Candis Watts Smith is Associate Professor of Political Science & African American Studies. She is the author of three books and co-editor of another together. The most recent publications are Stay Woke: A People's Guide to Making All Black Lives Matter (NYU Press, 2019) and Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics (U of Chicago Press, 2020). Taken together, Smith is an expert in American politics, racial & ethnic politics, and social policy & inequality. She has written in academic scholarly journals as well as for outlets such as the Washington Post, and has presented at TEDx.
The first wave of the Black Lives Matter movement, which crested after the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, had the support of less than half of white Americans. Given that Americans tend to have a very narrow definition of racism, many at that time were likely confused by the juxtaposition of Black-led […]
