Marissa Jackson Sow
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Profile
Professor Jackson Sow is a prolific scholar who teaches and writes in the areas of contracts, constitutional law, international law, human rights, political economy, Black women's history and Black feminist thought, democracy and state power, visual culture, and rhetoric. Some of her most recent most scholarship was published in the California Law Review, Michigan Law Review Online, and the Washington and Lee Law Review. Professor Jackson Sow earned her J.D. from Columbia Law School, her Master of Laws from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and her B.A. from Northwestern University. After serving in senior leadership for the de Blasio mayoralty, Professor Jackson Sow served as a Leadership in Government Fellow for the Open Society Foundations and a 2020 Fellow for the Fellowship Programme for People of African Descent hosted by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and as an awardee of the Open Society Foundation's Fellowship Advancement Fund. She was a law clerk to the late Honorable Sterling Johnson, Jr. in the Eastern District of New York, and the late Honorable Damon J. Keith on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.Expand All
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Grants and Fellowships
Fellowship Advancement Fund, Open Society Foundations and Institute of International Education, (2024 - 2024)
Leadership in Government Fellowship, Open Society Foundations, (2020 - 2021)
Fellowship for People of African Descent , United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, (2020 - )
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Presentations
"How to Get Away With Social Murder," Junior Faculty Workshop, Ohio State University Moritz College of Law (July 2023)
Lecturer , "Race and the Constitution," Race and the Law, Drexel Kline School of Law (March 2023)
"Whiteness as Contract in the Racial Superstate," Georgetown Law International Colloquium, Georgetown University Law Center (January 2023)
"Necropolitics as Liberal Governance Strategy," 2022 Lutie-Langston Southern Regional Workshop, University of Richmond School of Law (December 2022)
"Reckoning with the Racial Contract in International Law," Berger International Law Speaker Series, Cornell Law School (November 2022)
"Reckoning with the Racial Contract in International Law," Drexel Kline School of Law (October 2022)
Panelist, "Protect and Serve ," Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project: Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive Launch, Northeastern University School of Law (October 2022)
Presenter/Moderator, "Reckoning with the Racial Contract in International Law," Richmond Junior Faculty Forum , University of Richmond School of Law (May 2022)
"Reckoning with the Racial Contract in International Law," Francis Lewis Law Center, Washington and Lee Law School (April 2022)
Speaker, "Whiteness as Contract and Racial Capitalism," Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development Symposium, St. John's University School of Law (April 2021)
Speaker, "Whiteness as Contract in Legal Education," Epoch Symposium , Seattle University Law Review (February 2021)
"Crossing the Bridge: African Americans and the Necessity of a 21st Century Human Rights Movement," Derrick Bell Symposium, University of Pittsburgh Law School ( 2014)
"Crossing the Bridge: African Americans and the Necessity of a 21st Century Human Rights Movement," Association for the Study of African American Life & History Conference, ( 2013)
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Bar Admissions
New York
Eastern District of New York
Southern District of New York
US Court of Appeals, 2nd Circuit
US Court of Appeals, 6th Circuit
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Professional Experience
Assistant Professor of Law (2022 - present)
University of Richmond School of LawAssistant Professor of Law (2021 - 2022)
St. John's University School of LawDeputy Commissioner for Community Relations (2017 - 2019)
NYC Commission on Human RightsGeneral Counsel (2015 - 2017)
NYC Mayor's Office for International AffairsActing Assistant Professor of Law (2014 - 2015)
New York University School of LawLaw Clerk to the Honorable Damon J. Keith (2013 - 2014)
United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, Detroit, MILaw Clerk to the Honorable Sterling Johnson, Jr. (2011 - 2012)
United States District Court, Eastern District of New YorkAssociate (2009 - 2011)
Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, New York, NY -
Institutional Service
, Project on Democratic Pedagogy, (2024-01-01 to 2024-12-31)
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Grants and Fellowships
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Publications
Journal Articles
Social Murder and the Antisocial Contract, 85 Maryland Law Review
Social Murder, 85 Washington and Lee Law Review
Whiteness as Contract in the Racial Superstate, 14 University of California Irvine Law Review 457 (2024).
Fighting for Whiteness in Ukraine, 56 Creighton Law Review (2023).
(Re)Building the Master's House: Dismantling America's Colonial Politics of Extraction and Exclusion, 121 Michigan Law Review Online 1 (2023).
Redemption, 57 Richmond Law Review Online 39 (2023).
Protect and Serve, 110 CAL. L. REV. 743 743 (2022).
Whiteness as Contract, 78 Washington and Lee Law Review 1803 (2022).
Ukrainian Refugees, Race, and International Law's Choice Between Order and Justice, 116 American Journal of International Law 698
Whiteness as Guilt , 69 UCLA Law Review Discourse 20 (2022).
Coming to Terms: Applying Contract Theory to the Detroit Water Shutoffs, New York University Law Review Online 29 (2021).
The Disregarded Canary: On the Plight of Black Women Voters, Northwestern University Law Review Of Note (with Carliss Chatman) (2020).
Crossing the Bridge: African Americans and the Necessity of a 21st Century Human Rights Movement, 56 Human Rights and Globalization Law Review 56 (2014).
Closing the Gap: Toward a Rights-Based Approach to Refugee Law, IV Northwestern Interdisciplinary Law Review 147 (2011).
Neo-Colonialism, Same Old Racism: A Critical Analysis of the United States' Shift toward Colorblindness as a Tool for the Protection of the American Colonial Empire and White Supremacy, XI The Berkeley Journal of African-American Law & Policy 156 (2009).
Book ChaptersUkrainian Racial Contracting and the Geopolitics of Welcome in International Refugee Law, in Race, Racism, and International Law (Stanford University Press) (2025).
More Than An Icon: Taking Shirley Chisholm At Her Word, in A Seat at the Table: Black Women Public Intellectuals in US History and Culture (University Press of Mississippi) (October 2023).
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In the News
‘Unconstitutional’: Political experts analyze Trump’s recent Truth Social post on college protests (WRIC)
Thu., Mar. 6, 2025Eric Adams Praised a Reporter’s Body. It Wasn’t His First Such Remark. (The New York Times)
Wed., Jun. 12, 2024University of Richmond law professor receives grant to research Black legal issues (Richmond Free Press)
Thu., May. 23, 2024Higher Education Gifts or Grants of Interest to African Americans (The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education)
Wed., May. 22, 2024