From CRT to DEI: Tracing the Assault on Multiracial Democracy

Since the summer of 2020, rightwing officials and organizations have orchestrated a coordinated campaign to redefine antiracism as the new racism. Early iterations of this campaign presented a caricature of Critical Race Theory to discredit modest antiracist reforms and to limit classroom conversations about racism, bias, and American history writ large. More recently, against the backdrop of politics around Israel and Palestine, many of the same individuals and entities that spearheaded attacks on CRT have turned their sights on “diversity, equity and inclusion” (DEI) as well as various forms of critical and protest speech. Through a conversational dialogue, the panelists will chart historical, rhetorical, political and legal links that bind recent anti-CRT and anti-DEI campaigns. The panelists will also surface how this moment parallels past academic and political conflicts over race and scholarship.