Author speaks on immigration and framing

Women in Living and Learning sponsored a talk Wednesday night by Rinku Sen titled "Renewing America: Race, Immigration and Economic Justice in the 21st Century." The talk was part of a speaker series focusing on current global and local human rights struggles.

Sen is the president and executive director of the Applied Research Center, a think tank, which researches and explores racial justice. She used stories and personal experience to communicate her insight into an understanding of the politics of race and immigration in America today.

The idea of framing was central to Sen's talk. She said the context information was given in was often more important than its content. Rather than simply tell someone the facts, it is much more effective to tell a story, she said, particularly to emphasize the importance of context and word choice in its effectiveness.

Junior participant Christine Parker said she saw a connection between Sen's explanation of framing and a recent showing of Mark Crutcher's Maafa 21: Black Genocide in 21st Century America by the University of Richmond's Spider's for Life. "Words are important in shaping how we view things," Parker said.

Parker said she was bothered by the word choice of the title. "Genocide implies coming into someone's home and murdering their family," she said, "but there is an element of choice to abortion."

Junior Malori Holloman said, "Instead of pointing fingers, we need to change how we frame questions so we can change how people think on campus."

Sen said she had focused her discussion on immigration to connect to this year's presidential elections. She was concerned about the way race and immigration may be framed, she said. "Barack Obama has already been called a 'food stamp' president by Newt Gingrich," she said, "and his religious claims have been questioned. I see him being portrayed as un-American."

But Sen said she was optimistic, citing a recent exchange on MSNBC between her and Roy Beck, head of non-partisan think tank NumbersUSA. "He made a deliberate choice to say 'people without papers,' instead of 'illegals,' and that is progress," she said.

Sen has written several books and is the publisher of Colorlines.com.

For more information regarding the speaker series sponsored by WILL, go to will.richmond.edu.

Contact reporter Rachel Stoltzfoos at rachel.stoltzfoos@richmond.edu.