CEW+ Advocacy Symposium Kick-off Event: Creating Change through Introspection, Dialogue, and Action
CEW+ presents its annual fall symposium themed Creating Change through Introspection, Dialogue, and Action. The 2020 Symposium includes a diverse group of scholars and community practitioners who embody leadership in varied ways as they advocate for change. This year’s Symposium will be a virtual event that includes a series of presentations and workshops that will take place over the course of the academic year. At the kickoff event on October 23, 2020, Dr. Martha Jones will discuss the role of black women in the civil rights and voting rights movements and the on-going struggle for voting rights for different populations and CEW+ Carol Hollenshead Inspire Award for Excellence in Promoting Equity and Social Change Awardees will present lightning talks about their work as a precursor to a full-length workshop that will happen later in the academic year. The learning opportunities throughout the year-long Symposium will supplement Democracy and Debate Theme Semester coursework and activities.
This symposium is free and open to all activists, advocates, and allies from all U-M campuses (students, staff, faculty) as well as the local community. REGISTER NOW
KEYNOTE SPEAKER
The Epic History of African American Women’s Pursuit of Political Power — and How it Transformed America
In Vanguard, acclaimed historian Martha S. Jones offers a new history of African American women’s political lives in America. She recounts how they defied both racism and sexism to fight for the ballot, and how they wielded political power to secure the equality and dignity of all persons. From the earliest days of the republic to the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act and beyond, Jones excavates the lives and work of black women — Maria Stewart, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Fannie Lou Hamer, and more — who were the vanguard of women’s rights, calling on America to realize its best ideals.
This presentation will include a review of the new book, with a discussion regarding current existing barriers to voting for different populations. After a moderated Q&A session, a virtual book signing will follow the book talk.
Martha S. Jones, JD, PhD
Professor Martha S. Jones is the Society of Black Alumni Presidential Professor and Professor of History at The Johns Hopkins University. She is a legal and cultural historian whose work examines how black Americans have shaped the story of American democracy. Professor Jones is the author of Birthright Citizens: A History of Race and Rights in Antebellum America (Cambridge University Press, 2018), the winner of the Organization of American Historians Liberty Legacy Award for the best book in civil rights history, the American Historical Association LittletonGriswold Prize for the best book in American legal history, and the American Society for Legal History John Phillip Reid book award for the best book in Anglo-American legal history. Forthcoming in 2020 is Vanguard: How Black Women Broke Barriers, Won the Vote, and Fought for Rights for All (Basic). Professor Jones is also author of All Bound Up Together: The Woman Question in African American Public Culture 1830-1900 (University of North Carolina Press, 2007) and a co-editor of Toward an Intellectual History of Black Women (University of North Carolina Press, 2015). Currently, she is working on a biography of U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney.
Professor Jones is recognized as a public historian, frequently writing for broader audiences at outlets including the Washington Post, the Atlantic, USA Today, Public Books, the Chronicle of Higher Education, and Time. She has also curated museum exhibitions, including “Reframing the Color Line” and “Proclaiming Emancipation” in conjunction with the William L. Clements Library, and collaborated with the Smithsonian Institution’s National Portrait Gallery, the Charles Wright Museum of African American History, the American Experience, the Southern Poverty Law Center, PBS, Netflix, and Arte (France). Professor Jones holds a Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and a J.D. from the CUNY School of Law. Prior to the start of her academic career, she was a public interest litigator in New York City, for which she was recognized as a Charles H. Revson Fellow on the Future of the City of New York at Columbia University. Professor Jones currently serves as President of the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians, and on the Executive Board of the Organization of American Historians.
KEYNOTE MODERATOR
Angela D. Dilliard, PhD
Professor Angela D. Dillard is the Richard A. Meisler Collegiate Professor of Afroamerican & African Studies, History, and in the Residential College where she is part of the Social Theory & Practice program. Dr. Dilliarfd specializes in American and African-American intellectual history, particularly around issues of race, religion, and politics, and maintains an active interest in urban studies and visions of an egalitarian metropolis. She is the author of two books, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner Now?: Multicultural Conservatism in America (NYU Press, 2001) and Faith in the City: Preaching Radical Social Change in Detroit (U of Michigan Press, 2007). Both books reflect Professor Dillard’s interests in the study of political ideologies — how they emerge, how they get deployed in the context of political movements, and how they change over the course of time. Her current manuscript-in-process is focused on the wide history of Black freedom struggles situated at the intersection of the post-World War II civil rights movement and the rise of the New Right.
Dr. Dilliard is a faculty advisor of the Detroit School of Urban Studies and Co-PI on the Egalitarian Metropolis project, jointly sponsored by LSA and the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning and funded by the Andrew Mellon Foundation. In addition, Dillard serves on the Executive Committees for the Bentley Historical Library and the U-M Institute for the Humanities as well as on the Advisory Board for the Mellon Foundation’s College & Beyond, II study. Currently, Dillard serves as the Chair of the Academic Advisory Committee for the Fall 2020 Democracy & Debate Theme Semester.
CONFERENCE SCHEDULE
Friday, October 23, 2020
2:35 pm - Welcome
2:40 pm - Introduction of Carol Hollenshead Inspire Award for Excellence in Promoting Equity and Social Change
2:45 pm - Guided Mindfulness Practice
2:55 pm - Introductions and Lightning Talks
3:25 pm - Q&A
3:40 pm - Break
3:50 pm - Video Greeting - Anna Kirkland, Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Women's & Gender Studies; Director, Institute for Research on Women and Gender (IRWG)
3:55 pm - Introduction of Keynote Speaker - Angela D. Dillard, PhD
4:00 pm - Keynote Lecture - Martha Jones, JD, PhD
4:35 pm -Discussion / Q&A (moderated by Dr. Angela Dillard)
5:00 pm - Virtual Book Signing
2020-21 Carol Hollenshead Inspire Award for Excellence in Promoting Equity and Social Change Lightning Talks
- Kate Fitzpatrick-Harnish, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Music Education and acting Associate Dean of Undergraduate Academic Affairs (Fall, 2020) for the School of Music, Theatre and Dance at the University of Michigan
- Lightning Talk: Dismantling Systematic Marginalization and Oppression in Arts Education
- Rogério Pinto, Professor and Associate Dean for Research at the University of Michigan School of Social Work
- Lightning Talk: Diversity Matters: How about Equity and Inclusion?
- Reshma Jagsi, M.D., D.Phil., Newman Family Professor and Deputy Chair in the Department of Radiation Oncology and Director of the Center for Bioethics and Social Sciences in Medicine at the University of Michigan
- Lightning Talk: Promoting Gender Equity in the Professions: Insights from Academic Medicine
For more details on the award recipients and their talks, please visit the CEW+ Advocacy Symposium event page.
This Symposium is made possible through the generous support of CEW+’s Frances & Sydney Lewis Visiting Leaders Fund and the following supporters:
