News In and Around the Hughes Center
 
News: November 2011 Angela Davis to speak at KU Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies announces a lecture by Angela Davis, Distinguished Professor Emerita from the University of California, Santa Cruz, on February 7, 2012. http://www.womensstudies.ku.edu/feb_sisters/index.shtml Angela Y. Davis is known internationally for her ongoing work to combat all forms of oppression in the U.S. and abroad. Over the years she has been active as a student, teacher, writer, scholar, and activist/organizer. She is a living witness to the historical struggles of the contemporary era. Professor Davis's political activism began when she was a youngster in Birmingham, Alabama, and continued through her high school years in New York. But it was not until 1969 that she came to national attention after being removed from her teaching position in the Philosophy Department at UCLA as a result of her social activism and her membership in the Communist Party, USA. In 1970 she was placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List on false charges, and was the subject of an intense police search that drove her underground and culminated in one of the most famous trials in recent U.S. history. During her sixteen-month incarceration, a massive international "Free Angela Davis" campaign was organized, leading to her acquittal in 1972. Professor Davis's long-standing commitment to prisoners' rights dates back to her involvement in the campaign to free the Soledad Brothers, which led to her own arrest and imprisonment. Today she remains an advocate of prison abolition and has developed a powerful critique of racism in the criminal justice system. She is a member of the Advisory Board of the Prison Activist Resource Center, and currently in working on a comparative study of women's imprisonment in the U.S., the Netherlands, and Cuba. During the last twenty-five years, Professor Davis has lectured in all of the fifty United States, as well as in Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, and the former Soviet Union. Her articles and essays have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, and she is the author of five books, including Angela Davis: An Autobiography; Women, Race, and Class; Blues Legacies and Black Feminism: Gertrude "Ma" Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday; and The Angela Y. Davis Reader. Former California Governor Ronald Reagan once vowed that Angela Davis would never again teach in the University of California system. Today she is a tenured professor in the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz. In 1994, she received the distinguished honor of an appointment to the University of California Presidential Chair in African American and Feminist Studies. October 2011 Spring 2012 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor Tammy L. Kernodle, Associate Professor from Miami University in Ohio, has been named the Spring 2012 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor. Her scholarship and teaching has stretched across many different aspects of African American music but with an emphasis on the effects that gender, race, sexuality and regional identity have had on the creation, performance and reception of those musics. Her education includes a B.M. in Music Education (Vocal and piano) from Virginia State University, and M.A. and Ph.D. in Music History/Musicology from The Ohio State University. She served as the Scholar in Residence for the Women in Jazz Initiative at the American Jazz Museum in Kansas City and has worked closely with a number of educational programs including the Kennedy Center’s Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival, Jazz@Lincoln Center and NPR. Her work has appeared in Musical Quarterly, Black Music Research Journal, The Journal of the Society of American Music, American Music Research Journal. The U.S Catholic Historian, The African American Lectionary Project and numerous anthologies. She is the author of biography Soul on Soul: The Life and Music of Mary Lou Williams (Northeastern University Press). She served as Associate Editor of the recently released three volume Encyclopedia of African American Music (ABC-CLIO, 2010). Currently she is serving as one of the editors for the revision of New Grove’s Dictionary of American Music (Oxford University Press). A trained pianist and organist, she serves as Minister of Music and an Associate Minister at the First Baptist Church in Oxford, OH She will give a public lecture, title to be announced, on February 23, 2012. See the LHC Calendar for more details. Since 