Anti-Racist Resources
- Black Lives Matter Films (Film at Mason/VFS)
- An Interview with the Founders of Black Lives Matter
- With Friends Like These - "White Fragility 101" (Podcast)
- White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack by Peggy McIntosh
- Welcome to Racial Equity Tools
- MPD150: A People's Project Evaluating Policing
- Do the Work: An Anti-Racist Reading List
- White Fragility Mixtape
- Decolonize Your Syllabus
- If you’re planning to take part in protests, know your rights. Read this.
- Covering by Kenji Yoshino
- Addressing Micro-Aggression in the Workplace - Featuring Lenora Billings-Harris (video)
- “What the Police Really Believe” by Zack Beauchamp
- Theater Resource: Alternative Canon to 1945
- Theater Resource: School of Theater’s List of Books
WOULD YOU LIKE TO MAKE A GIFT?
If you’d like to support the Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group, please click on the "Make a Gift" button below. On the form, please select "Additional Comments About Your Gift" and ask that your funds be directed towards the Kritikos Anti-Racist Discussion series.
Thank you!
The arts create community. At Mason, artistic vision sparks global conversation.
Two new series, Kritikos and Global Arts Coffeehouse, bring Mason artists, scholars and neighbors into conversation about artistic work on the global scene as well as a thoughtful approach to the arts.
Please see the calendar for a list of current events. Check back for updates throughout the year.
These events are free and open to the public.
Kritikos
Kritikos engages topics such as writing about the arts, critical studies, translation, the artist in society, and art as speech.
Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group
Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.
Fridays, 1-2:30 pm, from October 2-November 20, 2020 (no talk on Oct 9)
Dear Members of the CVPA Community:
Inspired by mass actions and worldwide protests demanding racial justice earlier this year, CVPA’s Arts in Context is continuing the Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group this Fall, moderated by Mason faculty members Jessica Kallista and Kristin Johnsen-Neshati, with help from co-organizers, Aishah-Nyeta Brown, Natalie Ledesma, Jordan McRae, Sang Nam, and Aries Wilson.
Members of the CVPA community will meet in Fall 2020 for 90-minute sessions once a week, but with a goal of long-term commitment to relationship building, awareness, reimagining, and action, around anti-racist practices, racial justice, and the creation of conversations as well as systems of compassion and healing. We will focus on anti-Black racism and its effects on society.
Grounded in the knowledge that it is not a question of whether we are racist, but rather how racism is expressed and experienced in ourselves, our lives, our behaviors, and our institutions, we will explore books, music, art, essays, podcasts, and documentaries that allow us to critically question and consider our roles as artists, thinkers, citizens, and creatives in a society founded on racist values and practices.
All are welcome. If you are currently benefiting from the existing racist system, we ask only that you arrive
- ready to learn or expand your understanding of the role you play in sustaining the existing system, and
- willing to lean into the discomfort necessary to learn how to live in an ever-increasingly anti-racist way.
Every Friday, October 2-November 20, 2020 (no talk on Oct 9), 1-2:30 pm.
We hope you can join us!
Jessica and Kristin
We invite your feedback on the Fall 2020 Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group. Please take our survey.
Please take our survey about the Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group series this Fall.
Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group Weekly Schedule (Subject to Change)
Week One
October 2, 2020: Misogynoir
No talk October 9, 2020
Week Two:
October 16, 2020: Reparations
Week Three:
October 23, 2020: Afrofuturism, Otherwise Worlds, and Freedom Dreaming
Week Four:
October 30, 2020: Disability and Race (co-moderated by Aishah-Nyeta Brown)
Week Five:
November 6, 2020: Education as Liberation: Anti-Racist Pedagogy
Week Six:
November 13, 2020: Black Trans Lives Matter
Week Seven:
November 20, 2020: Black Joy, Bliss, Self-Care, and Healing
Join us for Our Discussions on Zoom (same link each week)
You’re invited to join this recurring Zoom meeting for the Kritikos Anti-Racist Reading Group:
Fridays from October 2 to November 20, 1 to 2:30 pm.
(Please note that we will not meet on October 9.)
