Keynote Event with Author Matthew Desmond (One Book, One U)
Tuesday, February 15, 2022 at 7 p.m. (EST)
Matthew Desmond discusses his book, “Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City,” the 2022 One Book, One U selection for the University of Miami. Desmond’s Pulitzer Prize winning text is a riveting and moving ethnographic study of the affordable housing crisis in the United States, and it poignantly shows how access to the American Dream can be determined—and undermined—by racial and gendered injustices.
“‘Evicted’ is astonishing—a masterpiece of writing and research that fills a tremendous gap in our understanding of poverty,” says author and journalist Rebecca Skloot. “‘Evicted’ is a must read for anyone who cares about social justice in this country.”
About the AuthorMatthew Desmond is the Maurice P. During Professor of Sociology at Princeton University. After receiving his Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, he joined the Harvard Society of Fellows as a Junior Fellow. He is the author of four books, including “Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City” (2016), which won the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Critics Circle Award, and Carnegie Medal, and PEN / John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction. The principal investigator of The Eviction Lab, Desmond’s research focuses on poverty in America, city life, housing insecurity, public policy, racial inequality, and ethnography. He is the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award, and the William Julius Wilson Early Career Award. A contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, Desmond was listed in 2016 among the Politico 50, as one of “fifty people across the country who are most influencing the national political debate.” Read more »
About One Book, One UIncreasingly standard at colleges and universities across the country, common books provide a shared educational experience for their communities. This experience then becomes the springboard for dialogue and exchange and is particularly useful in creating cohesion and community during times when controversy and political polarization threaten unity at institutions of higher education. The University of Miami’s One Book, One U program aligns with several distinct commitments that the University has made to promote learning and growth around racial justice on campus and in the wider world. Formally a platform through which to explore racial justice and equity under this plan's key initiatives, the program is firmly rooted in the institution's four aspirations. Co-sponsors of the program this year include the Office of the Provost, University of Miami Libraries, the Creative Writing Program in the College of Arts and Sciences, Student Activities, Office of Civic and Community Engagement, Learning Innovation and Faculty Engagement, Center for Humanities, and other campus partners. Read more »