Honors & Awards

Virginia State University Names Four Buildings to Honor Black Alumnae

Virginia State University has announced new names for four buildings on campus that will now honor Black alumnae. In March 2021, the university announced the removal of the names and signs identifying the four buildings saying the buildings were named for individuals whose past beliefs were not consistent with the beliefs and legacy of Virginia State University. 

Two Universities Bestow Honors on Civil Rights Icon James Lawson

Vanderbilt University in Nashville, which expelled Lawson in 1960 for his civil rights activities, will launch the James Lawson Institute for the Research and Study of Nonviolent Movements. The University of California, Los Angeles, where Lawson has taught for 20 years, is naming a historic building in his honor.

New Center Named for the Founder of Africana Studies at Washington and Lee University

Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia, will name a new interdisciplinary academic center for teaching and research on Southern race relations, culture, and politics in honor of late professor of history emeritus Theodore “Ted” Carter DeLaney Jr.

University of Pittsburgh Scholar Wins the Charles Horton Cooley Book Award

Waverly Duck, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Pittsburgh, received the Charles Horton Cooley Book Award from the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction. Dr. Duck was recognized for co-authoring the book Tacit Racism, which examines the many ways in which racism is coded into the everyday social interactions of Americans.

J. Herman Blake Wins the Distinguished Career Award from the American Sociology Association

J. Herman Blake, professor emeritus of sociology and founding provost of Oakes College at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and former president of Tougaloo College in Mississippi, was honored for his lifetime achievements in advancing the field of sociology through the positive impact of his work.

Professor Rebecca Wanzo of Washington University in St. Louis Has Won Two Book Awards

Rebecca Wanzo, professor and chair of women, gender, and sexuality studies in the College of Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has won two major awards in the field of comic book studies for her book The Content of Our Caricature: African American Comic Art and Political Belonging.

Ohio State’s Dorian Harrision Wins Award From the National Council of Teachers of English

Dr. Harrison's research focuses on issues of identity and power in literacy education, paying particular attention to how race, class, and language impact teaching and learning. She advocates for the need for culturally and linguistically diverse texts.

Marcia Chatelain of Georgetown University Is the 2020 Hooks National Book Award Winner

The Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change at the University of Memphis has named Marcia Chatelain, a professor of history and African American studies at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., as the 2020 Hooks National Book Award Winner for her book Franchise: The Golden Arches in Black America.

Vanderbilt University’s Clanitra Nejdl Honored by the American Association of Law Libraries

Clanitra Nejdl, head of professional development and research services librarian at the law school Vanderbilt University in Nashville, won the Emerging Leader Award and shared the Spectrum Article of the Year Award from the American Association of Law Libraries.

Yale School of Public Health Names a Scholarship After an African American Alumna

The executive master’s degree in public health scholarship at the Yale School of Public Health is being named in honor of Irene Trowell-Harris, the first African American woman in the history of the U.S. Air National Guard to be promoted to brigadier general and subsequently, in 1998, to two-star major general.

Virginia Commonwealth University’s First Novelist Award Given to Raven Leilani

Raven Leilani, who has served as an Axinn Foundation Writer-in-Residence at New York University, is the recipient of the 2021 Cabell First Novelist Award given by the creative writing program at Virginia Commonwealth University. The award, now in its 20th year, honors an outstanding debut novel published during the preceding calendar year.

Nashville’s Dixie Street Renamed to Honor a “Janitor” Who Pioneered Surgical Techniques

Vivien Thomas, who dropped out of college during the Great Depression, developed and refined a corrective cardiac surgical technique to treat “blue baby syndrome” at The Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1940s. Thomas did not receive due credit for the lifesaving advance for decades.

Two African American Faculty Members Win the Pulitzer Prize

Marcia Chatelain, a professor of history and African American studies at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., won the Pulitzer Prize in history and Mitchell S. Jackson, an assistant professor of English at the University of Chicago, was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for feature writing

Brittany Pearl Battle of Wake Forest University Honored by Sociologists for Women in Society

The Feminist Activism Award from the organization Sociologists for Women in Society was established in 1995. The award is presented annually to an SWS member who has notably and consistently used sociology to improve conditions for women in society.

Arkansas State University Honors Its First Black Faculty Member

The University of Arkansas System board of trustees has voted to rename the building housing the military science program as the Lieutenant Colonel Frederick C. Turner Jr. Military Science Building.

Thavolia Glymph Wins Three Awards From the Organization of American Historians

Thavolia Glymph, the Peabody Family Distinguished Professor of History at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, was honored with three awards for her book on the role of Black and White women during the Civil War.

Jessica Marie Johnson Honored for Her Book on Black Women in the Colonial Atlantic World

Jessica Marie Johnson, an assistant professor of history at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, has won the Kemper and Leila Williams Prize in Louisiana History. The honor is bestowed by The Historic New Orleans Collection and the Louisiana Historical Association.

Princeton University’s Nathan Alan Davis Wins Windham-Campbell Prize for Drama

Nathan Alan Davis, the Roger S. Berlind ’52 Playwright-in-Residence at the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University in New Jersey. Davis is an alumnus of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Indiana University Bloomington, and The Juilliard School.

James L. Moore III Honored by the American Council on Education

James L. Moore III, vice provost for diversity and inclusion and chief diversity officer at Ohio State University, has been awarded the 2021 Reginald Wilson Diversity Leadership Award. The award honors individuals who have demonstrated leadership and commitment on a national level to the advancement of racial and ethnic minorities in higher education.

Kaja Dunn Honored for Her Work Addressing Issues of Race in Theatre Education

Kaja Dunn, an assistant professor of theatre at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte received the Kennedy Center Medallion from the National Committee of the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival. The medallion is the organization's highest honor.
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