AAAS Authors Reception
Join the Department of African and African American Studies at Brandeis University for a celebratory evening at the Rose Art Museum in honor of the publication of Strolling in the Ruins: The Caribbean’s Non-sovereign Modern in the Early Twentieth Century (2023; Duke University Press) by Faith Smith, Marta F. Kauffman Chair in African and African American Studies, The Culture Trap (2023; Oxford University Press) by Derron Wallace, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Education, The Wounded World: W. E. B. Du Bois and the First World War (2023; MacMillian Publishers) by Chad Williams, Samuel J. and Augusta Spector Chair in History, and African Refugees (2023; Indiana University Press) by Toyin Falola and Olajumoke Yacob-Haliso, Associate Professor of African and African American Studies.
Professors Faith Smith, Chad Williams, and Olajumoke Yacob-Halis will discuss their books. A light reception will follow.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Faith Smith is an Associate Professor in the Brandeis departments of African and African American Studies, and English and American Literature, and the Latin American and Latino Studies, Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies, and CAST Programs. Her research interests are in the intellectual and cultural histories of the Caribbean and the African Diaspora from the late nineteenth century to the present. Her essays on academic life, gender, sexuality, and sovereignty include recent articles such as "Fabricating Intimacies: Artificial Silk and Cloth Wives in the Interwar Moment" (Caribbean Review of Gender Studies 12: 2018) and "Good Enough for Booker T to Kiss: Hampton, Tuskegee, and Caribbean Self-Fashioning" (Journal of Transnational American Studies 5, 1: 2013); the edited collection Sex and the Citizen: Interrogating the Caribbean (2011); and her recent publication Strolling Through the Ruins: The Caribbean's Non-Sovereign Modern in the Early Twentieth Century (2023).
Derron Wallace is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Education at Brandeis. He specializes in cross-national studies of structural and cultural inequalities in urban schools across global cities, focusing specifically on the experiences of young people of African descent. His current research examines the educational outcomes of Black youth in London and New York City. Derron is a Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude graduate of Wheaton College (Massachusetts), where he studied sociology and the African diaspora. He earned his Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge, where he was a Marshall and Gates Cambridge Scholar. With wide-ranging experiences in educational activism, analysis, policy, and research, Derron has worked with nomads in Ethiopia, young people with disabilities in Rwanda, immigrant youth in London, economically disadvantaged rural youth in Jamaica, English language learners in Thailand, and gifted students in New York City. He served as Special Assistant to the Minister of Education in Rwanda. He also worked as a professional community organizer and consultant with local educational authorities in London.
Chad Williams is the Samuel J. and Augusta Spector Professor of History and African and African American Studies at Brandeis University. He specializes in African American and modern United States History, African American military history, the World War I era, and African American intellectual history. Williams has published articles and book reviews in numerous leading academic journals and collections, as well as op-eds and essays in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, Time, and The Conversation. His first book, Torchbearers of Democracy: African American Soldiers in the World War I Era (2010), was praised as a landmark study and won the 2011 Liberty Legacy Foundation Award from the Organization of American Historians, the 2011 Distinguished Book Award from the Society for Military History and designation as a 2011 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title. His most recent title, The Wounded World: W. E. B. Du Bois and World War I, was published in April 2023.
Olajumoke Yacob-Haliso is an Associate Professor of African and African American Studies at Brandeis. She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. Olajumoke’s research has explored women's positions in conflict and post-conflict situations in Africa, focusing on refugee and displacement concerns. She has conducted extensive fieldwork in Liberia and some in Nigeria and Geneva. Olajumoke has also researched broader issues in relation to the comparative politics of African states. Dr. Yacob-Haliso is co-editor of four books, including Gendering Knowledge in Africa and the African Diaspora: Contesting History and Power (Routledge 2017) and Africa’s Big Men: Predatory State-Society Relations in Africa (Routledge, 2018). She is also the editor of the Journal of International Politics and Development and co-editor of the Journal of Contemporary African Studies.
This event is presented by the Brandeis Department of African and African American Studies and co-sponsored by the Brandeis Alumni of Color Association and the Rose Art Museum.