Thanks Mrs. Parks, without you, we would not be here!!

                                                              Black Student Union

Black History Fact

The Murder of Emmett Till

Emmett Louis Till (July 25, 1941 – August 28, 1955) was an African-American teenager from

 Chicago, Illinois who was brutally lynched in a region of Mississippi known as the Mississippi Delta near the

 small town of Drew in Sunflower County. His murder was one of the key events which energized the nascent

American Civil Rights Movement.   At about 2:30 AM on August 28, Roy Bryant and his half brother, J.W. Milam, kidnapped Till, once physically afflicted

by polio, from his uncle's house in the small cotton town of Money, Mississippi. He was driven away to a weathered plantation shed in neighboring

Sunflower County, where they brutally beat him, gouged out an eye, then shot him with a .45 caliber pistol before tying a seventy-five pound

cotton gin fan around Till's neck with barbed wire. This was to weigh down his body, which was dropped into the Tallahatchie River near Glendora,

another small cotton town.  A witness heard Till's screams for hours until the two men finally ended Emmett Till’s life. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

BSU News @  UI Front Page

UI BSU Schedules Memorial Commemoration of Rosa Parks 11/22/05

Rosa Parks, the "mother of the civil rights movement" was one of the most important citizens of the 20th century. Mrs. Parks was

 a seamstress in Montgomery, Alabama when, in December of 1955, she refused to give up her seat on a city bus to a white

passenger. The bus driver had her arrested. She was tried and convicted of violating a local ordinance. Her act sparked a citywide

 boycott of the bus system by blacks that lasted more than a year. The boycott raised an unknown clergyman named Martin

Luther King, Jr., to national prominence and resulted in the U.S. Supreme Court decision outlawing segregation on city buses. Over the next

four decades, she helped make her fellow Americans aware of the history of the civil rights struggle. This pioneer in the struggle for racial

equality was the recipient of innumerable honors, including the Martin Luther King Jr. Nonviolent Peace Prize and the Presidential Medal of

Freedom. Her example remains an inspiration to freedom-loving people everywhere. On Thursday, December 1, 2005 the UI BSU is hosting

a commemoration ceremony in her honor in the Commons food court.  Selected scenes from the PBS documentary "Eyes On the Prize" Episode 1

will be shown in addition to a historical narrative given by Dr. Sean Quinlan.

 BSU President Sherwin James Meets With Justice Alan C. Page

On October 20th, 2005, Sherwin James, the UI BSU President arranged with Dr. Donald Burnett (Dean of the College of Law)

a pre-lecture meeting with Justice Page to speak with the student athletes. In the discussion, Page discussed

the necessity and value of an education and a commitment to personal improvement. The student athletes felt that

the discussion was very inspirational and provided the motivational means to become better students and individuals.

Dr. Cornel West to Speak at Washington State University During MLK Celebration Activities.                                                                                             
Dr. Cornel West, one of America's most gifted and provocative public intellectuals will be speaking at WSU's MLK celebration on

February 10, 2006. Dr. West has won numerous awards, including the American Book Award, and has received more than 20

honorary degrees.   His work has been described as a “polemical weapon that attempts to transform linguistic, social, cultural,

and political tradition to increase the scope of individual development and democratic actions.” West’s writing, speaking, and

teaching weaves together the American traditions of the Baptist Church, transcendentalism, socialism, and pragmatism.  West’s best-selling book

Race Matters (1993), which has sold 400,000 copies, changed the course of America’s dialogue on race, justice, and democracy. His writings, along

with his frequent lecturing and preaching, has brought him widespread attention and honors. West’s first book, Prophesy Deliverance! (1982),

advocates a socially concerned African American Christianity that draws from Marxism. His American Evasion of Philosophy (1989) engages the

work of Ralph Waldo Emerson and the tradition of American pragmatism, especially the thought of John Dewey. Through the 1990s and into this

decade West has continued to produce a steady stream of authored and co-authored books for academics and for a more general audience,

including Breaking Bread (with bell hooks, 1991); Race Matters (1993); Jews and Blacks (with Michael Lerner, 1995 ); The Future of the Race

(with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., 1996); and The African-American Century: How Black Americans Have Shaped Our Century

(with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., 2000). His recent work also includes two important books he co-authored on public

 policy issues: The Future of American Progressivism (with Roberto Unger, 1998) and The War Against Parents (with Sylvia Ann Hewlett, 1998).

 sources: http://www.pragmatism.org/library/west/  ; http://www.apbspeakers.com               Go to page 2