CAR Intro sheet

THE BOSTON UNIVERSITY CENTER FOR ANTIRACIST RESEARCH Where academic excellence meets antiracist action

Thank you for your interest in the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research.

With your help, we can dismantle systemic racism and racial inequities.

At the Center, we start by looking at how academic research on racial inequities is often conducted today. Generally, it begins with an observation: People in this neighborhood are poorer. People of this race are getting sicker than people of that race. People in this district are voting less.

Too often, people ask, What’s wrong with these people? But that’s the wrong question.

The Boston University Center for Antiracist Research, led by founding director and Andrew W. Mellon Professor Ibram X. Kendi, intends to change the question—and find better answers that lead to better solutions.

“We start from the position that when there are racial inequities, it is not because there’s something wrong with or inferior about any racial group of people,” Dr. Kendi says. “And if that’s your starting point, then the research questions become: What’s wrong with policies? What’s wrong with conditions? What’s wrong with the structures?”

With the goal of eradicating systemic racism, the Center for Antiracist Research is a full-service organization that harnesses the interconnected pillars of research, policy, narrative, and advocacy to: • Conduct rigorous original research to determine the root causes of racial inequities across sectors from wealth to health • Develop policy solutions to address structural issues leading to racial inequities • Translate research insights into narratives that policymakers and the general public can understand • Propel grassroots advocacy and empower local communities Your philanthropic support can galvanize our work to alter the racial landscape of the United States and beyond. Toward that end, we welcome gifts from each and every person who wants to be part of this long-overdue change. With your help, our generation can root out racism.

OUR APPROACH A pervasive problem like systemic racism requires a multidisciplinary approach, bringing together expertise in law, medicine, public health, data sciences, communication, business, arts, and humanities.

Because BU is home to 17 schools and colleges that encompass the breadth of these fields and many others, the Center is uniquely well positioned to take the necessary multidisciplinary approach to eradicating racism.

“In the hard and medical sciences, it’s the norm to develop a multidisciplinary team,” Dr. Kendi says.

“But among those of us who study race and racism, it’s all about the individual scholar—which is no way to solve any sort of human problem that has multiple dimensions. And then, even for STEM scholars, there really is no pathway, there are no guideposts, for how their research can be transformed into policy change.”

The Center convenes these multidisciplinary teams, providing a pathway from academic research on racial inequities to the establishment of antiracist policies. We also share and amplify data-driven insights on racial inequities through narrative-change efforts and advocacy campaigns, focusing on partnerships with journalists, artists, experienced community organizers, and government workers.

And the Center doesn’t act alone. We seek out and build upon strong antiracist work being done at other institutions and organizations, with the goal of strengthening the racial justice movement as a whole. Across the country, many people are researching, writing, developing policy, and advocating against racism. What’s missing is a central entity that can bring all of these threads together in a systematic, organized way. According to Dr. Kendi, “That’s where we as a Center can play a special role.”

THE ROAD TOWARD RACISM’S END Defeating racism won’t be easy. Four hundred years of American history won’t be reversed overnight.

But it can be done.

“There is no way we can tackle this big problem if we’re not going to think big about solutions,” says Dr. Kendi. “We see the scale of the problem. We can’t shy away from the scale of the solution.”

To help fulfill the Center’s ambitious mission, we will need to secure philanthropic support on a major scale. Already, generous supporters from within and beyond the Boston University community— passionate about taking concrete steps to help eradicate racism—have stepped forward. Gifts large and small enable Dr. Kendi, the Center, and our affiliates across the country to understand racial inequities and deploy effective antiracist policies and ideas.

If you are inspired by this vision, please join us in our work by making a gift to the BU Center for Antiracist Research today.