UC Davis experts: African American issues

The following UC Davis faculty members are available to speak on topics related to African American issues.

Law, politics and race

• Changing face of workplace racism
• Race, ethnicity and urban communities
• Multicultural approach to civil rights
• Blacks in Congress

Family, religion and society

• Black family stress
• The black church experience

Popular culture

• Popular culture
• Blacks in film and TV
• Black visual and performing arts
• Gender and Southern culture in literature
• African American music history

Historical topics

• America's mixed-race history
• Blacks and Indians in U.S. history
• History of black women's activism

LAW, POLITICS AND RACE

Changing face of workplace racism

Race, ethnicity and urban communities

Bruce Haynes, UC Davis assistant professor of sociology, specializes in the study of race and ethnic group relations within the context of urban and suburban community development. He recently wrote, "Red Lines, Black Spaces: The Politics of Race and Space in a Black Middle-Class Suburb" (Yale University Press, 2001), a case study of race and class politics in a New York City suburban community. He is currently writing a book on African-American Jews in the United States. Contact: Bruce Haynes, Sociology, (530) 754-7127, bdhaynes@ucdavis.edu.

Multiracial approaches to civil rights

In "How Did You Get to Be Mexican?" Kevin Johnson, UC Davis professor of law and Chicana/o studies, calls for an end to inter-ethnic conflicts and the building of minority coalitions that will move beyond racial divisiveness and work to change the racial status quo. Also associate dean for academic affairs at the law school, Johnson teaches and publishes on civil rights. Johnson's new book, "The 'Huddled Masses' Myth: Immigration and Civil Rights" was published in December 2003. He edited "A Reader on Race, Civil Rights, and the Law: A Multiracial Approach" and wrote "Mixed Race America and the Law: A Reader" (2002), which traces the history of the anti-miscegenation laws, racial identity for mixed-race people, transracial adoption, and the 2000 census controversy over the classification of mixed-race people. Contact: Kevin Johnson, School of Law, (530) 752-0243, krjohnson@ucdavis.edu.

Blacks in Congress

Ben Highton, assistant professor of political science at UC Davis, can talk about the history of black representation in Congress and the factors that influence the election of black candidates. An expert on U.S. Congressional elections, voter registration and voter turnout, Highton is studying what it takes to elect black candidates to Congress through a $100,000 grant from the Carnegie Corp. of New York. He also has written about various aspects of voting and public opinion. Contact: Ben Highton, Political Science , (530) 752-0970, bhighton@ucdavis.edu.

FAMILY, RELIGION AND SOCIETY

Black family stress

UC Davis human development professor Rand Conger can talk about how economic hardship creates stress in African American families. Conger has been conducting research on the consequences of stress in families for over 20 years. In a recent report, he demonstrated that economic hardship has the same damaging impact on family relationships and child development in rural and urban African American families as in the European American families that he had previously studied in rural Iowa. Conger is an expert on social and economic stress, life course development, and family interaction processes. Contacts: Rand Conger, Human Development, (530) 757-8454 (lab), rdconger@ucdavis.edu).

The black church experience

Milmon F. Harrison, an assistant professor of African American and African studies at UC Davis, is a sociologist who looks at the various roles and meanings of Christianity and the black church in the African American experience. Currently he is studying the Christian music industry and can talk about how the racial reconciliation movement among evangelicals is opening white-owned Christian music radio stations to multicultural talent. Harrison can also talk about the production of African American gospel music. His book, "Name It and Claim It! The Word of Faith Movement, The Faith Message and the Disestablishment of Doctrinal Meaning," concerns the Word of Faith movement. He is also writing a new book on prosperity Christianity. Contact: Milmon Harrison, African American and African Studies, (530) 752-1548, mfharrison@ucdavis.edu.

POPULAR CULTURE

Popular culture

How do black images influence American popular culture? Where do persistent rumors or urban legends in the African American community begin? Patricia Turner, vice provost for undergraduate studies and a professor of African American studies, can answer such questions. Her latest project is a book on how black quilters embody African American culture. Turner is an expert in African American culture, and is the author of three books, "Whispers on the Color Line: Rumor and Race in America," cowritten with Gary Allan Fine, "Ceramic Uncles and Celluloid Mammies: Black Images and Their Influence on Culture" and "I Heard It Through the Grapevine: Rumor in African American Culture." Contact: Patricia Turner, vice provost for undergraduate studies, (530) 752-6068, paturner@ucdavis.edu.