1977, this visiting professorship has attracted prominent or emerging ethnic minority scholars to KU – from a broad range of disciplines and academic departments/schools. This one-semester appointment provides the recipient a stipend appropriate to the candidate’s rank, a small travel allowance, and a furnished apartment near the KU campus. The recipient will teach two courses during the semester of their appointment and deliver a campus-wide symposium on a topic or issue related to their discipline. To find out more about the LHVP see http://www2.ku.edu/~afs/faculty_staff/visiting_professorship.shtml and http://www.diversity.ku.edu//programs/langstonhughes.shtml William Tuttle Lecture American Studies at KU announces the fourth annual Tuttle Lecture. Darlene Clark Hine, "Rehearsal for Freedom: Black Professional Women’s Health Care Activism before Brown." October 26, 2011. 4:30 pm @ Woodruff Auditorium, Kansas Union. The fourth annual Bill Tuttle Distinguished Lecture in American Studies, Rehearsal for Freedom: Black Professional Women's Health Care Activism before Brown, presented by Darlene Clark Hine, Board of Trustees Professor of African American Studies and Professor of History at Northwestern University January 2011 Presidential Politics, Civil Rights, and the Road to Brown – Summer Seminar for Teachers
July 24-30, 2011
University of Kansas
http://www.gilderlehrman.org/education/seminar.php?seminar_id=144
 We are pleased to announce a special summer seminar for teachers to be held at the University of Kansas. The Langston Hughes Center and the Kansas Collection at the Kenneth Spencer Research Library are collaborating with the Brown v. Board of Education National Park, the Brown Foundation, and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History to hold a seminar entitled “Presidential Politics, Civil Rights, and the Road to Brown.” This seminar will explore the road to Brown v. Board of Education (1954) and the fight for social and political equality in the years before the modern Civil Rights Movement. Participants will learn about this struggle at the Brown v. Board of Education National Park Service site, one of the five locations for the plaintiffs in the Supreme Court decision, and at the Presidential Libraries of both Eisenhower and Truman, who were uniquely involved in the road to Brown. Moreover, the participants will learn about the struggle from a number of experts, including plaintiffs from the Supreme Court case and Jack Greenberg, the former president and direct-counsel of the NAACP Legal and Defense and Educational Fund and a member of the legal team that prepared and argued the Brown case. Finally, the seminar will provide educational resources and professional training to secondary teachers interested in exploring the struggle for civil rights in America.

The seminar will be held from July 24-30, 2011 on the University of Kansas campus in Lawrence, KS.

Secondary teachers interested in participating in the seminar visit <http://www.gilderlehrman.org/education/seminar.php?seminar_id=144> for application information.
 APPLICATION DEADLINE - February 1, 2011 
Presidential Politics, Civil Rights, and the Road to Brown 
Shawn Leigh Alexander, Director University of Kansas 
1440 Jayhawk Blvd Room 9
Lawrence, Kansas 66045 
(785) 864-5044 October 2010 Spring 2011 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor Clarence Lang, Associate Professor from the University of Illinois, has been named the Spring 2011 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor. Professor Lang brings an area of scholarship, urban studies, to the AAAS department that has been specified in the Strategic Plan of the department. Lang’s scholarship has focused on urban social movements and on black working-class culture and politics, particularly related to the urban Midwest. His has authored the book, Grassroots at the Gateway: Class Politics and Black Freedom Struggle in St. Louis, 1936-75 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2009). He also was co-editor of the book Anticommunism and the African American Freedom Movement: Another Side of the Story (New York: Palgrave, Macmillian, 2009); as well as published four book chapters and seven scholarly articles. Professor Lang received his B.A, in Journalism with a minor in Black Studies from the University of Missouri-Columbia; an M.A. in History from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville and a Ph.D. in History from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He will give a public lecture, title to be announced, on February 24, 2011. See the LHC Calendar for more