University of Massachusetts Amherst

08/28/2024 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 08/28/2024 17:31

Joy James to Present 29th Annual Du Bois Lecture Hosted by UMass Amherst Libraries

Image
Joy James

The UMass Amherst Libraries and the W. E. B. Du Bois Center will host the 29th annual Du Bois Lecture on Sept. 12, from 6-7:30 p.m. at Old Chapel. The lecture, titled "Did W. E. B. Du Bois's Rejection of Ida B. Wells Project Trauma and Alienation against Black Rebellion?", will be given by Joy James, Ebenezer Fitch Professor of the Humanities at Williams College. The lecture, which will be livestreamed on YouTube, is free and open to the public and will be followed by a reception for in-person attendees.

In-person attendance at the lecture and reception is free but space is limited. Registration is required to attend and the registration form will close when event capacity is reached.<_o3a_p>

This meditation on Black leadership will compare and contrast W. E. B. Du Bois's "Souls of Black Folk" and Ida B. Wells's "Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases." Both historical icons worked to co-found the NAACP as a resistance to anti-Black violence and repression, yet only one leader was pushed out of the NAACP because of their radical resistance to lynching.<_o3a_p>

James, a political philosopher who engages with organizers seeking justice and an end to militarism, writes on the "Captive Maternal" and works with incarcerated and abolitionist intellectuals and writers. She is the editor of "The Angela Y. Davis Reader," "Imprisoned Intellectuals; Warfare in the American Homeland," "Beyond Cop Cities: Dismantling State and Corporate-Funded Armies" and "ENGAGE: Indigenous, Black, and Afro-Indigenous Futures."

Her books include "Seeking the 'Beloved Community,'" "Transcending the Talented Tenth," "Resisting State Violence," "Shadowboxing: Representations of Black Feminist Politics," "In Pursuit of Revolutionary Love," "New Bones Abolition: Captive Maternal Agency and the (After)Life of Erica Garner" and "Contextualizing Angela Davis."<_o3a_p>