Virtual Event: Jennifer Eberhardt on "Biased"

Join us for a virtual conversation with Stanford psychology professor and author Jennifer Eberhardt who will discuss her book, “Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See, Think, and Do.” An acclaimed and powerful examination of unconscious racial bias from one of the world’s leading experts the book has been selected as the second title for our collaboration with the Palo Alto Library’s virtual Palo Alto Reads series. A “one book, one community” program, Palo Alto Reads is a joint partnership between the Palo Alto Library and the City of Palo Alto’s Race & Equity Initiative. It encourages the reading and discussion of a selected book to foster community conversation about themes and topics relevant to our city. The history of our city’s segregation is a great starting point to discuss ongoing inequities in our community, and explore solutions together.

Professor Jennifer Eberhardt will be joined in conversation by Ralph Richard Banks, professor of law at the Stanford Law School and Ed Shikada, Palo Alto City Manager.

This author event is co-hosted by the Bill Lane Center, The Stanford Center for Racial Justice, the Palo Alto Library and the City of Palo Alto

Synopsis of the book:

How do we talk about bias? How do we address racial disparities and inequities? What role do our institutions play in creating, maintaining, and magnifying those inequities? What role do we play? With a perspective that is at once scientific, investigative, and informed by personal experience, Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt offers us the language and courage we need to face one of the biggest and most troubling issues of our time. She exposes racial bias at all levels of society—in our neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, and criminal justice system. Yet she also offers us tools to address it. Eberhardt shows us how we can be vulnerable to bias but not doomed to live under its grip. Racial bias is a problem that we all have a role to play in solving. 

If you would like to purchase a copy of the book prior to the event, the Stanford Bookstore has them available.

About the Author

Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt is a professor of psychology at Stanford and a recipient of a 2014 MacArthur “genius” grant. She has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and was named one of Foreign Policy‘s 100 Leading Global Thinkers. She is co-founder and co-director of SPARQ (Social Psychological Answers to Real-World Questions), a Stanford Center that brings together researchers and practitioners to address significant social problems.

Jackson Eli Reynolds Professor Law, Stanford Law School
Faculty Director, Stanford Center for Racial Justice

Banks has been a member of the Stanford faculty since 1998. Prior to joining the law school, he practiced law at O’Melveny & Myers, was the Reginald F. Lewis Fellow at Harvard Law School and clerked for a federal judge, the Honorable Barrington D. Parker, Jr. (then of the Southern District of New York). Professor Banks teaches and writes about family law, employment discrimination law and race and the law and is the co-founder and Faculty Director of the Stanford Center for Racial Justice. He is the author of Is Marriage for White People? How the African American Marriage Decline Affects Everyone. At Stanford, he is affiliated with the Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research, the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity, the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education and the Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality.

Discussant

Ed Shikada
City Manager, City of Palo Alto

Ed Shikada has been the Palo Alto City Manager since December 2018, and has worked in the dual role of Assistant City Manager and General Manager of the Utilities Department since 2015. Shikada is interested in engaging the Palo city government and community to the topics discussed in Biased and in the previous Palo Alto reads title, The Color of Law.