Professor Kelley will be shedding light on the adversities and joys of the Black working class in America through a stunning narrative centered on her forebears. Spanning two hundred years\, this discussion will highlight the lives of the laundresses\, Pullman por ters\, domestic maids\, and postal workers who established the Black worki ng class as a force in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.< /p>\n
This event is part of "The Public Square" series\, aiming to conne ct leaders and innovators with the public. Through these discussions\, we aim to push disciplines forward to a new higher level of equity. So join u s for this insightful conversation as we look back on history and forward to a possible future.
\nThis program is brought to you in partnershi p with the DC Public Library Foundation and the A nacostia Community Museum. 50 copies of Dr. Kelley's book\, B lack Folk: The Roots of the Black Working Class will be gifted to aud ience members while supplies last. Learn more about the author and book be low and register to reserve your seat.
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For reasona ble accommodations\, please contact the Center for Accessibility at 202-72 7-2142 or DCPLaccess@dc.gov. For ASL or tactile interpretation\, please al low at least seven (7) days notice.
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\nAn aw ard-winning historian illuminates the adversities and joys of the Black wo rking class in America through a stunning nar rat ive centered on her fore bears. Spanning two hundred years&mdash\;from one of Kelley&rsquo\;s earli est known ancestors\, an enslaved blacksmith\, to the essential workers of the Covid-19 pandemic&mdash\;Black Folk highlights the lives of the laund resses\, Pullman porters\, domestic maids\, and postal workers who establi shed the Black working class as a force in the late nineteenth and early t wentieth centuries. Taking jobs white people didn&rsquo\;t want and confin ed to segregated neighborhoods\, Black workers found community in intimate spaces\, from stoops on city streets to the backyards of washerwomen\, wh ere multiple generations labored from dawn to dusk\, talking and laughing in a space free of white supervision and largely beyond white knowledge. A s millions of Black people left the violence of the American South for the promise of a better life in the North and West\, these networks of resist ance and joy sustained early arrivals and newcomers alike and laid the gro undwork for organizing for better jobs\, better pay\, and equal rights. Wi th the resurgence of labor activism in our own time\, Black Folk presents a stirring history of our possible future.
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Blair LM Kelley\, Ph.D.Blair LM Kelley\, Ph.D. is an award-winning author\, historian\, and scholar of the African American ex perience. A dedicated public historian\, Kelley works to amplify the histo ries of Black people\, chronicling the everyday impact of their activism. Kelley is currently the Joel R. Williamson Distinguished Professor of Sout hern Studies at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and the direc tor of the Center for the Study of the American South\, the first Black wo man to serve in that role in the center&rsquo\;s thirty-year history.
\ nKelley is the author of two books that trace the protests that toppled segregation and the people and movements that challenged the inequities o f race and class. The first\, Right to Ride: Streetcar Boycotts and Africa n American Citizenship (UNC Press)\, chronicles the little-known Black men and women who protested the passage of laws segregating trains and street cars at the turn of the twentieth century. Right to Ride highlights the wo men and men who led and participated in protests\, recounting those thousa nds of Black southerners who fought valiantly for equal treatment despite the tremendous threat of racial violence. The first book-length treatment of the streetcar boycott movement\, Right to Ride was awarded the 2010 Let itia Woods Brown Memorial Book Prize from the Association of Black Women H istorians\, and has become canonical for scholars studying the history of segregation\, civil rights\, and Black women&rsquo\;s history\, reviving s cholarly interest in the streetcar boycott movement and turn of the centur y African American activism.
\nKelley&rsquo\;s newest book\, Black F olk: The Roots the Black Working Class (Liveright)\, begins with the quest ion &ldquo\;What does it mean to be Black and working class?&rdquo\; Drawi ng on family histories and continuing into the archive\, Black Folk illumi nates the adversities and joys of the Black working class in America in th e past and present. Connecting the everyday\, lived experience of working black people to wider discussions of the American working class\, Black Fo lk argues that the history of the Black working class provide a crucial mo del of how we should engage a wider swath of Americans citizens in informe d citizenship. Black Folk was awarded a 2020 Creative Nonfiction Grant by the Whiting Foundation\, and the 2022-23 John Hope Franklin/NEH Fellowship by National Humanities Center.
\nActive inside the academy and out\ , Kelley has produced and hosted her own podcast and has been a guest on C NN Tonight with Don Lemon\; MSNBC&rsquo\;s \;All In and Melissa Harris Perry Show\, and Velshi\; NPR&rsquo\;s Here and Now\, WNYC&rsquo\;s The T akeaway\, Democracy Now and WUNC&rsquo\;s \;The State of Things. She h as written for the New York Times\, the Washington Post\, The Root\, The G rio\, Ebony\, Salon\, and Jet Magazine. Highlighted as one of the top-twee ting historians by History News Network\, she has been tweeting as \;@ profblmkelley for more than thirteen years and has over 46\,000 followers.
\nKelley received her B.A. from the University of Virginia in Histo ry and African and African American Studies. She earned her M.A. and Ph.D. in History\, and graduate certificates in African and African American St udies and Women&rsquo\;s Studies at Duke University.
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JENNIFER C. THO
MASJENNIFER C. THOMAS is an associate professor and journalism sequence coordinator in the Department of Media\ , Journalism and Film at her alma mater\, Howard University. She earned a Master of Arts Degree in Journalism from Columbia University. A former Scr ipps Howard FoundaDon AEJMC Teacher of the Year\, she is dedicated to ensu ring her students have a successful transiDon from classroom to newsroom. She is an award-winning broadcast journalist with more than 25 years of ex perience\, notably as an ExecuDve Producer with CNN\, where she served as the 9am show producer during the September 11 Terror APacks. She is the fo under of MediaReady ConsulDng\, LLC\, which specializes in media relaDons\ , training\, and consulDng. A Fulbright Specialist Scholar\, her creative works and published research include the dissection of current practices a nd pedagogies in journalism\, the transition from professional to professo r\, and the complex facets of women\, media\, and images.
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