Annual Two Icons Lecture

Wednesday, October 29, 2014
5 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.

Hawkins-Carlson Reading Room

Lecture

UR photo

"Framing Ferguson: Religious Faith, Righteous Feminists and Holy Fire"

This year we have the pleasure of hosting Jennifer Harvey, Associate Professor of Religion at Drake University to speak at the Two Icons Lecture, which is co-hosted by the Susan B. Anthony Institute for Gender and Women's Studies as well as by the Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African American Studies.

Framing Ferguson: Religious Faith, Righteous Feminists and Holy Fire

“Regardless of whether or not any one person may know what to do about segregation and oppression, it’s better to protest than to accept injustice.” –Rosa Parks (1971) 

Pictures coming out of Ferguson, Missouri in August 2014 were eerily similar to iconic images seared in our collective, national memory from the 1950s. What does that similarity show us? How should we understand Ferguson? Lesser known (and, perhaps, surprising) perspectives on the Civil Rights Movements—perspectives like those of Rosa Parks in the years well beyond her famous bus protest—may help us understand why Ferguson should have shocked none of us. More importantly, the chastening wisdom and powerful courage of religious faith and righteous feminists light the fires of our moral imagination so we can engage the most critical question: where do we go from here?