Crisis Democracy: Conversations on Politics in America will encourage the university community to reflect on, interpret, and imagine the future of political participation, inclusion and expression. Conversations between academics and local organizers will explore topics including: legal developments that affect citizen democratic participation, debates over free speech and safe spaces, and the shifting configurations of social movements.

The Futures of Democratic Social Movements panel features:

Cedric de Leon, Associate Professor of Sociology, Tufts University
Jessica Garrick, Doctoral Candidate, Sociology, University of Michigan
Maria Cotera, Associate Professor, American Culture and Women's Studies, University of Michigan

Maria Cotera is currently an associate professor in the Departments of Women’s Studies and American Culture at the University of Michigan. She holds a PhD from Stanford University’s Program in Modern Thought, and an MA in English from the University of Texas. Professor Cotera currently serves as director of the University of Michigan Latina/o Studies Program. She is the author of Native Speakers: Ella Deloria, Zora Neale Hurston, Jovita Gonzalez and the Poetics of Culture (University of Texas Press, 2008).

Jessica Garrick is a doctoral candidate in sociology at the University of Michigan, where she transferred after starting her graduate career at the University of New Mexico. While in New Mexico, she worked closely with an immigrant worker center to document the incidence of wage theft among Mexican immigrants in the area. For her dissertation, Jessica is using the case of US labor law to explore how laws long “on the books” are repurposed to fit new contexts.

Cedric de Leon is an associate professor of sociology at Tufts University. Before arriving at Tufts, he served as chair of the sociology department at Providence College. He is the author of The Origins of Right to Work (Cornell University Press, 2015) and Party and Society (Polity Press, 2014) and is co-editor of Building Blocs (Stanford University Press, 2015) with Manali Desai and Cihan Tugal. He has served in numerous elected and appointed posts in the American Sociological Association and Social Science History Association and sits on the editorial boards of Contemporary Sociology and Social Problems.

This LSA Bicentennial Theme Semester event is presented with support from the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts and the University of Michigan Bicentennial Office. Additional support provided by the Department of History and Eisenberg Institute for Historical Studies.