N*gga Theory

Jody David Armour is the Roy P. Crocker Professor of Law at the University of Southern California. He has been a member of the faculty since 1995. Armour's expertise ranges from personal injury claims to claims about the relationship between racial justice, criminal justice, and the rule of law. Armour studies the intersection of race and legal decision making as well as torts and tort reform movements.A widely published scholar and popular lecturer, Armour is a Soros Justice Senior Fellow of The Open Society Institute's Center on Crime, Communities and Culture. Armour earned his AB degree in Sociology at Harvard University and his JD degree with honors from Boalt Hall Law School at UC Berkeley. Prior to joining USC, he was an associate at Morrison & Foerster, Kirkpatrick and Lockhart and taught at UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall, Indiana University and the University of Pittsburgh.Armour currently teaches students a diverse array of subjects, including Criminal Law, Torts, and Stereotypes and Prejudice: The Role of the Cognitive Unconscious in the Rule of Law. He is the author of Negrophobia and Reasonable Racism: The Hidden Costs of Being Black in America and N*gga Theory: Race, Language, Unequal Justice, and the Law. Melina Abdullah is Professor and former Chair of Pan-African Studies at California State University, Los Angeles. She earned her Ph.D. and M.A. from the University of Southern California in Political Science and her B.A. from Howard University in African American Studies. She was appointed to the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission in 2014 and is a recognized expert on race, gender, class, and social movements. Abdullah is the author of numerous articles and book chapters, with subjects ranging from political coalition building to womanist mothering. One of the nation's leading progressive District Attorneys, Larry Krasner serves as DA for Philadelphia, having campaigned on the platform to radically reform elements of the criminal justice system to reduce racialized mass incarceration.

“As a chief prosecutor, Jody pushes us to accept that the time has come to repair the broken criminal justice system and undo the harm caused to communities by ending the cycle of over-policing and over-incarceration that has destroyed communities. Prosecutors can be a force for good, for reform, for dismantling this system of racial injustice and mass incarceration. Justice is making sure that we treat people fairly within our criminal justice system, that we have one standard of justice regardless of creed or color or sexual orientation, that we recognize the flaws in our criminal justice system and try to correct them and, that we stay the course to right the wrongs of the past to create a justice system that we all believe in. Jody’s narrative shines a light on these issues and reminds us all that when we invest in people — as mothers, daughters, husbands, brothers, and fathers — we can help them thrive and create safer and healthier communities for everyone.”