William Julius Wilson, the esteemed sociologist, was appointed to the Kluge Chair in American Law and Governance at the Library of Congress. Over the next four months, Professor Wilson will conduct research at the Kluge Center on theories he first put worth in his 1978 book, The Declining Significance of Race: Blacks and Changing American Institutions (University of Chicago Press, 1978).
Dr. Wilson is the Lewis P. and Linda L. Geyser University Professor at Harvard University. He is one of only 24 University Professors at Harvard. Professor Wilson joined the faculty at Harvard in 1996 after teaching for nearly a quarter century at the University of Chicago.
A past president of the American Sociological Association, Dr. Wilson’s latest book is More Than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City (W.W. Norton, 2009). He is a graduate of Wilberforce University and holds a master’s degree from Bowling Green State University, both in Ohio. Professor Wilson earned his Ph.D. at Washington State University.