Inflection Point: Black Lives Matter and White America

ONLINE - On September 30, 2020, Northwestern University School of Professional Studies hosted a lunchtime table talk and multimedia presentation featuring Barnor Hesse, PhD, Associate Professor of African American Studies at Northwestern University. At the height of the event, the virtual lecture saw 290 attendees consisting of faculty, staff, and students from across Northwestern University's two campuses. 

The presentation traced and considered what Dr. Hesse posits as the recent inflection point of White America as a result of the Black Lives Matter movement. He conjectured whether this inflection point was creating two White Americas: one desiring to conserve the nation and the other desiring to transform the nation. After showing a clip from the movie A Time to Kill, Dr. Hesse ended the lecture with the question, "if we are thinking about change, transformation, in the U.S. and in large its appeal to White America, does that change in transformation simply reside in the capacity of White America to imagine Black people as white in order to respond effectively?"

The lecture was moderated by Soo La Kim, the Assistant Dean of Graduate Programs at SPS, and was a part of the school's Lunchtime Table Talk series, a lecture and Q&A series that highlights the interdisciplinary research and conversation occurring at the School of Professional Studies. The lectures are free and open to Northwestern University staff, students, and faculty, as well as the general public.

If you are interested in learning more about the Northwestern University School of Professional Studies Lunchtime Table Talk series, please contact us at SPS@northwestern.edu and ask to be added to our email list.