Posted Friday, June 5, 2020
The Executive Board of the Northeast Modern Language Association calls for an immediate end to the state-sanctioned police violence against black communities. We are writers, teachers, activists, and scholars from a multitude of backgrounds (racial, ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and educational) and geographical regions who believe that the pursuit of justice is at the root of the protests that have emerged in all 50 states, throughout the Pacific territories, and around the world in response to the murders of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor—as well as the deaths of Eric Garner, Sandra Bland, Freddie Gray, and Tamir Rice, among too many others. We are committed to ending white supremacist ideologies that criminalize and dehumanize entire communities to which many of our members and our students belong and whose voices we honor. As an organization, we will continue to work against anti-Black racism, and all racial injustice, by deliberately welcoming a multitude of anti-racist perspectives and dialogues at our annual conference. Further, as a multi-ethnic organization comprised of language practitioners, critics, activists, and public humanities figures, we emphatically condemn any attacks on the Constitutional right to freedom of expression, individual and collective. We believe in the power of the humanities to develop a more socially, environmentally, economically, and politically just future.
The Northeast Modern Language Association Executive Board:
Brandi So, President
Bernadette Wegenstein, First Vice President
Joseph Valente, Second Vice President
Carole Salmon, Past President
Carine Mardorossian, Executive Director
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NeMLA