On Friday, June 4, CSS Director Earl Lewis spoke on a panel with other University of Michigan leaders to reflect on the national and local outcry for change following the racial justice protests of summer 2020. 

"Crucial Conversations for Societal Change: Reflection, Research & Resolve" brought together both UM leaders, including President Mark Schlissel, Executive Director of Public Safety and Security Eddie Washington, Jr., Deputy Chief Diversity Officer Katrina Wade-Golden, and Vice President for Research Rebecca Cunningham, as well as undergraduate and graduate student representatives. 

"The violence...actually has to do with the ways we produce and reproduce knowledge. We should not delude ourselves to believe that universities won't somehow be at the center of a battle over what constitutes things to be taught. And so I highlight and underscore the cultural wars that are now emerging over critical race theory, that grew out of legal theory, and that is now becoming a new way to say let's silence certain kinds of knowledge and silence certain ways of looking at the world."

Watch the panel here: