WFHB Bloomington Community Radio
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On Wednesday, September 30, and Thursday, October 1, IU’s Department of History will be presenting three events designed to bring together IU and the greater Bloomington community in a conversation focused on race, white supremacy, and voter suppression. This year’s speaker for the virtual town hall meeting on Thursday, October 1, from 6 to 8 PM, is Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson, co-executive director of the Highlander Research and Education Center. Beforehand on Wednesday, September 30, there will be a Virtual Justice Fair (2 to 4 PM) and a Virtual Organizing Workshop (6 to 8 PM) with Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson.
In tonight’s show, hosts Clarence Boone and William Hosea spend the hour with Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson and Dr. Amrita Myers to give an overview of some of the issues that will be explored in depthly during the workshop:
Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson is a 34 year-old, Affrilachian (Black Appalachian), working-class woman, born and raised in Southeast Tennessee. Ash-Lee is the first Black woman executive director of the Highlander Research & Education Center, a social justice leadership training school and cultural center founded in 1932. Through popular education, language justice, participatory research, cultural work, and intergenerational organizing, they help create spaces — at Highlander and in communities — where people gain knowledge, hope, and courage, expanding their ideas of what is possible. Ash-Lee is a long-time activist working against environmental racism in central and southern Appalachia – and has fought for workers’ rights, racial justice, women and LGBTQUIA+ rights, reproductive justice, international human rights, and led-intergenerational social movements across the South. She serves on the governance council of the Southern Movement Assembly and is a nationally recognized leader in the Movement for Black Lives.
Amrita Myers, Ph.D., is the Ruth N. Halls Associate Professor of History and Gender Studies at Indiana University. Her research focuses on issues of race, gender, freedom, sex, and power and the ways in which these constructs intersect with one another in the lives of black women in the Old South. Her first book, Forging Freedom: Black Women and the Pursuit of Liberty in Antebellum Charleston (2011), examines the lives of free black women, both legal and de facto, in Charleston, South Carolina, from 1790-1860. Her second book, Remembering Julia: A Tale of Sex, Race, Power, and Place (2019), examines the limits of agency, power, and privileges denied to black women through the exploration of the decades-long relationship of Julia Chinn, a woman of color, and U.S. congressman, senator, and one-term Vice President Richard Mentor Johnson, a white man.
To register for the virtual Defending Democracy events, please click here.
CREDITS: The hosts of today’s show are Clarence Boone and William Hosea.
The Executive Producer is Clarence Boone with help from WFHB News Department Director Kade Young.
The original theme music was created by Jamyl Efiom, with additional background tracks by David Baker.
The promotional graphic is provided by William Hosea.
Online writing help provided by Chantalle LaFontant.
