--- title: "9 Critical Quotes By Dean Spade" description: "9 Critical quotes by Dean Spade. Plus more from Dean Spade and more Critical sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/047/dean-spade-13866_critical_my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiqu_827191.jpg" --- > [My work is heavily influenced by critiques that many critical intellectual traditions, especially Critical Race Theory, have made of reform projects focused…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiques-that-many-critical/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/047/dean-spade-13866_critical_my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiqu_827191.jpg) > [In recent years I have become more interested in making the critical ideas that I love teaching and talking about available in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/in-recent-years-i-have-become-more-interested-in-making-the-critical/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b56/dean-spade-13866_articles_in-recent-years-i-have-become-more-inter_2707123.jpg) > [Critical Race Theory offers a critique of how law and certain law reform strategies misunderstand the actual operation of life-shortening state violence,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/critical-race-theory-offers-a-critique-of-how-law-and-certain-law/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/3ef/dean-spade-13866_aim_critical-race-theory-offers-a-critique-o_2880637.jpg) > [I strive to find materials that will engage students, expand their capacities as critical readers and thinkers, and feel immediately relevant to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-strive-to-find-materials-that-will-engage-students-expand-their/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ec2/dean-spade-13866_books_i-strive-to-find-materials-that-will-eng_2785912.jpg) > [I often notice how students can gain the capacity to use certain critical methodologies through engaging with very different texts - how…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-often-notice-how-students-can-gain-the-capacity-to-use-certain/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4b3/dean-spade-13866_accounts_i-often-notice-how-students-can-gain-the_1402309.jpg) > [Critical Race Theory offers of discrimination frameworks as ways of understanding and eradicating racism. The focus on "discrimination" as the way to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/critical-race-theory-offers-of-discrimination-frameworks-as-ways-of/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e8e/dean-spade-13866_bad-idea_critical-race-theory-offers-of-discrimin_3154855.jpg) > [Because my graduate academic training at law school was not one that included most of the intellectual traditions I find useful for…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/because-my-graduate-academic-training-at-law-school-was-not-one-that/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/00b/dean-spade-13866_academic_because-my-graduate-academic-training-at_30722.jpg) > [I am often talking about the ideas collected in Normal Life in contexts that are not academic, or that are full of…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-am-often-talking-about-the-ideas-collected-in-normal-life-in/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/512/dean-spade-13866_able_i-am-often-talking-about-the-ideas-colle_3000335.jpg) > [I went to law school which is a 3-year program in the US that is focused primarily on memorizing certain doctrines and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-went-to-law-school-which-is-a-3-year-program-in-the-us-that-is/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f3/dean-spade-13866_bar-exam_i-went-to-law-school-which-is-a-3-year-p_2922998.jpg) ## Other authors on Critical ## More by Dean Spade > [Because my graduate academic training at law school was not one that included most of the intellectual traditions I find useful for understanding the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/because-my-graduate-academic-training-at-law-school-was-not-one-that/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [One of the concepts I was having trouble illustrating was the concept that administrative systems create narrow categories of gender and force people into…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/one-of-the-concepts-i-was-having-trouble-illustrating-was-the-concept/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [Let’s be gentle with ourselves and each other and fierce as we fight oppression.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/let-s-be-gentle-with-ourselves-and-each-other-and-fierce-as-we-fight/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [More conservative advocacy work often encourages portrayals of trans people as people who deserve rights. Deservingness, of course, corresponds to national racial, gender and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/more-conservative-advocacy-work-often-encourages-portrayals-of-trans/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [Instead of focusing on what the law says about trans people, which is really what the law is saying about itself as a protector…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/instead-of-focusing-on-what-the-law-says-about-trans-people-which-is/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [In addition to encouraging us to participate in narratives of "deservingness" that cast large parts of our constituencies as "undeserving," legal reform strategies encourage…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/in-addition-to-encouraging-us-to-participate-in-narratives-of/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > ["Oppression" or "systems of oppression" operate as a shorthand terms in much writing and speaking so that we do not have to list all…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/oppression-or-systems-of-oppression-operate-as-a-shorthand-terms-in/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [I am interested in recent scholarly work examining the emergence of women's studies and ethnic studies departments and the development of the neoliberal university.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-am-interested-in-recent-scholarly-work-examining-the-emergence-of/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [Choosing an agenda that supports the apparatuses of racial violence always pays better.