Law and Race Commons^™

Note, Moving Ground, Breaking Traditions: Tasha’S Chronicle, Angela Onwuachi-Willig

Faculty Scholarship

This Note uses a fictional dialogue to analyze and engage issues concerning stereotypes, stigmas, and affirmative action. It also highlights the importance of role models for students of color and the disparate hiring practices of law firms and legal employers through the conversations and thoughts of its main character, Tasha Crenshaw.

The Diversity Among Us, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

UF Law Faculty Publications

It is really a pleasure to be here today and I think we owe great thanks to Western New England College School of Law for hosting this historic First Annual Northeastern People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference. I think there are two people who deserve special mention and to whom a great deal of thanks are in order. First, I would like to thank Dean Mahoney of Western New England College School of Law who made this conference possible. These events just do not happen without administrative and, more specifically, deaconal support. Her role and support are invaluable. The other …

Race And Criminal Justice, Richard B. Collins

Publications

No abstract provided.

Race, Cops, And Traffic Stops, Angela J. Davis

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This article discusses the Supreme Court's failure to provide a clear and effective remedy for discriminatory pretextual traffic stops. The first part explores the discretionary nature of pretextual stops and their discriminatory effect on African-Americans and Latinos. Then, the article examines Whren v. United States, a Supreme Court case in which the petitioners claimed that these “pretextual stops” violate the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution and are racially discriminatory. The Supreme Court rejected the claim, upholding the constitutionality of pretextual stops based on probable cause and noting that claims of racial discrimination must be challenged under the Equal Protection Clause. …

Two Parents Are Better Than None: Whether Two Single, African American Adults--Who Are Not In A Traditional Marriage Or A Romantic Or Sexual Relationship With Each Other--Should Be Allowed To Jointly Adopt And Co-Parent African American Children, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

This article proposes an additional adoption model to allow joint adoption and co-parenting by single African Americans who are not in a traditional marriage relationship with each other and not in a romantic or sexual relationship with each other. Under this model, for example, two friends, two sisters, two brothers, a sister and a brother, etc., could jointly adopt and co-parent a child. If some new model such as this one is not devised, many single blacks may hesitate to take on the entire adoption responsibility alone. As a result, many black children will continue to go without any parents. …

Representing Black Male Innocence, Joan W. Howarth

Scholarly Works

This Article is a case study of a California capital case. Drawing on cultural studies, the first part develops the social construction of Black male gang member, especially as that identity is understood within white imaginations. The powerful and frightening idea of a Black man who is a gang member, even gang leader, captured the imagination and moral passion of the decisionmakers in this case, recasting and reframing the evidence in furtherance of this idea. In fundamental ways, this idea or imposed identity is fundamentally inconsistent with any American concept of innocence.

The second part uses the case to investigate …

Latcrit Praxis To Heal Fractured Communities, Laura M. Padilla

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay explores LatCrit praxis as a healing tool. Before turning to LatCrit practice, let me offer a preliminary observation that many Latinos are troubled by leading divided lives in fractured communities. This is exacerbated by social conditioning which encourages Latinos, as well as other outsiders, to fragment their identities. One of the benefits of LatCrit theory is that it encourages the process of working toward wholeness. At a recent conference which looked at the courage of those who have decided to live lives divided no more, Parker Palmer, the plenary speaker, suggested that the spark which causes people to …

Intersectionality And Positionality: Situating Women Of Color In The Affirmative Action Dialogue, Laura M. Padilla

Faculty Scholarship

This article explores the position of women of color in the affirmative action dialogue. Affirmative action has come under attack locally, statewide, and federally. During this same period, critical race feminists have brought into sharp relief how women of color are marginalized or erased in discourses over sex and gender, as well as over race and ethnicity. Despite these protests and warnings, the current debate over affirmative action continues this history of invisibility, perpetuating America's spoken and unspoken conceptions about where women of color belong. For example, most discussion of affirmative action focuses on race, more specifically on African-Americans. Some …