Next Conversations on Race and Policing hosts Marisol LeBrón, author and scholar from UC Santa Cruz

Marisol LeBrón, an interdisciplinary scholar whose research and teaching focus is on social equality, policing and violence, will be the next guest speaker at Cal State San Bernardino’s series, Conversations on Race and Policing.

The program, free and open to the public, will take place at 1 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 18 on Zoom. It can be accessed from a PC, Mac, Linux, iOS or Android at https://tinyurl.com/csusb-race-policing.

LeBrón, an author and associate professor of feminist studies, critical race and ethnic studies at UC Santa Cruz, will discuss her latest book project, “Up Against the Wall: Policing and the Making of Latinxs.”

“Up Against the Wall,” according her website, “aims to uncover the centrality of policing to the emergence and consolidation of Latinx identity in the United States. The book demonstrates that policing has played an essential, although chronically underexamined, role in shaping how we understand Latinxs and their place within American society. When and how diverse Latinx communities have come into contact with the United States’ law enforcement apparatus tell us a great deal about how Latinx groups are positioned within hierarchies of belonging related to race, citizenship, class, and spatial location in ways that continue to have deadly reverberations.”

In addition to her current project, LeBrón is the author of “Policing Life and Death: Race, Violence, and Resistance in Puerto Rico” and “Against Muerto Rico: Lessons from the Verano Boricua.” Along with Yarimar Bonilla, LeBrón is the co-editor of “Aftershocks of Disaster: Puerto Rico Before and After the Storm.” She has also published articles in The Washington Post, The Guardian and Truthout, as well as sharing her expertise with various news media outlets.

Conversations on Race and Policing began after the murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, and its aftermath. It was the death of Floyd, a Black man, by a white Minneapolis police officer, that sparked widespread protests, calls for reform and revamping of the nation’s policing system, difficult and hard conversations on race and racism – and gave birth to Cal State San Bernardino’s Conversations on Race and Policing, also known as CoRP.

In subsequent court cases, three other former Minneapolis police officers implicated in Floyd’s death were given prison sentences.

The series has featured scholars, journalists, law enforcement officers, lawyers, activists, artists, educators, administrators and others from throughout the nation who shared their experience and expertise on issues related to race and policing.

More than 90 forums have taken place, and video recordings of the sessions are posted online on the Conversations on Race and Policing Lecture Series Archive. 

The guest presenters in the upcoming programs of Conversations on Race and Policing, each at 1 p.m. on Wednesdays, include:

• Oct. 25: Dorothy Roberts, George A. Weiss University Professor of Law and Sociology and the Raymond Pace and Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander Professor of Civil Rights at the University of Pennsylvania and author of “Torn Apart: How the Child Welfare System Destroys Black Families--and How Abolition Can Build a Safer World”
• Nov. 1: U.S. Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), whose Congressional committee assignments include the House Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Human Services. Last spring, he found himself in a dispute with U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Green (R-Ga.), demanding that she apologize to him for making statements employing historically “racist tropes” after the two exchanged words outside the Capitol.
• Nov. 8: Ronnie Dunn, executive director of diversity and associate professor of urban studies, Cleveland State University, whose research interest includes urban and social policy, racial profiling, racial inequality, the criminal justice system and issues affecting children and families living in urban areas, minority populations and the urban poor.
• Nov. 15: Joanna Schwartz, UCLA professor of law, faculty director of the David J. Epstein Program in Public Interest Law and Policy and author of “Shielded: How the Police Became Untouchable.”

The series is organized by Matt Patino (CSUSB MA candidate); CSUSB faculty members Mary Texeira (sociology) and Jeremy Murray (history); Robie Madrigal, public affairs/communication specialist for the CSUSB John M. Pfau Library; Michael German, fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice; and community member Stan Futch, president of the Westside Action Group.

For more information, contact Robie Madrigal at rmadriga@csusb.edu or Jeremy Murray at jmurray@csusb.edu.

Also visit the Conversations on Race and Policing webpage.