PUTNEY — On Monday, Sept. 12, author and public speaker Allan G. Johnson will visit Landmark College to talk about race and opportunities to overcome racism in the U.S.
Johnson's talk, “Unraveling the Knot of Race,” will be in the Brooks M. O'Brien auditorium at the East Academic Building at Landmark at 7 p.m. Landmark is located at 19 River Road South in Putney. The event is free, accessible, and open to the public.
“I love using Allan Johnson's book 'Privilege, Power, and Difference' in my Civic Engagement course because his writing is down to earth and his message is wise, simple, and clear,” Landmark College Associate Professor Ann McCloskey said in a news release.
McCloskey's course is part of a larger effort at Landmark to engage topics related to racial and cultural diversity.
Landmark President Dr. Peter Eden has led the institution in public statements about the importance of having discussions on campus about diversity. “This is the place for neurodiversity, but we also want it to be the place for diversity overall,” he said at the 2016 Convocation ceremony.
According to Johnson, one of the greatest barriers to ending racism and other forms of privilege is that we are trapped in cultural ways of thinking that turn conversations about privilege and oppression into occasions for members of dominant groups to feel guilty, defensive, and angry.
He describes his presentation as offering an alternative that can help to overcome that barrier. The talk is based on Johnson's books, “The Gender Knot” (third edition, 2014) and “Privilege, Power, and Difference” (second edition, 2005).