(Charleston, IL) – Eastern Illinois University invites community members to join students, staff and faculty in celebrating African-American Heritage Month this February.
According to the African-American Heritage Month committee, EIU will offer a variety of cultural and educational events intended to celebrate black lives by honoring the men, women, families and communities that support and sustain black excellence. Events will center around a principal theme of “We the People: Redefining Black History,” and include an assortment of virtual programs and activities that highlight black contributions and applaud the most fundamental elements of blackness in American and global culture.
Yolanda Williams, academic advisor and member of EIU’s African-American Heritage Month planning committee, encourages everyone in the broader EIU community to explore and attend some or all of the university’s online African-American Heritage Month offerings.
“This year’s AAHM theme of We The People: Redefining Black History speaks to people of the African Diaspora not only being an intricate thread in the fabric of America, but also speaks to the fact that Black/African/African-American people are and have always been a huge part of the democratic process,” Williams said. “[And with] their participation in this process comes a redefining of what Black History and Black Excellence looks like in this world.”
African-American Heritage Month events at EIU kicked off earlier this week, and included an open-forum discussion about systematic oppression, racism, the Black Lives Matter movement, safety, and breaking socio-cultural color barriers. Remaining events in this month’s African-American Heritage Month at EIU will include:
Coloring the Path: Grad School Edition at 7 p.m.
Presented by Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA). This event will be a conversation about the importance of Graduate School, why it is important, how to navigate the application process and voices from some EIU current Grad students.
For more information and links to EIU’s African-American Heritage Month virtual events, visit EIU’s Office of Inclusion and Academic Engagement on the web at www.eiu.edu/oiae/. For more information about EIU, or to learn more about its growing assortment of programs and services, visit the university’s website at www.eiu.edu, or call EIU’s public information office at (217) 581-7400.
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ADDENDUM: WEIU-TV shared the following list of events they are hosting in February as well. Please see below:
2/10 at 9:30pm - Charlie's Place
Description: Charlie's Place, a nightclub in the black neighborhood of Myrtle Beach, S.C., brought blacks and whites together to listen to music by performers such as Ella Fitzgerald, Billy Holiday and Ray Charles.
2/11 at 9:30pm - Dr. Ibram X. Kendi -- An IGI Special Presentation
Description: Author Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, founding director of the Antiracist Research & Policy Center at American University in Washington, D.C.
2/13 at 6pm - Amen! Music of the Black Church
Description: The traditions, historical significance and meaning of Black church music; Dr. Raymond Wise leads the Indiana University African American Choral Ensemble in a performance of sacred music derived from African traditions.
2/13 at 7pm - Marching Forward
Description: Two high school band directors -- one Black, one white -- inspire an atypical collaboration in the segregated South in 1964.
2/13 at 8pm - Dreams of Hope
Description: Behind-the-scenes interviews provide insight into the concert at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., that took place more than 50 years after a hate crime killed four black girls.
2/14 at 6pm - Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards 2020
Description: A look at the only juried American book prize focusing on works that address racism and diversity; host Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr.
2/14 at 9pm - CodeSwitching: Race and Identity in the Suburban Schoolhouse
Description: Black students shuttled from the inner-city to white suburban schools default to code switching to fit in in the face of insipid racism and isolation.
2/15 at 9pm - Vernon Jordan: Make It Plain
Description: Vernon Jordan's rise from the segregated South to his leadership in several civil rights organizations and position as partner at Lazard.
2/17 at 9:00pm - Congressman John Lewis and Andrew Aydin: The Story of March
Description: Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) and co-author Andrew Aydin discuss their graphic novel trilogy, "March," at the Flynn Center in Burlington, Vt.
2/18 at 7pm - American Experience
Roads to Memphis
Description: The entwined stories of assassin James Earl Ray and his target, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
2/18 at 9pm - Unchained: Generational Trauma and Healing
Description: Men and women discuss the lingering emotional trauma passed down from their slave ancestors; the roots of American racism and processes that bring about reconciliation.
Booth House
Eastern Illinois University
600 Lincoln Ave.
Charleston, IL 61920
217-581-7400
jdreinhart@eiu.edu