Upcoming:

Invited Panelist, "Current Issues in Black Studies," The 26th Annual National Conference for Race & Ethnicity in American Higher Education (NCORE), Wedn., 5/29, 2:30-4:30pm, Hilton Riverside New Orleans

Recent honors, lectures, and activities to note:

DR. AMILCAR SHABAZZ VISITS THE AMILCAR CABRALFOUNDATION
Amherst, MA, March 2013 – At the invitation of the Honorable Pedro Pires, former President of Cape Verde, West Africa, Dr. Amilcar Shabazz, Professor in the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies, visited the Amilcar Cabral Foundation in Praia, Cape Verde. Cabral was a leading theoretician and practitioner of anti-colonial revolution during the struggle to liberate Guinea–Bissau and Cape Verde from Portuguese rule. He had a tremendous influence on the Black liberation movement in the U.S. In Praia, Shabazz discussed the effort to preserve, digitize, and share more widely with the world the papers of Amilcar Cabral. He also toured, along with Rob Cox of UMass Amherst's Du Bois Library and Sidonia Ferreira, Director of Enrollment Services at UMass and a Cape Verdean national, the National Archives and the National Library of Cape Verde, and was featured on the "Morning Show,"  on RTCV, the national television station.

• The National Council for Black Studies' 37th Annual National Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana, The Westin Indianapolis:

  • Chair, A State of the Art Panel on Building & Maintaining Excellent Africana Studies Departments/Programs, 3/14, with Professors Jeanette Davidson, Valerie Grim, Maulana Karenga, Jeffrey Ogbar, and W.F. Santiago-Valles.
  • Presenter & Chair, Building a State of the Art in New African Independence Movement Studies, 3/16.
  DISCOVERING SPRINGFIELD'S AFRICAN AMERICAN HERITAGE: A Conversation with Dr. Amilcar Shabazz of UMASS Amherst; Wayne Phaneuf, Editor-in-Chief of The Republican & Author of "The Struggle for Freedom;" and Joseph Cavalho III, Author of "Black Families in Hampden County, Mass.: 1650-1855." February 23rd @ 1:00pm at PAHMUSA.
• Attended the joint conference of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees and Mass Association of School Superintendents held Nov. 7-10, 2012, in Hyannis, MA. Participated in plenary sessions with nationally known speakers, current-issue panel discussions, informative exhibits, demonstrations of successful instructional and management initiatives in local districts, and the New Member Orientation session focused on changes to the open meetings, conflict of interest, and public records laws and requirements.
• Association for the Study of African-American Life & History 97th annual meeting in Pittsburgh, PA: Participant, "Are You On Fire?: A Hands-On Workshop for Preparing Submissions to Fire!!! The Multimedia Journal of Black Studies," Fri, Sep 28 - 2-3:50pm, Westin Convention Center Hotel-Westmorland East/ AV Room; and Presenter, "New Digitizing Projects for Black History and Scholarship," Sat, Sep 29 - 8:30-9:50am, Westin-Crawford West/ AV Room.
• Placed under contract the volume Representing Black Equality: Mass Media and the U.S. Civil Rights Movement, 1945-1975, co-edited with Demetria R. Shabazz.
• Faculty mentor for Commonwealth Honors College student London Tatum’s ten-week summer Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) Program in Community Engaged Research entitled “Using African Heritage-Informed Education (AHIE) to Enhance Literacy Development in Underserved Students in Springfield, MA” in collaboration with Springfield’s Pan-African Historical Museum (PAHMUSA).
• Developed and taught AFROAM 597A-01 “Afro-Caribbean Studies” as a summer study abroad course to Cuba with Prof. Agustin Lao-Montes [see https://blogs.umass.edu/afroam597a-shabazz/about/]. Made plenary presentation to the International Colloquium of the 32nd Annual Festival del Caribe in Santiago de Cuba, “Africana Studies in the Americas from Estudios Afrocubanos to Estudios Afrodiasporicos,” July 7, 2012.
• Invited guest lecturer on W.E.B. Du Bois, in Anthro 577: UMass Amherst Summer Field School in Archaeological Heritage, by Whitney Battle-Baptiste and Bob Paynter.
• Invited speaker, “On Juneteenth,” a public event sponsored by Justice for Charles and other Western Massachusetts organizations in Springfield, MA, June 23, 2012.
• Invited Guest Speaker, “Education for Life: The Du Bois Doctorate of African American Studies and Its First Forty Years of Unity and Struggle,” April 12-14, 2012, at Northwestern University’s AFAM Conference A Beautiful Struggle: Transformative Black Studies in Shifting Political Landscapes–A Summit of Doctoral Programs in Evanston, IL. Part of news stories on the conference in Diverse Issues in Higher Education (July 5, 2012), The Daily Northwestern (April 13, 2012), and The Chronicle of Higher Education (April 12, 2012).
• Invited Panelist, “‘Bodies Acting Together’: Collaborating and Colliding in the Academy,” UMass English Graduate Organization Interdisciplinary Conference Forces at Play: Bodies, Power, and Spaces, March 31, 2012, at UMass Amherst.
• Presenter, “Developments in the Digital Humanities, W.E.B. Du Bois, and the History of Afro-Latin American Studies,” March 23, 2012, at The 3rd Annual Negritud Conference at the Center of Advanced Studies of Puerto Rico & the Caribbean, San Juan, Puerto Rico.
• Elected Secretary of the National Council for Black Studies in May of 2012. Attended board meetings of the NCBS and chaired two panel sessions at its annual meeting, March 7-10, 2012, in Atlanta, GA.
• Presenter, “Melvin Tolson: Radical as Educator,” March 2, at the Texas State Historical Association’s 2012 Annual Meeting, at the Omni Houston Hotel in Houston, TX.
• Invited Keynoter, “Black Women in American Culture and History,” February 15, 2012, at the Community Charter School of Cambridge, MIT’s Walker Auditorium (MA).
• Service on the Editorial Board of The Journal of Black Studies; and invited to serve on the board of The Black Scholar (I accepted by email on June 12, 2012). These are the two oldest and most distinguished journals in the interdisciplinary field of Afro-American Studies.
• Internationalization trip to Colombia with Prof. Agustin Lao-Montes. Made presentations on Afro-American Studies at universities and community-based cultural centers in Bogotá, Buenaventura, and Cali.
• Presenter, “Du Bois and the Strengthening of Trans-Atlantic Connections: Digital Discoveries in the Afro-German Experience,” August 19-21, 2011—The Black German Cultural Society, First Annual Convention held from at the German Historical Institute (GHI) in Washington, DC.
• Consultant, “The Civil Rights Movement, 1945-1968,” prepared curriculum. Used at my July 26-28, session at Smith College with area schoolteachers in the final session of the Let Freedom Ring Summer Program of the Collaborative for Educational Services, created with support from a U.S. Department of Education Teaching American History grant. Donated stipend to Du Bois Department scholarship fund.
• Service on Faculty Senate as a Senator, At-Large Member of the Rules Committee, and Co-Chair of the Ad Hoc Committee on Strategic Oversight. Member of the General Education Council and the Davis Integrative Experience Task Force. Developed department’s Du Bois Senior Seminar (AFROAM 494DI-01)—named exemplary by General Education Council.
• Member, Search Committee for Endowed Chair in the Study of Nonviolent Direct Action and Civil Resistance, 2012 (appointed by Provost James Staros); Member, College of Humanities & Fine Arts Chair Search for Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies, 2011.
• Steering Committee for the W.E.B. Du Bois Center and the Center for Heritage & Society.
• Service within the Five College Consortium: Member, Faculty Advisory Council (2011); Five College African Studies Council and program faculty member; part of a consortial effort to become the host site of the African Studies Association (one of two finalists).
• Member, Amherst School Committee and Vice-Chair, Amherst Regional School Committee (MA), elected to a 3-year term on April 3, 2012, and an ex officio Town Meeting Member—the legislative body of the Town of Amherst.
• Member, Northwestern District Attorney’s Citizen Advisory Board (MA)

