Life comes at you fast. One moment you’re a columnist. The next moment, you become a case study of racial double standards and institutional censorship.
That was my experience after being wrongfully fired via email last year, 11 years into my tenure at the Washington Post as a columnist and editor. In the aftermath of the Charlie Kirk killing, I was accused of “gross misconduct” and being a physical safety risk to my colleagues for pointing out documented patterns of racial double standards in how America talks about political violence, and specifically white men who espouse hatred and violence.
As a proud member of the Washington Post Guild and the Washington-Baltimore Newsguild, I was able to file a grievance against the Post; our case finally went to arbitration last week. We are confident that we successfully argued that the Washington Post had no just cause to fire me.
There will be more updates on that front.
But for now, this is yet another brutally clarifying lesson.
In a time in which democracy is under attack, and civil rights are being stripped away in broad daylight, we cannot trust our most “prestigious” institutions to save us. They can’t even stomach the most basic of discussions about race and power, much less help us to imagine a better and more equitable future.
I know this because it's not the first time I’ve fought back against institutions that have tried to silence my work on race, media, and power.
Many of you last year remember when Columbia canceled my class on race and media, and I decided to teach it anyway.
Columbia Canceled My Course on Race and Media. I'm Going to Teach It Anyway.
When I got the opportunity to teach at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) in the fall of 2023 for the spring 2024 semester, I was elated. My dream of teaching in a global environment had come true.
I decided to launch my virtual Race, Media, and International Affairs 101 class independently last summer, under the name Resistance Summer School. We sold out 500 seats in 48 hours.
What started as a response to institutional retreat grew into something much, much bigger.
Students showed so much enthusiasm for the course that we ran a Fall 101 and 102 cohort with over 660 students enrolled. and over 5,000 on our waitlist. We have awarded nearly 100 scholarships through community funding. We’ve now built Resistance Summer School into a bigger brand: "Resistance Studies.”
We have a small operations team that has been tireless in providing a great learning experience for students. We have also been able to host salons and events— including a sold-out event with former Teen Vogue editor, Versha Sharma, Team Zeteo’s Mehdi Hasan, and philosopher Olufemi Taiwo.
In the middle of so much turmoil, I’ve decided to keep building anyway. I’m happy to announce that….
Enrollment is Now Open for Race Media and International Affairs 101 and 102!
We are officially enrolling for Resistance Summer School 2026!
Beginning July 20th, I’ll be bringing back Race, Media, and International Affairs 101 and 102 to the public for a seven-week online course.
The class explores the construction of race in Western media and how these depictions of race, power, and labor systems constructed the global order we live in today.
I’ll offer a hybrid mix of live online lectures and recordings, access to a syllabus, and guest speakers. Live group discussions are available to paid participants.
To keep things manageable and meaningful, I’ll be capping the weekly discussion cohorts at 20 people.
This course is suitable for all ages. While I taught this at the graduate level, the material is primarily a media history and current events course.
We look at the development of newspapers, the telegram, radio, photography, and film to examine how various technological developments in media either advanced or set back race relations.
We’ll cover a global range of material—from the development of colonial mass media in the U.S., to media coverage of racial justice at the 1919 League of Nations, to the recent rollback of civil rights laws, to how labor movements and protests are covered differently in left-leaning media.
And we analyze current headlines, news stories, and narrative framings through these historical lenses.
The courses are joined by guest lecturers from academia, journalism, history, and political science to help us navigate both the past and the present.
Live Zoom lectures for 101 will be held on Mondays at 6:00 pm ET — 102 lectures will be held on Wednesdays at 6:00 pm. Discussion sections will be on Thursday evenings.
More information on scheduling and enrollment can be found here!
For those who would like to support the work but cannot commit to a full six-week course, you can contribute to support scholarships and operations here.
If you've asked how you can support me during this period, the answer is simple:
Help us build. Learn from us. Support Resistance Studies. Support independent education. Difficult conversations belong in public life, even when powerful institutions would rather avoid them.
They try to cancel us, but we build schools anyway.
I’m looking forward to seeing you all in class for Summer School!
We Move!
Karen
The purpose of unions and tenure is about power sharing and ability to resist arbitrary and capricious decisions by those with control. Adjunct professorships are low paid "at will" contracts used to pump the cash flow to the pseudo-corporate institution while it is being run like a for-profit company. Those positions amplify the disparity in power of those employed that way. Given current experience, the concept needs to be rebalanced. Educational institutions need a better way to resist authoritarian control by demagogues who can refuse to spend Congressionally allocated research funding. Columbia should have sued instead of caving.
Excited to take 102! 101 was fabulous 🫶