Patricia J. Williams is the James L. Dohr Professor of Law Emerita at Columbia Law School. She received a B.A. from Wellesley College in 1972 and a J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1975. Before entering academia, Williams served as deputy city attorney in the Office of the Los Angeles City Attorney and as a staff lawyer at the Western Center on Law and Poverty. Her academic career includes appointments at Golden Gate University School of Law, City University of New York Law School, University of Wisconsin School of Law, and Columbia Law School, where she taught since 1991. She held fellowships at the School of Criticism and Theory at Dartmouth College and the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. Williams served on the board of trustees at Wellesley College and received the MacArthur Fellowship in 2000. She is an elected member of the American Philosophical Society since 2019.

Williams publishes extensively on race, gender, and law, legal theory, and legal writing. Key books include The Alchemy of Race and Rights (Harvard University Press, 1991), The Rooster’s Egg (Harvard University Press, 1995), Seeing a Color-Blind Future: The Paradox of Race (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1998), Open House: Of Family, Food, Piano Lessons, and the Search for a Room of My Own (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2004), Giving a Damn: Racism, Romance and Gone with the Wind (HarperCollins, 2021), and The Miracle of the Black Leg: Notes on Race, Human Bodies, and the Spirit of the Law (The New Press, 2024). She has authored articles in journals such as the Columbia Journal of Gender and Law, Theory & Event, and the Yale Review. A longtime columnist for The Nation as “Diary of a Mad Law Professor,” Williams has influenced discussions on social justice. She currently serves as University Distinguished Professor of Law and Humanities at Northeastern University School of Law, with a joint appointment in the Department of Philosophy and Religion and as director of Law, Technology and Ethics Initiatives.

Professional Email: williams@law.columbia.edu