Cheryl Harris

Cheryl I. Harris is an American legal scholar and critical race theorist. She is a professor of civil rights and civil liberties at the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law, where she currently serves as the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation Chair.^[1]

Cheryl Harris
Born	Cheryl I. Harris
Education	Wellesley College (BA) Northwestern University (JD)
Occupations	Legal scholar critical race theorist law professor
Spouse	Keorapetse Kgositsile (separated)
Children	Earl Sweatshirt
Website	UCLA faculty profile

Harris is widely known for "Whiteness as Property", published in the June 1993 edition of the Harvard Law Review.^[2][3] In the paper, Harris describes the white racial identity and the value it confers in a slave society.^[4]

Harris was married to activist Keorapetse Kgositsile, together having rapper Earl Sweatshirt. On December 7, 2024, she and Earl met at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles and spoke on academia and music.^[5]

Education

Harris received her Bachelor of the Arts degree from Wellesley College in 1973 and her Juris Doctor degree from the Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law in 1978.^[2]

Awards

Harris has received multiple awards in recognition of her contributions to legal education. In 2005, she was the recipient of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California's Distinguished Professor Award for Civil Rights Education. In 2018, she received UCLA's Rutter Award for Excellence in Teaching, four years later, she was awarded with UCLA's Distinguished Teaching Award.^[1] In addition to her honors as a law professor, the 2024 UCLA Academic Senate granted Harris the Faculty Award for Career Commitment to Diversity, an accolade part of the greater Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Awards maintained by the senate.^[6]