Olivia DrakeWhat are the challenges of building a national museum? Lonnie G. Bunch III, director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, will speak on this topic during the Center for African American Studies' 18th Annual Distinguished Lecture. The event takes place at 8 p.m. April 4 in Beckham Hall. A reception will follow. Bunch, a historian, author, curator and educator, is the founding director of the national museum. In this position he is working to set the museum’s mission, coordinate its fundraising and membership campaigns, develop its collections, establish cultural partnerships and oversee the design and…
The Center for African-American Studies (CAAS) is hosting a First Book series during the Fall 2011 semester. The series features trailblazing junior scholar-authors whose projects are and will make significant contributions to the field of African-American Studies. Gina Athena Ulysse, the new director of the Center for African American Studies, associate professor of African American Studies, associate professor of anthropology, created the series as the main initiative of her directorship to coincide with the AFAM junior colloquium that she is teaching. Ulysse's interests and concerns were to economically achieve three goals: 1) give AFAM incoming majors the opportunity to engage directly with scholars who are impacting the…
Prize-winning author Robin D.G. Kelley will deliver the Center for African-American Studies 17th Annual Distinguished Lecture at 8 p.m. April 14. Kelley is a professor of American studies and ethnicity and history at the University of Southern California. His topic will be, "Faking It for Freedom: Grace Halsell's Amazing Journey through the Minefields of Race, Sex, Empire and War - A 20th Century Love Story." The lecture is based on Kelley's new project - a biography of the late journalist Grace Halsell. Halsell, a white journalist, spent a good part of her life masquerading as others and traveling the country…
Bill HolderThe first-floor lounge of the Center for African American Studies will be renovated thanks to a $50,000 gift from Michelle ’84 and Kurt ’87 Lyn P’12 of Houston, Texas. Their gift honors the 40th anniversary of the establishment of CAAS and is intended to make the lounge a more attractive venue for the entire campus community. Ashraf Rushdy, professor and chair of the African American Studies Program, professor of English, expressed deep gratitude to the Lyn family for their generosity. “The money will be used to make the lounge even more welcoming (more…)