We're excited to welcome acclaimed writer Dr. Ibram X. Kendi to the Freedom Center as part of the Mercantile Library’s Harriet Beecher Stowe Freedom Writer series. Dr. Kendi is a leading scholar and voice on antiracism, earning accolades for his books Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, How to Be an Antiracist and Antiracist Baby.
Dr. Kendi will be in conversation with Professor Emily Houh to discuss his work and his research, the state of equity and the scourge of racism in America and advice for advocates seeking to make the country a place where all can be free.
The Harriet Beecher Stowe Freedom Writer Award series, begun in 2003, honors Stowe, who spoke at the Mercantile Library in 1873. Dr. Kendi received the Harriet Beecher Stowe Freedom Writer Award in 2020 because of his commitment to “writing to change the world.”
Signed copies of Dr. Kendi's books will be available for purchase.
This program is SOLD OUT and on a wait list. Please email info@mercantilelibrary.com to be placed on the wait list.
Presented by Greater Cincinnati Foundation and Karen Smith & Paul De Marco.
Dr. Kendi is the director and founder of The Center for Anti-Racist Research at Boston University and a National Book Award-winning and #1 New York Times bestselling author of five books for adults and three books for children.
Among Dr. Kendi’s long list of accolades include the W.E.B. Du Bois Book Prize for The Black Campus Movement and the 2016 National Book Award for Nonfiction for Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. Among his New York Times bestsellers are How to Be an Antiracist and Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019, co-edited with Keisha Blain. He has been a visiting professor at Brown University, a National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellow and postdoctoral fellow at the Rutgers Center for Historical Analysis. Dr. Kendi was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2019 and a 2021 MacArthur Fellowship, popularly known as the “Genius Grant.” In 2021, he was elected to the Society of American Historians. His next two books, How to Raise an Antiracist and Goodnight Racism, a picture book, will be released June 14, 2022.
Professor Emily Houh is the Gustavus Henry Wald Professor of the Law and Contracts at the University of Cincinnati College of Law. She has been teaching contracts, commercial law and critical race theory and race and the law since 2000, winning the Goldman Prize for Excellence in Teaching five times. In 2010, Houh co-founded Cincinnati Law’s Nathaniel R. Jones Center for Race, Gender, and Social Justice with colleagues Verna Williams and Kristen Kalsem.