Meeting ID: 926 7149 1960
Passcode: 749553
Dial by your location
+1 267 831 0333 US (Philadelphia)
+1 301 715 8592 US (Germantown)
Meeting ID: 926 7149 1960
Passcode: 749553
Find your local number: https://gmu.zoom.us/u/aebTs6wcSB
Join by SIP
92671491960@zoomcrc.com
Join by H.323
162.255.37.11 (US West)
162.255.36.11 (US East)
115.114.131.7 (India Mumbai)
115.114.115.7 (India Hyderabad)
213.19.144.110 (Amsterdam Netherlands)
213.244.140.110 (Germany)
103.122.166.55 (Australia)
149.137.40.110 (Singapore)
64.211.144.160 (Brazil)
69.174.57.160 (Canada)
207.226.132.110 (Japan)
Meeting ID: 926 7149 1960
Passcode: 749553
Readings for Week Seven Discussion - November 20, 2020
Week 7: November 20, 2020— Black Joy, Self Care & Healing from Racial Trauma
Materials
Calm: Do Nothing for 2 Minutes
RADICAL SELF CARE: ALICIA GARZA
How racism makes us sick | David R. Williams
Racism at My Job Literally Gave Me PTSD by Erika Stallings
Audre Lorde reads Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic As Power (FULL Updated)
Readings for Week Six Discussion - November 13, 2020
Week 6: November 13, 2020— Black Trans Lives Matter
Materials
END THE WAR ON BLACK TRANS, QUEER, GENDER NONCONFORMING AND INTERSEX PEOPLE (website with multiple resources)
A Vision for Black Lives M4BL POLICY DEMANDS FOR BLACK POWER, FREEDOM, & JUSTICE Policy Brief 4 (PDF)
Black Trans Women Seek More Space in the Movement They Helped Start
Marsha P. Johnson Was a Transgender Rights Pioneer Who Fought for LGBTQ Minorities
Black Trans* Lives Matter | D-L Stewart | TEDxCSU
Thousands Protest in Support of Black Trans Lives in NYC | NowThis (video)
Black Trans Lives Matter: Movement Pushes for Justice & Visibility Amid “Epidemic” of Violence Democracy Now (video)
Diamond Stylz on Why Black Trans Rights Are Civil Rights | The Root
Readings for Week Five Discussion: November 6, 2020
Week 5: November 6, 2020—Education as Liberation: Anti-Racist Pedagogy
Materials
Pedagogy of the Oppressed: Chapter 2—Paulo Friere (full text)
Teaching to Transgress, Chapter 1: Engaged Pedagogy by bell hooks (full text)
Teaching to Transgress, Chapter 4: Paulo Friere by bell hooks (full text)
bell hooks on interlocking systems of domination (4 min video)
We Want to Do More Than Survive, Chapter 5: Abolitionist Teaching, Freedom Dreaming, and Black Joy by Bettina Love
Creating Inclusive Classrooms (Mason Website)
“Education Liberates” featuring bell hooks and Bettina Love (1 hr, 30 min video)
Readings for Week 4 Discussion - Race and Disability
Week 4: October 30, 2020—Race and Disability
Materials
Alice Sheppard on Disability Dance and Access
Children of color with autism face disparities of care and isolation
Dis/ability critical race studies (DisCrit): theorizing at the intersections of race and dis/ability
M4BL POLICY PLATFORM: END THE WAR ON BLACK HEALTH AND BLACK DISABLED PEOPLE
Intersectionality & Disability, ft Keri Gray, the Keri Gray Group #DisabilityDemandsJustice (video)
#RaceAnd: Kay Ulanday Barrett (video)
Readings for Week Three Discussion - October 23, 2020
Week 3: October 23, 2020—Afrofuturism, Otherwise Worlds, and Freedom Dreaming
Materials
Why should you read sci-fi superstar Octavia E. Butler? - Ayana Jamieson and Moya Bailey (video)
Excerpt: "Emergent Strategies" - adrienne maree brown (video)
Sci-Fi Digital Series “Afrofuturism” Sun Ra Part 1 | DUST (video)
Afrofuturism mixes sci-fi and social justice. Here’s how it works. (video)
Afrofuturism Explained: Not Just Black Sci-Fi | Inverse (video)
Otherwise, Ferguson by Ashon Crawley (essay)
Against the Normative World by Sofia Samatar (interview)
NOTES TOWARD A THEORY OF QUANTUM BLACKNESS by SOFIA SAMATAR (poem)
Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination, Chapter 6: KEEPIN’ IT (SUR)REAL: DREAMS OF THE MARVELOUS by Robin D. G. Kelley
Freedom Dreaming: A Call to Imagine by Sarah Branch, Downtown Brooklyn Arts Management Fellow
Readings for Week Two Discussion - October 16, 2020
Week 2: October 16, 2020—Reparations
Materials
The Case for Reparations by Ta-Nehisi Coates (The Atlantic article)
What is Owed by Nikole Hannah-Jones (NYT article)
We May Be the First People to Receive Reparations for Slavery | NYT Opinion (NYT video)
Slavery reparations bill debated in US House hearing (The Guardian video)
‘Stain of slavery’: Congress debates reparations to atone for America's original sin (The Guardian article with video)
Can reparations help right the wrongs of slavery? (PBS video)
North Carolina City Will Give Reparations to Black Residents | NowThis (video)
Reparations, H.R. 40 and the Path Forward (ACLU)
How Reparations Could Fix The Racial Wealth Gap In America | NBC News NOW (video)
Six questions about slavery reparations, answered (CNN article)
Readings for Week One Discussion - October 2, 2020
Week 1: October 2, 2020—Misogynoir
Materials
Why you need to know what 'misogynoir' means right now (article)
What "Misogynoir" Means . . . and Why It Has to End (video)
End Adultification Bias (Full Version) (video)
The Uses of Anger by Audre Lorde (essay)
The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House (pdf) by Audre Lorde (essay)
How to Be an Anti-Racist: Chapter 14: Gender by Ibram X. Kendi
M4BL: End of the War on Black Women (website)
Doreen Garner Sculpts Our Trauma | Art21 "New York Close Up" (video)
‘Nobody's Free Until Everybody's Free’: Fannie Lou Hamer’s Legacy Is More Important Now Than Ever (article)
The problem with celebrating the 19th Amendment: Opinion by Treva B. Lindsey (article)
Ida B. Wells | The Vote | American Experience | PBS (video)
Global Arts Coffeehouse
The Global Arts Coffeehouse centers on the work of international artists, globalization in the arts, and cross-cultural artistic exchange. This series highlights artists with international impact and provides opportunity for Mason students and the community to learn about their work. Each of these events is free and open to the public.
