Redress and Reparations: Black/Asian Intersections

Redress and Reparations: Black/Asian Intersections
Jovan Scott Lewis
Associate Professor of Geography, UC Berkeley; Reparations Task Force Member
Don Tamaki
Donald K. Tamaki, Senior Counsel at Minami Tamaki LLP; Reparations Task Force Member
Moderated by: Lok Siu
Chair of the Asian American Research Center and Professor of Ethnic Studies, UC Berkeley
The U.S. is as segregated today as it was in the 1940’s. The historic exclusion of African Americans from equal education, employment, the benefits of the New Deal, federally insured home loans, and other opportunities that created America’s middle class has resulted in Black households having nine times less in wealth than White households. It has produced huge disparities that persist in housing, houselessness, healthcare, education, policing, and criminal justice, among others.
California is the first and thus far the only state to examine the compounding consequences of this multi-generational harm and to consider how to address them. In 2020, the state of California established the Task Force to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans. The work of the Task Force is informed by and builds on the successful organizing for redress for Japanese American incarceration.
Task Force members Jovan Scott Lewis and Donald K. Tamaki discuss the connections between Asian American and Black American communities, histories, and resistance, and suggest how people can get involved in this growing reparations movement.
Sponsored by: ISSI's Asian American Research Center
Co-sponsored by: African and African American Studies, Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies, Asian American Law Journal, Institute of Governmental Studies, Othering & Belonging Institute
(This event included a screening of the film Reparations by Jon Osaki. For copyright reasons, the film is not included in the event video. You can learn more about the film here: www.newday.com/films/reparations )
April 12, 2023