2016-2017 Presentations

Social media: Expanding the African diaspora

Friday, October 21, 2016
3:30-5:00 p.m.
PSU 313

Students discuss how they use social media to make connections across the African Diaspora. This panel offers insights about how social media changes their worldviews. They will discuss its benefits and advantages in making and keeping connections, as well as how its use allows them to experience Afrocentric cultures. They will also comment on social media’s challenges and pitfalls ranging from misrepresentation of African Diaspora cultures to cross-cultural communication problems within the African Diaspora.

The Missouri State University community is welcome to attend this panel presentation free of charge.

Please join us for this Special Session of the Mid-America Alliance for African Studies (MAAAS) Conference. If you are interested in attending the full conference, please register with MAAAS.

Sponsored by Mid-America Alliance for African Studies (MAAAS), Division for Diversity and Inclusion, Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning, African and African American Studies Committee. For additional information please contact Dr. Jamaine Abidogun, Diversity Fellow at JamaineAbidogun@MissouriState.edu or 417-836-5916.


Trail of Tears: Its history and connections today

Wednesday, November 16, 2016
4:30-6:00 p.m.
Temple 002

Presented by Dr. Julie Reed, History Department, University of Tennessee

A Native American Heritage Month event. According to the National Parks Service (2016), “The main (northern) land route of the Trail of Tears passes directly through the Springfield, Missouri area, where Missouri State University is located.” Join us to learn about the Cherokee people’s forced removal from their homelands. Their history is one of many harrowing stories of Native American land occupation and forced migration. Dr. Reed will discuss the Trail of Tears experience and how Native American lands are threatened today. 

Author of Serving the Nation: Cherokee Sovereignty and Social Welfare, 1800–1907 (Norman: Oklahoma University Press, 2016). Her book will be available for purchase at this event.

Sponsored by Division for Diversity and Inclusion, Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning, Multicultural Programs, and American Indian Student Association, Native American Studies Committee, and Ozark Studies Committee. For additional information please contact Dr. Jamaine Abidogun, Diversity Fellow at jamaineabidogun@missouristate.edu or 417-836-5916.


Seizing freedom

Thursday, February 16, 2017
Meyer Library, Room 101
4:30 – 6:00 PM

Presentation by Dr. David Roediger, Foundation Distinguished Professor of American Studies and History at Kansas University. He is the author of Seizing Freedom: Slave Emancipation and Liberty for All. New York: Verso, 2014; and co-author of The Production of Difference: Race and the Management of Labor in U.S. History, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012, and several other books, chapters, and articles on race, labor, and social justice in the United States.

“Seizing Freedom, David Roediger’s spellbinding account of black self-emancipation and the array of movements accelerated by this ‘general strike of the slaves’ as DuBois put it, reminds us that it is never too late to take up the democratic promise of Radical Reconstruction.”
— Angela Y. Davis, University of California, Santa Cruz

His book Seizing Freedom: Slave Emancipation and Liberty for All. New York: Verso, 2014, is available for purchase at this event. 

Sponsors:  African & African American Studies Committee, Division for Diversity & Inclusion, Faculty Center for Teaching & Learning, College of Humanities & Public Affairs, and Political Science Department.

This event is free and open to the public.


Trauma and healing in the diaspora

February 23, 2017
4:00 – 6:00 PM
PSU Theatre

An Afrocentric look at social trauma and healing through a “house concert” musical presentation with streaming video of how communities can heal from past injustices and how current injustices may be corrected through this healing process. The Division for Diversity & Inclusion and Faculty Center for Teaching  & Learning welcome filmmaker and musician, Patrick Mureithi.  

Please join us for a night of musical healing and collective engagement.

This event is free & open to the public.