Blacks in film and TV

Christine Acham, UC Davis assistant professor of African American and African studies, can talk about the history of blacks in African American film and television. Her book, "Power to the People: Television of the Black Revolution," will be published this year. She can also talk about contemporary film and TV trends in regards to blacks, African Americans currently in the film and television industry, and popular culture. She is writing another book on the Blaxploitation films of the '70s. Contact: Christine Acham, African American and African Studies, (530) 754-6619, acham@ucdavis.edu.

Black visual and performing arts

Nicole Fleetwood, assistant professor of American Studies at UC Davis, has worked as an art consultant for several organizations, including the San Francisco Art Institute, the Walker Art Center, Southern Exposure and the New Museum of Contemporary Art. She can talk about black popular culture, media and race, and technology and race studies. Fleetwood studies young black performance artists as well as hip hop fashion and its relationship to masculine anxiety. Currently she is completing a book on black visual and performing arts. Contact: Nicole Fleetwood, American Studies, (530) 754-8090, nrfleetwood@ucdavis.edu.

Gender and Southern culture in literature

English assistant professor Riché Richardson, a native of Montgomery, Alabama, specializes in African American literature and Southern studies. She also looks at black Southern masculinity and blackness in global contexts. Richardson is currently writing a book, "Masculinity, Black Identity and the American South: From Uncle Tom to Gangsta," and completing a project on Southern rap. Richardson's research and teaching interests include African American and American literature, cultural studies and feminism. Contact: Riché Richardson, English, (530) 752-4295, rrichardson@ucdavis.edu.

African American music history

Sandra Graham, an assistant professor of music at UC Davis, can talk about the history of African American music. Her specialty is in Negro spirituals and how they evolved from folk music on the plantation before the Civil War to concert music on the stage, eventually becoming a popular American tradition. She is writing a book about The Fisk Jubilee Singers and the concert spiritual. Contact: Sandra Graham, Music, (530) 752-2603, sjgraham@ucdavis.edu.

HISTORICAL TOPICS

America's mixed-race history

UC Davis American historian Clarence Walker can talk about the prevalence of mixed-race offspring among Native Americans, African Americans and Anglos in the 17th and 18th centuries and the effects it has had on Native Americans. "On the East Coast, there was a great deal of intermixture between red, black and white," Walker reports. "In New England, as Indians were driven into towns, they married blacks and disappeared from the census." He can also talk about how the reality of a mixed-race America belied the 19th century political and cultural images of the United States as a "white" nation. Walker teaches a two-quarter course called "Race in America" and is doing research for his newest book, "Founding Parents: Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings and the Racial Origins of the American Republic." Walker specializes in the study of the sociology of American race relations and American popular culture. Contact: Clarence Walker, History, (530) 752-0779, cewalker@ucdavis.edu.

Blacks and Indians in U.S. history

UC Davis Native American studies professor emeritus Jack Forbes can cover a wide range of topics in regards to African American history in the United States. He can discuss African American-Indian relations, ethnicity and ethnohistory. He wrote "Black Africans and Native Americans: Race, Caste and Color in the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples" (1988) as well as articles on the evolution of the "red-black people," African Americans in the Far West and Spanish-speaking African Americans of the Southwest. Forbes can also talk about community and development, racism, and colonialism. Contact: Jack Forbes, Native American Studies, (530) 752-3626, jdforbes@ucdavis.edu.

History of black women's activism

UC Davis women's history scholar Lisa Materson can talk about African American women's political activism from the 19th through the late 20th centuries. She can talk about black women's involvement in the abolitionist, suffrage, anti-lynching, uplift and civil-rights movements. Currently Materson is researching the history of black women's involvement in electoral politics between the end of Reconstruction and the 1936 voting realignment. Contact: Lisa Materson, History, (530) 752-9991, lgmaterson@ucdavis.edu.

Media contacts:

Claudia Morain, News Service, (530) 752-9841, cmmorain@ucdavis.edu

Top of page