Black lives matter. The recent murders, in the United States, of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Ahmaud Arbery, and so many others expose exploitations and inequities rooted in more than four centuries of colonialism, enslavement, and the violation of civil and human rights.

The international advisory board of the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI) stands in solidarity with those protesting racist forms of injustice and police violence. We commit to creating and promoting anti-racist environments for scholars, students, and staff in the humanities, in the United States, and around the world.

We also recognize that we are witness to a phenomenon that is not unique to the United States: forms of institutional racism and repressive violence are present on every continent. While the United States’ foundational affirmation of equality highlights the violence and demands our attention, we nevertheless reaffirm our international approach to the elimination of institutional racism and to the difficult work of building more equitable institutions, curricula, concepts, and archives.

Scholars in the humanities have deep commitments to concepts such as freedom, humanity, personhood, dignity, and democracy, and yet we recognize that these same concepts often reproduce paradoxes, exclusions, and systems of injustice. By analyzing these concepts, excavating their histories and examining our own habits and institutions, we commit ourselves to imagining a better future and inventing the world in which we want to live.

CHCI Member Resources on Anti-Racism, Equity, and Inclusion