TIME: 8 PM ET / 5 PM PT | PLATFORM: Zoom | REGISTER: click here

Commemorate the 155th anniversary of Juneteenth with an evening of reflections from noted civil rights attorney Sherrilyn Ifill, President & Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. Ifill will be joined by Alex Kotlowitz, journalist, filmmaker, writer in residence at Northwestern University, and author of national bestseller There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in The Other America.  Introduction by VP of the Museum's Board of Directors and Member of the Museum's Executive Committee Rick Salomon.

Juneteenth is the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. However, the history of freedom and the legacy of racism in this country can be tangled, and this is no exception. In cities across the country, people use this time to acknowledge a period in our history that shaped and continues to influence our society today.

Ifill – who argued in front of the Supreme Court at age 28 and now leads the organization where she started her career – is a nationally recognized advocate for civil rights, voting rights, and judicial diversity. She is also the author of On the Courthouse Lawn, which describes the lasting impact of lynching in the United States.

“Sherrilyn Ifill’s seminal work exposing the brutality of the abhorrent, barbaric practice of lynching is as important today as it was ten years ago when it was first published—perhaps more so... On the Courthouse Lawn should be read, and re-read, by anyone interested in racial justice and healing in this country.” — Angela J. Davis, author of Arbitrary Justice

 Kotlowitz’s There Are No Children Here was named as one of the 150 most important books of the twentieth century by the New York Public Library. Kotlowitz’s work has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, and This American Life.  “This is the moving and powerful account of two remarkable boys struggling to survive in Chicago's Henry Horner Homes, a public housing complex disfigured by crime and neglect. Alex Kotlowitz joins the ranks of the important few writers on the subject of urban poverty." — Chicago Tribune

This program will take place via Zoom. Click here to register: https://bit.ly/3dyAZWQ

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Community Partners: Ballot Ready; Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality at the University of Chicago; Center on Halsted; Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights; The Decalogue Society of Lawyers; DePaul University Department of Women’s and Gender Studies; Gender and Women’s Studies Program at the University of Illinois at Chicago; Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Department at Lake Forest College; Illinois State Bar Association; In Her Shoes Foundation; International Women’s Forum – Chicago Chapter; Jewish Judges Association of Illinois; League of Women Voters Chicago; Lesbian and Gay Bar Association of Chicago; Mujeres Latinas en Acción; UIC John Marshall Law School; Women’s Bar Association of Illinois; Women’s and Gender Studies at Northeastern Illinois University; Women’s and Gender Studies Program at Roosevelt University; Women’s Studies & Gender Studies Program at Loyola University Chicago