details. Since 1977, this visiting professorship has attracted prominent or emerging ethnic minority scholars to KU – from a broad range of disciplines and academic departments/schools. This one-semester appointment provides the recipient a stipend appropriate to the candidate’s rank, a small travel allowance, and a furnished apartment near the KU campus. The recipient will teach two courses during the semester of their appointment and deliver a campus-wide symposium on a topic or issue related to their discipline. To find out more about the LHVP see http://www2.ku.edu/~afs/faculty_staff/visiting_professorship.shtml and http://www.diversity.ku.edu//programs/langstonhughes.shtml Professor Lang’s Address: “At the Margins of Black Freedom Studies: Working-Class Representations and the Blues Idiom” http://www.diversity.ku.edu//events/clarence-lang.shtml July 2010 Celebrating 40 Years of Africana Studies: Reflection and Visualization (7/30/10) During the month of October, in conjunction with the Kansas African Studies Center, the Langston Hughes Center will facilitate an interdisciplinary seminar series on the general topic of Africana Studies. As a number of African American and African Studies Departments throughout the country, including KU’s AAAS Department, are celebrating 40 year anniversaries, LHC and KASC will hold a series of lectures to create a dialogue concerning the state, history, and future of African and African American Studies. Check the Calendar for more details once the Semester begins. April 2010 Make It Funky: An Exploration of African American Music and Poetry The presentation will cover the development of African-American music and performance from before the Civil War to the present. Tony Bolden, professor of African and African-American studies, will share his expertise in how successive generations of singers, dancers, instrumentalists and poets have drawn from and built upon the practices, particularly rituals and dancing, that came before them. “Make It Funky” will also feature the performances of improvisational slam poet Tracie Morris and funk bassist Scot Brown. Morris will discuss and perform her work, followed by a joint performance with Brown. Brown will also discuss the development of funk music in Dayton, Ohio. Bolden developed the presentation to explore the extraordinary propensity for performance in African-American culture and the relation between music and the works of many innovative black writers. His teaching and research interests include African-American music, African-American cultural studies, popular culture, African literature and ethnic-American literature. May 2, 2009. 2:00 - 4:00 pm @ Alderson Auditorium - Kansas Union February 2010 Writing Jazz The University Honors Program Lecture Series at the Commons during the Spring term will focus on the theme Writing Jazz. Three lecture will occur during the term, by Fred Moton, Tammy Kernodle, and Paul Lopes. For more information see http://www.honors.ku.edu/academics/commons.shtml and check the LHC calendar for dates, times, and titles of the lectures. December 2009 Remembering John Brown (12/02/09) One hundred and fifty years ago John Brown was sent to the gallows for his raid on Harpers Ferry. In 1959, on the centennial of the Raid and Brown’s death, Langston Hughes urged the readers of his Chicago Defender column to remember the Sage of Osawatomie. Click here to read Hughes’ October 17.pdf and October 24.pdf articles. Amiri Baraka at KU (12/01/09) The Langston Hughes Center and the African and African American Studies Department are pleased to present the poetry reading portion of Amiri Baraka’s Marwa Lecture at the University of Kansas on November 3, 2009. Click here to view the poetry reading: Baraka Poetry Reading at KU. November 2009 Spring 2010 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor Adam Banks, Associate Professor from Syracuse University, has been named the Spring 2010 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor. He will give a public lecture, title to be announced, on February 25, 2010. See the LHC Calendar for more details. Since 1977, this visiting professorship has attracted prominent or emerging ethnic minority scholars to KU – from a broad range of disciplines and academic departments/schools. This one-semester appointment provides the recipient a stipend appropriate to the candidate’s rank, a small travel allowance, and a furnished apartment near the KU campus. The recipient will teach two courses during the semester of their appointment and deliver a campus-wide symposium on a topic or issue related to their discipline. To find out more about the LHVP see http://www2.ku.edu/~afs/faculty_staff/visiting_professorship.shtml and http://www.diversity.ku.edu//programs/langstonhughes.shtml October 2009 Marwa Africana Lecture African and African American Studies at KU announces the fourth Marwa Africana Lecture. Amiri Baraka, "Racism, Imperialism, and the Obama Presidency - Lecture and Poetry Reading" November 3, 2009. 