The Ethics of Now with Tracie Canada and Hanif Abdurraqib

Join the Kenan Institute for Ethics and host Adriane Lentz-Smith for a conversation with sports anthropologist Tracie Canada and award-winning author and MacArthur Fellow Hanif Abdurraqib on race, exploitation, and hope in sports.

Sports are about way more than just play. In her new book, “Tackling the Everyday: Race and Nation in Big-Time College Football,” Duke professor Tracie Canada reflects on the experiences of Black athletes to understand how labor, power, exclusion, and intimacy matter on and off the playing field. And in the recent “There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension,” longlisted for the 2024 National Book Award, Hanif Abdurraqib offers us a poetic personal reflection on basketball, life, and home in Columbus, Ohio, exploring what it means for an athlete to “make it” and the tension between excellence and ever-growing expectations.

Join us to find out how looking at our country through the lens of sports can reveal things we might not otherwise see.

This event takes place at the Durham Arts Council. Copies of Canada’s “Tackling the Everyday” and Abdurraqib’s “There’s Always This Year” will be available for purchase, courtesy of the Regulator Bookshop. A book signing and reception will follow the event. Please be advised that seating for this event is first come, first served.