civil rights attorney and Harvard Law professor Lani Guinier

civil rights attorney and Harvard Law professor Lani Guinier speaks at ASU on Wednesday, April 16.

In year 19, ASU continues to invite great people to deliver its A. Wade Smith Memorial Lecture on Race Relations. Tonight’s offering, by civil rights attorney and Harvard Law professor Lani Guinier, promises to keep in that tradition.

The event is free, open to the public, and requires no RSVP. But seats are often at a premium.

Guinier’s remarks are titled “Rethinking Race and Class.” She will speak tonight at 7:00 pm, in the Carson Ballroom of Old Main on the Tempe campus.

As ASU says,

“Guinier challenges conventional thinking on the issues of race and class. This lecture focuses on the ways that those who have been excluded (based on race or class) are like canaries in coal mines: their vulnerability signals problems with the larger atmosphere affecting us all.”

More information on the Lecture and Guinier is here.

And here is background on the Lecture’s namesake:

“The A. Wade Smith Memorial Lecture on Race Relations was created in 1995 to perpetuate the work of a man who had devoted his life to the idea of racial parity. As professor and chair of sociology at Arizona State University, A. Wade Smith worked tirelessly to improve race relations on the ASU campus and within the greater community.”

I never had the opportunity to know Wade Smith, but I know and think very highly of his family. I am so pleased to see the Lecture continue and thrive.