Dr. Ruha Benjamin Keynote Address

Please join a keynote address featuring distinguished scholar and public intellectual, Dr. Ruha Benjamin. Please save the date, September 25, 2025, and invite colleagues and students to this upcoming event. 

This event is co-sponsored by the Project STAND, the Mellon Foundation, the African American Digital and Experimental Humanities (AADHum) at UMD, The Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy (MICA) at UMD, UMD Libraries, and UMD's US Latina/o Studies. 

Collective Imagination: Freedom Dreaming and Liberation

Date and Time: 2:00 pm-3:30 pm September 25, 2025

Location: Samuel Riggs IV Alumni Center, University of Maryland

A reception will follow. 

Register here: https://forms.gle/yvfFVqWuoPz5phqx5

Benjamin's talk, Collective Imagination: Freedom Dreaming and Liberation, will address how science and technology reinforce social inequalities and the vital role of grassroots organizers who boldly imagine more just possibilities. 

About the Speaker:

Ruha Benjamin is a transdisciplinary scholar, writer, and educator. Her research and teaching explore the social dimensions of innovation and technology, as well as the radical potential of imagination. She is Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University and Founding Director of the Ida B. Wells JUST Data Lab. Her work investigates the relationships between innovation and inequity, knowledge and power, race and citizenship, and health and justice. She is the author of Imagination: A Manifesto (2024), Viral Justice (2022), Race After Technology (2019), People's Science (2013), and editor of Captivating Technology (2019)