Spring 2021
Working forward
Stefan Bradley, Washington State University alumnus, studies diversity in the history of Black people. He works for that goal as a history professor and writer. » More ...
African Americans
Winter 2020
The faces of small farms
Despite the hurdles, a new crop of Washington small farmers are finding their way into the field. » More ...
Spring 2020
BAM! The Black Arts Movement in Chicago
The Black Arts Movement in Chicago was a spiritual and inspirational time and place for multiple generations, as explored in a new documentary by two Washington State University Vancouver professors. » More ...
Spring 2019
Power of words
Sandy Williams delivers a voice to the African-American community in Spokane through Black Lens. The Washington State University alumna started and still publishes the newspaper to raise the profile of the Black community in Spokane and empower people to speak up. » More ...
Winter 2018
Briefly noted
Freedom’s Racial Frontier: African Americans in the Twentieth-Century West
Edited by Herbert G. Ruffin II and Dwayne A. Mack ’02 PhD History
University of Oklahoma Press: 2018
Between 1940 and 2010, the black population of the American West grew from 710,400 to 7 million. With that explosive growth has come a burgeoning interest in the history of the African American West—an interest reflected in the range and depth of the works collected in Freedom’s Racial Frontier that link past, current, and future generations of African American West scholarship. The West is revealed as a place where black Americans have fought—and continue to fight—to make … » More …
Fall 2018
Being best
A 9-year-old slave girl fanned her young mistress to keep the flies off her while she learned her lessons. Because she picked up enough education to be able to read and write a little, she ended up teaching other slaves and ex-slaves.
Her daughter became a schoolteacher, married to a Presbyterian minister in segregated Columbus, Ohio. The couple passed on the family mantras to their children: “You must get an education to get ahead” and “you must be a credit to our race.”
Their children, the second generation born free, took the advice to heart, attending college and becoming teachers and professionals. One of them, … » More …
Spring 2018
Hip Hop Ain’t Dead and Playing While White
Hip Hop Ain’t Dead: It’s Livin’ in the White House
Sanford Richmond ’11 PhD
Mill City Press: 2016
Playing While White: Privilege and Power On and Off the Field
David J. Leonard
University of Washington Press: 2017
During his undergraduate years at the University of Southern California, writes Sanford Richmond in Hip Hop Ain’t Dead, “I began to … » More …
Winter 2015
Black Spokane
Dwayne Mack was, to say the least, skeptical when his faculty mentor at Washington State University, LeRoy Ashby, suggested he write his doctoral dissertation on Spokane’s black history.
“I thought to myself, ‘Wow, every time we pay a visit to Spokane, we rarely even see black people,’” recalls Mack, who was brought up in Brooklyn and received his master’s degree from a historically black college, North Carolina Central University. “There couldn’t be enough black people to do a study.”
Then he started researching Spokane’s African-American history and realized he had “struck gold.” Spokane’s African-American community was small—historically averaging between 1 and 2 percent of Spokane’s … » More …
Gallery: Seeing Selma
A gallery of photos by former WSU photographer Jim Barker of the 1965 civil rights march to Selma.
» More ...Summer 2015
Seeing Selma
In March 1965 WSU photographer James H. Barker and others from WSU joined and documented the march to Selma in support of voting rights for African Americans.
» More ...