7:00 pm @ Alderson Auditorium - Kansas Union “Making the (Richard) Wright Connection” Teaching Institute Funded The University of Kansas and the Project on the History of Black Writing were awarded a $200,000 grant in support of the Making the (Richard) Wright Connection: Reading Native Son, Black Boy and Uncle Tom's Children from the National Endowment for the Humanities. In addition, the project is honored to be designated as a National Endowment for the Humanities "We the People" project, an initiative that is designed to encourage and strengthen the teaching, study, and the understanding of American history and culture. Making the Wright Connection is a fifteen month program that follows the centennial of Richard Wright's birth and the many national and international celebrations commemorating his work in 2008. By incorporating both onsite and distance learning components, Making the Wright Connection will provide educational resources and professional training to secondary teachers interested in exploring the works of Richard Wright. The project will include a two-week institute and subsequent virtual institutes using the latest technology. The institute will be held from July 11-24, 2010 on the University of Kansas campus in Lawrence, KS. Secondary teachers interested in participating in the Institute will find Applications at the following site http://richardwrightat100.ku.edu/ For more information visit http://richardwrightat100.ku.edu/ or write wrightconnection@ku.edu February 2009 William Tuttle Lecture American Studies at KU announces the second annual Tuttle Lecture. William Chafe, "From Jim Crow to the Civil Rights Movement: The Continuity of Struggle." March 22, 2009. 6:00 pm @ Hansen Hall, Dole Institute of Politics. “Despite the presumption that Jim Crow was a time of total white domination and total black submission, it was a time of ongoing resistance that laid the foundations for the civil rights movement. William Chafe is the Alice Mary Baldwin Professor of History at Duke University. He is the author and editor of twelve books. His work has focused on civil rights history, women's history, and modern political history. He helped to start the Duke Oral History Program, the Center for the Study of Civil Rights and Race Relations, the Duke-UNC Center for Research on Women, and the Center for Documentary Studies. He chaired the Duke history department from 1990-95 and was Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and Vice-Provost for Undergraduate Education from July 1, 1995 to July 1, 2004. From 1999-2000 he served as President of the Organization of American Historians.” January 2009 NEW MA in African & African-American Studies at KU On January 15, 2009, the Kansas Board of Regents approved the establishment of a M. A. degree program in African & African-American Studies at the University of Kansas. The Program will begin in the Fall of 2009 and the University is currently accepting applications. Founded in 1970, the Department of African and African-American Studies seeks to educate students to function in a multicultural environment and in a global community. The objective of the M.A. program in African and African-American Studies at the University of Kansas is to produce scholars, teachers, administrators, and other professionals who have the intellectual and scholarly capacity and skills to make on-going contributions to the world in which they live. The African and African-American Studies M. A. program is designed to take two years of full time study. A total of nine upper-division and graduate courses, in addition to a thesis or additional course work for a non-thesis option, are required for the degree -- 33 credit hours. There are four core courses, Introduction to Africana Studies I: African-American; Introduction to Africana Studies II: African; Research Methods in Africana Studies; and Seminar in Africana Studies. The students are then expected to choose five courses, fifteen credit hours, within their area of specialization. Students are able to take six credit hours outside of the Department in related course offerings including, among others: American Studies, Anthropology, Art, Communications, Economics, Education, English, Geography, History, Philosophy, Political