Backus lecturer Tim Golden to address racism, American democracy

The event will be held Tues., Feb. 13 at La Sierra’s Cossentine Hall Room 100 at 6 p.m. Golden, who directs the Donald Blake Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Culture at Walla Walla University in Washington will give a talk titled “The Sickness Unto Life: Auto-Immunity, Racism, and American Democracy.”

In his presentation, Golden will examine the permanence of racism and the moral obligation to resist it. Through an exploration of Supreme Court jurisprudence and the work of legal scholar Derrick Bell and philosopher Jacques Derrida, he will explore how America’s efforts to correct the problems of racism and oppression are, although well-conceived, unable to bring about systemic change. Golden will then argue that the perpetual sickness of racism in American democracy has not been a curse that has led to self-defeating pessimism, but rather a blessing that awakens genuine moral responsibility. 

Golden is also a professor of philosophy and history at Walla Walla which is a sister school to La Sierra University. Both are part of the Seventh-day Adventist higher education system. A native of Philadelphia, Pa., Golden’s career has included serving as associate professor of philosophy at West Chester University in Pennsylvania where he was also director of the university’s Frederick Douglass Institute. He served 20 years as a criminal defense attorney and practiced law in the Federal Court of Appeals. He holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the Thurgood Marshall School of Law at the University of Memphis and a Juris Doctor degree from Texas Southern University.

An accomplished public speaker, Golden’s previous engagements include giving a plenary address for the International Religious Liberty Association’s 8th World Congress in August 2017, and a TEDx talk at Walla Walla University in 2016.

Golden pursues an avocation in acting and is known for his performance of “Thurgood,” a one-man play about the life of Thurgood Marshall, lawyer and first African-American justice for the Supreme Court of the United States.

Established in 1986, the Isaac Backus American Freedoms Endowment at La Sierra University was founded with a gift from the estate of sisters Florence and Eleanor Backus, longtime residents of Riverside.  The founders’ interests in the endowment sprang from the example of their colonial ancestor, Isaac Backus (1724-1806), a leading Baptist preacher and a dissenter who fought the imposition of religious taxes and generally championed the cause of religious autonomy. Backus supported the American War for Independence which he saw as a battle for religious freedom. The endowment funds an annual lecture delivered on the campus of La Sierra University.

Admission for the Isaac Backus American Freedoms Lecture is free. For further information call 951-785-2341. A campus map is at https://lasierra.edu/campus-map/.