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Discovering Du Bois: The Niagara Movement--is a website project of the University of Massachusetts Amherst, as part of its effort to improve use of its extensive collection of the papers of W.E.B. Du Bois located in UMass Amherst’s W.E.B. Du Bois Library, Department of Special Collections and University Archives. Below are some video clips from the site.

q1_sm.flv 03:51-Dr. Amilcar Shabazz on the context and background of W.E.B. Du Bois and the Niagara Movement... youtube.com

q4_sm.flv05:03 -Dr. Amilcar Shabazz on the Niagara Movement's Declaration of Principles...

q3_sm.flv02:36 -Dr. Shabazz on the approach of Du Bois and Niagara Movement member John Hope to education...

q2_sm.flv03:52 -Dr. Shabazz on the response of Du Bois and the Niagara Movement to Booker T. Washington...

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Elected to membership in the Texas Institute of Letters and formally introduced at the TIL's annual meeting in Texas, April 17-18, 2009.

Photo below: Jena 6 National Walk-Out Day Rally, Amherst Commons, 10/1/07. [by Caitlin Coughlan]

Links to news stories:
iBerkshires.com - May 1, 2008

Shabazz addresses 14th Annual Mass. Statewide Undergraduate Research Conference

USA Today - March 13, 2008
Supporters rally for Mass. student By Mark Pratt, Associated Press Writer

Diverse: Issues In Higher Education - September 20, 2007
On The Move: Professional Appointments

In the Loop (online informational site for faculty & staff at UMass Amherst), MA - July 6, 2007
Shabazz named new chair of Afro-American Studies

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Join me at UMass in the #1 graduate program in Afro-American Studies
Visit our link now: http://www.umass.edu/afroam/gradprog.html