Science, Religion, Sociology, Theater & Film, and Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies. For more information contact the Department of African & African-American Studies at afs@ku.edu (785) 864-3054 or contact the Graduate Program Coordinator Shawn Leigh Alexander at slalexan@ku.edu (785) 864-5044 For more information about the Department visit us at http://www2.ku.edu/~afs/ Fight for Freedom! A Century of the NAACP and the Struggle for Racial Equality The Langston Hughes Center at the University of Kansas announces, Fight For Freedom: A Century of the NAACP and the Struggle for Racial Equality. Marking the centennial of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and honoring Langston Hughes’ 1962 history of the organization, this symposium (re)investigates the NAACP and its various legacies for a dawning new century. This commemoration will also provide a powerful entry for larger conversations on race and racism in America today. February 13, 2009 | 8 am - 5 pm | Alderson Auditorium, Kansas Union, The University of Kansas Visit the symposium link - Fight for Freedom - for more details. To register online or for more information, visit http://www.continuinged.ku.edu/programs/naacp/ October 2008 Spring 2009 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor Henry Miller has been named the Spring 2009 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor. He will give a public lecture entitled, “The Spiritual Origin of the Drama: Baldwin, Osiris, Dionysus, Eshu and the Bible,” on November 12. See the LHC Calendar for more details. September 2008 Michael Tilford Conference on Diversity & Multiculturalism: “Changing Demographics: Is Kansas Ready?” (9/12/08) The Michael Tilford Conference on Diversity & Multiculturalism, sponsored by the Kansas Board of Regents and the Council of Chief Academic Offices, will be held at Wichita State University on October 2-3, 2008. The focus of the conference is the changing demographics, both nationally and regionally, and its impact on higher education in Kansas. For more information and registration go to the Office of the Provost’s Diversity Matters website. Blacks and the United States Constitution (9/9/08) A traveling exhibit from the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture is on display at the Brown Foundation from September 1-30. This exhibition surveys the pivotal role of race in American Constitutional History. Moreover, the exhibit places the role of African American freedom struggles in a perspective that reveals their relationship to the Constitutional history of all Americans. Brown v. Board of Education National Historical Site | 1515 SE Monroe | Topeka, KS Free and Open to the Public | Daily 9 am - 5 pm For more information call the Brown Foundation at 235-3939 or email to brownfound@juno.com Power, Place, and People: African American and Indigenous Stories (9/9/08) The Power, Place, and People: African American and Indigenous Stories exhibition visually illustrates the “Shifting Borders” project. The exhibit includes photographs, documents, and artwork illustrating each participant’s oral story, and will be accompanied by a DVD featuring the oral history interviews. The exhibition is on display at the Lawrence Arts Center from September 9-19. On September 17 @ 7pm at the Larwrence Art Center Gallary, there will be a panel discussion on the overall project. Panelists include, Daniel Wildcat and Mike Tosee from Haskell Indian Nations University, Maryemma Graham from the University of Kansas, and James Leiker from Johnson County Community College To learn more about the Shifting Borders Project visit the project’s website. Richard Wright Centennial (9/2/08) September 4, 2008 marks the centennial of author Richard Wright’s birth. You may click on the Richard Wright Centennial webpage for more information about the author and his works. Of special interest will be the events page which has information about a number of events and celebrations this week and throughout the rest of the year. It also includes a slideshow of the conferences in France and Japan. Finally, note that Julia Wright, Richard Wright’s daughter, will appear at KU on November 6. See our calendar for more details. LHC Calendar July 2008 St. Luke’s AME Church (7/19/08) In June, St. Luke’s AME, the boyhood church of Langston Hughes, received a $60,000 Heritage Trust Fund grant to help restore the historical site. St. Luke’s, located at 9th and New York, hopes to finish the restoration by 2010, the centennial of the site. If you would like to learn more about the restoration or donate additional