David G. Embrick, professor of sociology and Africana studies at the University of Connecticut, will deliver a talk titled “White Sanctuaries: Entitlement and Spatial Awareness at the Museo D’art de Catalunya in Barcelona, Spain” at 1 p.m. March 12 in the Mountainlair, Gluck Theatre.
Embrick will introduce the notion of white sanctuaries as white spaces that help maintain white normativity and reify whites’ sense of power, belonging and entitlement in racialized societies.
Using ethnographic data over three years at the Museo D’art de Catalunya, Embrick will discuss spatial awareness and the policing of space as mechanisms that reinforce how museums operate as white sanctuaries and create a sense of belonging for some patrons and exclusivity for others.