Critical Race Theory Statement

What is Critical Race Theory?

By: UO Critical Race Lab

Introduction

As the Critical Race Lab at the University of Oregon (UO), we challenge the role that racial difference plays in structural inequality and violence. We use critical race theory (CRT) to understand how race and other forms of social difference, like gender and class, are relationships of power that shape our society. 

CRT is a body of frameworks and practices that illuminate how race and other differentials are produced throughout history. CRT is the result of historical, geographical, and ethical reflection on the part of academics, activists, and communities. As a lab, we invite and celebrate a plurality of voices and experiences interested in challenging dominant narratives that reify racial differences or treat racism as an aberration in U.S. history and culture. 

Core to CRT is the understanding of race as a construct and ideology that enables various racial projects, such as colonization and slavery. Ideologies produce hierarchies in which some secure advantages and privileges at the expense of others. Such hierarchies have been normalized over the centuries, thereby institutionalizing harm and inequality. We recognize that the borders separating us are geographical markings that are given more value than the lives that are displaced and forced to cross them. 

Recently, CRT has been caricatured and used to channel and express white resentment, fear, and rage. One of the ways it is misrepresented is by focusing on individual actions and prejudice rather than power structures that shape our society. This backlash has developed in response to growing challenges to white supremacy and nationalism. The U.S.’s racial reckoning reached new heights in 2020 in response to the murder of George Floyd and countless other Black people. Mass protests in support of Black Lives Matter, coupled with demographic change and an increase in white nationalism pose a threat to those invested in white innocence and opposed to racial justice.

Critical Race Theory Roots & Practice

CRT emerged as an intellectual movement in critical legal studies in the 1970s and 1980s.1 Legal scholars sought to problematize the fact that in the law, the U.S. was considered a nonracist place, with racism occurring only as an aberration. Drawing on legal history and other forms of evidence, including stories and narratives, they argued that racism was systemic in the U.S. Although this was a necessary intervention and became the basis of a scholarly field, earlier scholars such as W.E.B. DuBois made similar claims. While race is indeed a social construct, it has real material consequences. Race is composed of both ideological and material components that are manifested in the creation of social structures, institutions, and practices.2 More recently, scholars have developed the concept of intersectionality3 to understand how race and other forms of difference, such as gender, religion, sexuality and ability, overlap to create distinct experiences – ones that the law was previously unable to address in a meaningful way. 

CRT influences youth groups and community organizing outside of academia. Grassroots groups, such as the Youth Justice Coalition, Black Lives Matter, Migrant Roots Media, and Dignity and Power Now, all use CRT to analyze structural violence within historically marginalized groups. Activists attest to the potency of CRT as a living theory, one that speaks to the experiences of marginalized individuals and communities on an ongoing basis, thus CRT is constantly evolving. It is an empowering framework that encourages solidarity and action. 

Beyond Misconceptions of Critical Race Theory

The current weaponization of CRT in the U.S. is yet another example of historical and contemporary forms of domination that ultimately serve to undermine the well-being of communities of color. As a nation, the U.S. can never truly attain racial justice without a true reckoning with its past. Legislative attempts to silence discussions of structural racism attest to just how crucial an honest accounting of the past is. While some may succeed in erecting legal barriers – this will not stop people from seeking and sharing the truth. 

Addressing the causes of inequalities requires recognizing that the very differences we deem as normal have been produced over time to protect the interest of capital and the privilege of some. Thus, abolishing racism and systemic oppression requires that we look at the roots of racial inequality, which are fundamental to the creation of the U.S. Indeed, how do we understand the dispossession of millions of Native people without powerful racial ideologies, or the fact that much of the U.S.’s wealth and power was produced through slavery? Only deep reflection and collective work on these root causes might allow us to live lives of accountability and solidarity among each other.4 

Learn More:

1 See work by Derrick Bell, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Richard Delgado, Cheryl Harris, Gloria Ladson-Billings, Patricia Williams, and Tara Yosso

2 Pulido, L. 2006. Black, Brown, Yellow, and Left: Radical Activism in Los Angeles. University of California Press.

3 Crenshaw, K. 1993. Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color. Stanford Law Review 43 (6):1241–1299.

4 Bruno, T., and C. Faiver-Serna. 2022. More Reflections on a White Discipline. The Professional Geographer 74 (1):156–161.