funds, contact the church at: St. Luke’s AME, 900 NY St. Lawrence, KS 66044 June 2008 Jesse B. Semple Brownbag Series (6/30/08) The Langston Hughes Center introduces the Jesse B. Semple Brownbag Series every second Monday of each academic month. The series is an informal forum for the African Americanist community and those who are interested in the general study of race, culture, and American society. The Jesse B. Semple Brownbag will begin on September 8, 2008. Check the Calendar for more details once the Semester begins. “Come to Africa and its here!” African Americans and Africa (6/30/08) During the month of October, in conjunction with the Kansas African Studies Center, the Langston Hughes Center will facilitate an interdisciplinary seminar series on the general topic of African Americans and Africa. Through a series of presentations, KU faculty and invited scholars will discuss the relationship of African Americans to Africa in social, historical, and philosophical contexts. Check the Calendar for more details once the Semester begins. May 2008 Richard Wright Centennial (5/20/08) 2008 marks the centennial of author Richard Wright’s birth. His life and writings are being celebrated throughout the year and the Hughes Center will continually update its calendar with events happening locally, nationally and internationally. You may also click on the Richard Wright Centennial webpage for more information about the author and his works. Randal M. Jelks on Obama and Rev. Wright (5/19/08) Randal M. Jelks, Spring 2008 Langston Hughes Visiting Professor and incoming Professor of American Studies and African & African American Studies at KU blogs on the Barack Obama and Rev. Wright controversy. Obama, Wright & Trinity April 2008 Aimé Césare, Martiniquan poet and political activist, dies at age 94. (4/17/08) “Césaire’s “Cahier” takes all that we have, Senghor, Guillén and Hughes, and flings it at the moon, to make of it a space-ship of the dreams of all the dreamers in the word” Langston Hughes (“Draft Ideas,” LHP, December 3, 1964, Collected Works, v. 9, 408) The Langston Hughes Center (4/1/08) The Langston Hughes Center, formerly the Langston Hughes Resource Center, is relaunching its activities at the University of Kansas and throughout the region. http://www.womensstudies.ku.edu/feb_sisters/index.shtmlhttp://www2.ku.edu/~afs/faculty_staff/visiting_professorship.shtmlhttp://www.diversity.ku.edu//programs/langstonhughes.shtmlhttp://www2.ku.edu/~amerst/http://www.gilderlehrman.org/education/seminar.php?seminar_id=144http://www.gilderlehrman.org/education/seminar.php?seminar_id=144http://www.history.illinois.edu/people/celanghttp://www2.ku.edu/~afs/faculty_staff/visiting_professorship.shtmlhttp://www.diversity.ku.edu//programs/langstonhughes.shtmlhttp://www.diversity.ku.edu//events/clarence-lang.shtmlhttp://www.honors.ku.edu/academics/commons.shtmlNews_files/October%2017-1.pdfNews_files/October%2024.pdfhttp://ids.ku.edu/john/baraka/poetry/http://www2.ku.edu/~afs/faculty_staff/visiting_professorship.shtmlhttp://www.diversity.ku.edu//programs/langstonhughes.shtmlhttp://www2.ku.edu/~afs/lecture_series/index.shtmlhttp://richardwrightat100.ku.edumailto:wrightconnection@ku.eduhttp://www2.ku.edu/~amerst/mailto:afs@ku.edumailto:slalexan@ku.eduhttp://www2.ku.edu/~lhcaas/Fight%20For%20Freedom.htmlhttp://www2.ku.edu/~lhcaas/Fight%20For%20Freedom.htmlhttp://www.continuinged.ku.edu/programs/naacp/http://www.diversity.ku.edu/tilford.shtmlmailto:brownfound@juno.comhttp://www.shiftingborders.ku.edu/http://www.shiftingborders.ku.edu/http://www.richardwrightat100.ku.edu/index.htmlhttp://www2.ku.edu/~lhcaas/Calendar.htmlhttp://www.richardwrightat100.ku.edu/index.htmlhttp://www.ssrc.org/blogs/immanent_frame/2008/05/19/obama-wright-and-trinity/shapeimage_2_link_0shapeimage_2_link_1shapeimage_2_link_2shapeimage_2_link_3shapeimage_2_link_4shapeimage_2_link_5shapeimage_2_link_6shapeimage_2_link_7shapeimage_2_link_8shapeimage_2_link_9shapeimage_2_link_10shapeimage_2_link_11shapeimage_2_link_12shapeimage_2_link_13shapeimage_2_link_14shapeimage_2_link_15shapeimage_2_link_16shapeimage_2_link_17shapeimage_2_link_18shapeimage_2_link_19shapeimage_2_link_20shapeimage_2_link_21shapeimage_2_link_22shapeimage_2_link_23shapeimage_2_link_24shapeimage_2_link_25shapeimage_2_link_26shapeimage_2_link_27shapeimage_2_link_28shapeimage_2_link_29shapeimage_2_link_30shapeimage_2_link_31shapeimage_2_link_32
"So will my page be colored that I write?
Being me, it will not be white.
But it will be
a part of you, instructor.
You are white—
yet a part of me, as I am a part of you."  -- Langston Hughes (“Theme for English B,” 1949)