20th Annual Ray Warren Symposium on Race and Ethnic Studies

Illustration by Yiran Jia

Studying our history provides more than an insight into the past. It also helps us navigate the present and shape a future, too. As we celebrate the 20th year of the Ray Warren Symposium on Race and Ethnic Studies, we consider not only how we arrived here but also this vital question: what lies ahead?

This year’s symposium revolves around reimagining society to build a liberating and just future. Inspired by Afrofuturism and BIPOC traditions of speculation and imagination, we explore what it means to integrate BIPOC futurism(s) into the world we create, whether fantastical or real. We hope to generate conversations that invite a reimagining of our futures, free from hegemonic and oppressive realities.

What defines BIPOC futurism as an idea, aesthetic, and framework? How are utopian and/or dystopian futures expressed in literature, art, music, media, and technology? In what ways do urban planning, public policy, and decolonial movements for social justice articulate and manifest these visions of a world to come? 

2023-24 student co-chairs:

Lucinda Law ’24 and Mithila Tambe ’25