Law Chapter, is hosting a symposium on racial justice, United Against White Supremacy
Event: The symposium will be a space to examine and discuss how white supremacy operates in the daily lives of UC Berkeley students and the wider population. Through a series of panels, speakers will provide a forum to shift narratives around race and will consider how legal advocacy can be used to confront and dismantle white supremacy. Specific topics will include gentrification, affirmative action, immigration, and free speech.
Organization/Speaker: The Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law, & Justice has invited Ai-jen Poo to be the keynote speaker for its spring symposium, Home and Homecoming: Feminist Journeys.
Event: Ai-jen Poo is the executive director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance and co-director of Caring Across Generations. She is an organizer, thought leader, and innovator whose work spans family care, workers’ rights, and social justice. Poo is a winner of the 2014 MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant, and in 2012, was listed as one of TIME Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People.
Organization/Speaker: The Black Graduate Engineering and Science Students are inviting Professor Talithia Williams to campus to speak on how STEM fields can advance social justice and empower students of color.
Event: Dr. Talithia Williams is the Associate Dean for Research and Experiential Learning and Associate Professor of Mathematics at Harvey Mudd. Williams’ research focuses on how statistics can be used to understand and quantify personal health information. As an educator, she works to make STEM more inclusive, accessible, and diverse for all identities. She has been awarded the Mathematical Association of America’s Henry L. Alder Award for Distinguished Teaching by a Beginning College or University Mathematics Faculty Member.
Organization/Speaker: The Hermanos Unidos de UC Berkeley has invited Dr. Daniel Solorzano, Professor of Education at the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, to campus to examine and identify how racism impacts and pervades conversations, institutions, and systems in everyday life.
Event: Dr. Daniel Solorzano has authored some of the seminal texts on race and education. He is the nation's foremost expert on racial microaggressions— verbal and non-verbal assaults directed toward people of color that are often carried out in subtle, automatic, or unconscious ways. Solorzano will speak on how different forms of oppression— from systemic racism to everyday comments, are used to marginalize people of color.