NELC Statement of Solidarity

Submitted by Selim S. Kuru on

To our students of color: we recognize and share your pain and anguish caused by ongoing struggles for racial justice in the United States. We must name the problem with integrity and honesty: we are battling institutional racism that has been with us in different forms since the inception of our country. Policing is just one form of institutional racism in this country. On that front, we join our colleagues who have called on the University of Washington to reconsider its relations with the UW Police Department and the Seattle Police Department.

While we believe in the liberating potential of the humanities, we recognize that liberal education, like other social domains, remains linked with the same discourses of power and race-thinking that you are fighting to dismantle. Following its mission statement, NELC faculty and staff will continue working together to critically address the question of race in our curriculum and classes. Ultimately, our objective is to empower you to cultivate the critical literacy and empathy necessary to identify and combat racism in all its varied forms, both on individual and institutional levels. In your lifelong struggle for racial justice, consider us your allies in solidarity. We collectively affirm that Black Lives Matter.

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