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Stepping it up: Creating Powerful Multiracial Alliances with Progressive Bloggers
Friday, August 14th 3:00 PM - 4:15 PM
Panel/Room, 301/302

The session will focus on how the progressive blogosphere often neglects to discuss larger social justice issues, particularly those related to race and ethnicity and results in critical concerns like immigration enforcement and criminal justice being mostly covered by nativist and politically conservative bloggers.

Stepping it up: Creating Powerful Multiracial Alliances with Progressive Bloggers along with Cheryl Contee (Jack and Jill Politics), Kyle de Beausset (Citizen Orange and the Sancutuary) and Jacki Esposito (Detention Watch Network) and moderated by Will Coley (Aquifer Media).

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The Myth of Post-Racial America
Thursday, August 13th 9:00 AM - 10:15 AM
Panel, 301/302
Time: Thursday, August 13th, 9:00am - 10:15am
Room: 301/302

The election of Barack Obama as president has led many to view our country as entering a "post-racial" era. The reaction to Attorney General Eric Holder's "nation of cowards" remarks, the controversy over the New York Post cartoon of a police officer shooting a chimpanzee and the president's own reluctance to appoint an immigration rights advocate as assistant attorney general for civil rights indicate that Obama's election may be the beginning—not the end—of a post-racial America. Panelists will discuss and share analyses on the role of race both during the election and post-inauguration, and its impact on progressive policy.

Panelist include: Keith Kamisugi, Director of Communications at the Equal Justice Society • Rinku Sen, Executive Director of the Applied Research Center (ARC) and Publisher of ColorLines magazine • Rich Benjamin, author of Searching for Whitopia: An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America and Senior Fellow at Demos, a multi-issue national think tank based in New York City. • Annabel Park, Annabel's video blog (youtube.com/9500liberty) documenting the immigration battle in northern Virginia is considered a breakthrough in new media activism. She studied political theory at Oxford University as a Marshall Scholar.

If you're coming to the conference, come join us and share your perspective on this issue!