Independent since 2002 Issue No. 1102 Week of November 7, 2026 Get the free email dispatch →

Home Derik Smith

Guest Commentator

Derik Smith

Derik Smith is a professor of African-American literature currently teaching at Zayed University in the United Arab Emirates. He is at work on Love's Lonely Offices, a book about the poetry of Robert Hayden. Write to him at [email protected].

1 piece

Guest Commentary

Investigating the Crash Scene

By Derik Smith Guest Commentator

In coming semesters, this year’s winner of best picture at the Academy Awards likely will become one of the more frequently discussed films in American higher education. Because Paul Haggis’s Crash offers a convenient and generative entryway into myriad discourses swirling around the ever-interrogated category of race, many instructors and professors in the humanities and…

In coming semesters, this year's winner of best picture at the Academy Awards likely will become one of the more frequently discussed films in American higher…

Continue reading 11 min

$ $ Contribute $ $