Black Boxes: Enigmas of Space and Race

Black Boxes: Enigmas of Space and Race was a two-day symposium on race and its role in the built environment that will be held Jan. 16 and 17 at the Yale School of Architecture in New Haven, Connecticut. The event was organized by Ms. Newsom, a second-year graduate student at the School.

An article by Jennifer Newsom is posted at http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=63
The article closes with the following
The goal of Black Boxes is not to validate one opinion or put forth an ideological stance: it is simply to speak, reveal, and contribute verbally and openly. After all, we must acknowledge that what we make is not neutral. We must demystify the other and render difference commonplace rather than exotic. We must move beyond binaries, into a sort of enmeshed existence.
In order for us to fill the silence and surpass a cursory tokenism, we need to communicate. Black Boxes will provide the stage for this discussion. And it will continue to be an important discussion, for, as the scholar Cornel West notes, “the struggle with difference is what is and will be taking place in cultural architectural practices for the next 10, 20, 30 years.”