Tue 1/29 @ 7-8:30PM
[This event has been postponed, and will be re-scheduled at a later date]
There’s a section in Emory University professor Carol Anderson’s 2018 book One Person, No Vote that delves into Democrat Doug Jones’ improbable win in a special election for the U.S. Senate in 2017. While many attributed his razor-thin victory margin to the fact that his opponent, Roy Moore, was a creepy stalker of underage girls (which undoubtedly helped), there was a lot more to the story. Jones’ victory in fact hinged on a determined group of black women who worked relentlessly to overcome obstacles to voting placed in the way of Alabama’s black voters by its white politicians and to get their community to the polls.
As we celebrate the centennial of the passage of the 19th amendment, which gave women the right to vote, it’s important to remember that in many places, especially the Jim Crow South, the idea that black women AND men could vote was more theory than reality. And black women were often on the forefront of systemic change, even while men were in the spotlight.
Case Western Reserve University associate professor Joy Bostic, who is also the interim vice president of the Office for Inclusion, Diversity and Equal Opportunity at CWRU, kicks off the 2020 Women’s Empowerment lecture series with a lecture on “Our Voices, Our Votes: Courage and Persistence in Black Women’s Struggle for Voting Rights.” She’ll talk about how black women have organized locally and nationally to help advance voting rights for all in the U.S.
The talk, co-sponsored by the Laura and Alvin Siegal Lifelong Learning Program Case Western Reserve University and the League of Women Voters of Greater Cleveland, takes place at CWRU’s Tinkham Veale University Center. It’s free and open to the public. While registration isn’t required, it’s appreciated.
womens-empowerment/our-voices-our-vote-courage-and-persistence-black-womens-struggle-voting-rights
Cleveland, OH 44106