Two upcoming conferences.
Lynda e-mails about NOW's conference in Nashville, July 1-3, and two announced speakers Dolores Huerta and Sara Paretsky:
Dolores Huerta is one the century's most powerful and respected labor movement leaders. Huerta left teaching and co-founded the United Farm Workers with Cesar Chavez in 1962: "I quit because I couldn't stand seeing kids come to class hungry and needing shoes. I thought I could do more by organizing farm workers than by trying to teach their hungry children." The mother of 11 children, Ms. Huerta has played a major role in the American civil rights movement.
Using tactics of non-violence, she organized a successful boycott of California table grapes that lasted five years but resulted in the entire California table grape industry signing a three-year collective bargaining agreement with the UFW, and launched UFW into a period of fast-paced organizing, with Ms. Huerta negotiating contracts with growers, lobbying, organizing strikes and boycotts and well as spearheading farm worker political activities.
[. . .]
When Sara Paretsky introduced her private detective V.I. Warshawski in Indemnity Only in 1982, she revolutionized the mystery world. By creating a female investigator who uses her wits as well as her fists, Paretsky challenged a genre in which women traditionally were either vamps or victims. Hailed both by critics and readers, Indemnity Only was followed by ten more best-selling Warshawski novels. The Los Angeles Times says, "Paretsky is unique among the women writing about women," while Publishers Weekly claims, "Among today's P.I.'s, nobody comes close to Warshawski."
Paretsky's deep-rooted concern for social justice, the hallmark of her novels, has carried her voice beyond the world of crime fiction. As a frequent contributor to the New York Times and The Guardian, and a speaker at such places as the Library of Congress and Oxford University, she is an impassioned advocate for those on society's margins.
Gina e-mails to note the NAACP has their annual convention in July as well, July 9-14, in Milwaukee. I'm not seeing any other information on it at the web site (Gina, let me know if I missed it -- wouldn't be the first time).
But I do see information on this month's Leadership 500 Summit:
On May 26-29, 2005, the NAACP will host the Leadership 500 Summit at the Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort in Destin, Florida. The theme for the Summit is "Reaching in and Pulling Back." As the NAACP approaches its 100th Anniversary in 2009, we are gratified to record a steady and welcome membership growth among African-Americans of high school and college age, yet find a considerable gap in participation from those in the age cohort 35 - 45. Public opinion polls report the NAACP remains high in the estimation of African-Americans across all age ranges and is consistently rated the organization most trusted to carry on the battles for justice and fairness.
The Summit is the creation of NAACP Vice Chairman Roslyn Brock and is designed to attract professionals and entrepreneurs between 30-50 years old in the areas of health, religion, politics, law, media, entertainment, economic development and education to help shape the future direction of social justice advocacy efforts in our nation. An agenda has been planned to include a series of speeches, workshops, and plenary sessions as well as a Black Film Screening, Leadership Gala, Golf Tournament and Spa Treatments.
While we're noting the NAACP, we'll note "NAACP Mourns Death of Kenneth B. Clark, Psychologist and Educator Who Helped End School Segregation:"
The NAACP mourns the passing of Dr. Kenneth B. Clark, whose groundbreaking studies of African American children in the south influenced the U.S. Supreme Court to rule that school segregation was unconstitutional. Clark died yesterday at his home in Hastings-on-the Hudson, N.Y.
NAACP Interim President and CEO Dennis Courtland Hayes said: “Dr. Clark made a monumental contribution to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision that has proven so important in this country. His research has been key to the understanding by African Americans that we are all created equal in the eyes of God and to value our heritage.”Clark’s research verified the damaging effect of racial segregation to black school children in the early 1950’s. This testimony was used by attorney Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP to challenge the constitutionality of the separate-but-equal doctrine that violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
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