“If We Want to Heal, We Must Tell the Truth: Truth, Reconciliation and Racial Justice in the Midst of Ahistorical Narratives”

This webinar will offer insight into truth and reconciliation as a tool of transitional justice required for social change. Dr. Amber Johnson will focus on the recent history of the communication discipline’s racial climate leading up to #communicationsowhite, #rhetoricsowhite, and the scholar strike of 2020, what we can learn from that moment, the roles of historical and indisputable truths required for progress, and ways our discipline can promote futurity and actionable change with global and local impact.

Amber Johnson is an award-winning associate professor of communication and social justice at Saint Louis University. As a scholar, artist and activist, Johnson’s research and activism focus on narratives of identity, protest, and social justice in digital media, popular media, and everyday lived experiences. As a polymath, their mixed-media artistry involves working with metals, recycled and reclaimed goods, photography, poetry, percussion, and paint to interrogate systems of oppression.

Johnson’s notable awards include the Golden Anniversary Monograph Award for research on black masculinity and the performative possibilities of social media, the Lilla A. Heston award for Outstanding Scholarship in Interpretation and Performance Studies for work on embodied pedagogies and social justice, the Faculty Excellence Award for Diversity and Social Justice, a presidential citation for social justice work within and beyond the communication discipline, and several article of the year and top paper awards.