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/choosing-an-agenda-that-supports-the-apparatuses-of-racial-violence/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [My work is heavily influenced by critiques that many critical intellectual traditions, especially Critical Race Theory, have made of reform projects focused on legal…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiques-that-many-critical/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [Legal reform organizations are usually trying to portray their constituents as "hard workers," as "not criminals," as citizens, as part of normative family arrangements,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/legal-reform-organizations-are-usually-trying-to-portray-their/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [One particular debate that I have seen play out again and again is whether trans people who have more traditional gender expressions or who…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/one-particular-debate-that-i-have-seen-play-out-again-and-again-is/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [There are sharply different, competing models of what trans advocacy looks like - those that seek to follow the path laid out by the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/there-are-sharply-different-competing-models-of-what-trans-advocacy/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [Legal reform has significant dangers: changing only the window-dressing of harmful systems but leaving the violence of the systems in tact, failing to provide…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/legal-reform-has-significant-dangers-changing-only-the-window/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) > [Law reforms in the US, ostensibly enacted to prohibit racism, have proven ineffective because they focus on bad intentions of individuals and fail to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/law-reforms-in-the-us-ostensibly-enacted-to-prohibit-racism-have/) [Dean Spade](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dean-spade/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/critical/dean-spade/#itemlist", "name": "9 Critical Quotes By Dean Spade", "numberOfItems": 9, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "My work is heavily influenced by critiques that many critical intellectual traditions, especially Critical Race Theory, have made of reform projects focused on legal equality.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiques-that-many-critical/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/047/dean-spade-13866_critical_my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiqu_827191.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/047/dean-spade-13866_critical_my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiqu_827191.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/047/dean-spade-13866_critical_my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiqu_827191.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“My work is heavily influenced by critiques that many critical intellectual traditions, especially Critical…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "In recent years I have become more interested in making the critical ideas that I love teaching and talking about available in more forms, because many people prefer to engage with ideas in films, infographics, comics and other forms that are not traditional books or articles.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/in-recent-years-i-have-become-more-interested-in-making-the-critical/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b56/dean-spade-13866_articles_in-recent-years-i-have-become-more-inter_2707123.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b56/dean-spade-13866_articles_in-recent-years-i-have-become-more-inter_2707123.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/b56/dean-spade-13866_articles_in-recent-years-i-have-become-more-inter_2707123.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“In recent years I have become more interested in making the critical ideas that I love teaching and talking…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "Critical Race Theory offers a critique of how law and certain law reform strategies misunderstand the actual operation of life-shortening state violence, and how that has produced a set of reforms that fail to actually transform material conditions of white supremacy. These critiques redirect our attention to the conditions we aim to transform.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/critical-race-theory-offers-a-critique-of-how-law-and-certain-law/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/3ef/dean-spade-13866_aim_critical-race-theory-offers-a-critique-o_2880637.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/3ef/dean-spade-13866_aim_critical-race-theory-offers-a-critique-o_2880637.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/3ef/dean-spade-13866_aim_critical-race-theory-offers-a-critique-o_2880637.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Critical Race Theory offers a critique of how law and certain law reform strategies misunderstand the actual…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "I strive to find materials that will engage students, expand their capacities as critical readers and thinkers, and feel immediately relevant to their daily lives and future work in court and social service systems.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-strive-to-find-materials-that-will-engage-students-expand-their/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ec2/dean-spade-13866_books_i-strive-to-find-materials-that-will-eng_2785912.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ec2/dean-spade-13866_books_i-strive-to-find-materials-that-will-eng_2785912.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/ec2/dean-spade-13866_books_i-strive-to-find-materials-that-will-eng_2785912.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“I strive to find materials that will engage students, expand their capacities as critical readers and…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 5, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "I often notice how students can gain the capacity to use certain critical methodologies through engaging with very different texts - how a graphic novel about gentrification and an anthology about Hurricane Katrina and a journalistic account of war profiteering might all lead to very similar classroom conversations and critical engagement. I'm particularly interested in this when teaching law students who often resist reading interdisciplinary materials or materials they interpret as too theoretical.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-often-notice-how-students-can-gain-the-capacity-to-use-certain/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4b3/dean-spade-13866_accounts_i-often-notice-how-students-can-gain-the_1402309.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4b3/dean-spade-13866_accounts_i-often-notice-how-students-can-gain-the_1402309.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4b3/dean-spade-13866_accounts_i-often-notice-how-students-can-gain-the_1402309.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“I often notice how students can gain the capacity to use certain critical methodologies through engaging…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 6, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "Critical Race Theory offers of discrimination frameworks as ways of understanding and eradicating racism. The focus on \"discrimination\" as the way to understand racism in the US has meant that racism is considered a question of discriminatory intentions - whether or not somebody intentionally left someone out or did something harmful because of their biased feelings about a person's race. This focus on individual racists with bad ideas hides the reality that racism exists wherever conditions of racialized maldistribution exist.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/critical-race-theory-offers-of-discrimination-frameworks-as-ways-of/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e8e/dean-spade-13866_bad-idea_critical-race-theory-offers-of-discrimin_3154855.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e8e/dean-spade-13866_bad-idea_critical-race-theory-offers-of-discrimin_3154855.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e8e/dean-spade-13866_bad-idea_critical-race-theory-offers-of-discrimin_3154855.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Critical Race Theory offers of discrimination frameworks as ways of understanding and eradicating racism…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 7, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "Because my graduate academic training at law school was not one that included most of the intellectual traditions I find useful for understanding the conditions and problems that most concern me - anti-colonial theories, Foucault, critical disability studies, prison studies and the like are rarely seen in standard US Law School curricula, where students are still fighting on many campuses to get a single class on race or poverty offered - I developed most of my thinking about these topics through activist reading groups and collaborative writing projects with other activist scholars.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/because-my-graduate-academic-training-at-law-school-was-not-one-that/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/00b/dean-spade-13866_academic_because-my-graduate-academic-training-at_30722.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/00b/dean-spade-13866_academic_because-my-graduate-academic-training-at_30722.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/00b/dean-spade-13866_academic_because-my-graduate-academic-training-at_30722.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Because my graduate academic training at law school was not one that included most of the intellectual…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 8, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "I am often talking about the ideas collected in Normal Life in contexts that are not academic, or that are full of people who are not primarily engaging as theorists or theory-readers. Being able to make ideas visual, especially critical ideas about movements that can be difficult to hear because of attachments we have to certain national narratives, or because of ways that we see ourselves, is especially useful.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-am-often-talking-about-the-ideas-collected-in-normal-life-in/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/512/dean-spade-13866_able_i-am-often-talking-about-the-ideas-colle_3000335.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/512/dean-spade-13866_able_i-am-often-talking-about-the-ideas-colle_3000335.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/512/dean-spade-13866_able_i-am-often-talking-about-the-ideas-colle_3000335.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“I am often talking about the ideas collected in Normal Life in contexts that are not academic, or that are…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 9, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "I went to law school which is a 3-year program in the US that is focused primarily on memorizing certain doctrines and taking exams that test whether you can apply those doctrines to help prepare for the bar exam. If you are lucky, you get a few classes where you are encouraged to think more critically and read critical texts rather than just casebooks, and perhaps write a paper that is not a legal memo or brief.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Dean Spade" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dean-spade/i-went-to-law-school-which-is-a-3-year-program-in-the-us-that-is/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f3/dean-spade-13866_bar-exam_i-went-to-law-school-which-is-a-3-year-p_2922998.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f3/dean-spade-13866_bar-exam_i-went-to-law-school-which-is-a-3-year-p_2922998.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f3/dean-spade-13866_bar-exam_i-went-to-law-school-which-is-a-3-year-p_2922998.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“I went to law school which is a 3-year program in the US that is focused primarily on memorizing certain…” — Dean Spade", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } } ] }, { "@type": "CollectionPage", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/critical/dean-spade/#webpage", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/critical/dean-spade/", "name": "Critical Quotes by Dean Spade", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website" }, "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/critical/dean-spade/#itemlist" }, "primaryImageOfPage": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/047/dean-spade-13866_critical_my-work-is-heavily-influenced-by-critiqu_827191.jpg" }, "description": "9 Critical quotes by Dean Spade. 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