WFU summit to present urban culture expert

Michael E. Dyson, Avalon Professor in the Humanities in the department of religious and Africana studies at the University of Pennsylvania, will give the keynote address of the Wake Forest University Multicultural Male Summit on March 29. The free, public lecture titled “Identity: Who am I? … Why am I?” will be held at 8 p.m. at the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art on Marguerite Drive in Winston-Salem.

Honey magazine’s reigning “boy genius” of his generation, Dyson is a cultural critic, social analyst, media consultant, weekly newspaper columnist for The Chicago Sun-Times, a weekly radio commentator for National Public Radio’s “Tavis Smiley Show” and an ordained Baptist preacher as well as a professor.

Hailing from lower-income Detroit, Dyson turned his scholarly eye on urban black culture after receiving his doctorate from Princeton University. He is the author of such national best-sellers as “Making Malcolm: The Myth and Meaning of Malcolm X,” “I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr.,” “Holler if You Hear Me: Search for Tupac Shakur” and his most recent book, “Why I Love Black Women.”

The Wake Forest Multicultural Male Summit will bring more than 200 people — students and others — to Greene Hall and Carswell Hall on campus for workshops, forums and lectures on March 29. The theme of the summit is “Identity: Who am I? … Why am I?”

The summit will begin at 10 a.m. with a lecture titled “Developing the Leader Within,” delivered by Pedro Noguera of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. This lecture will be open only to summit participants.

Noguera’s research focuses on youth violence, race relations within schools, factors contributing to student achievement and secondary issues resulting from the desegregation of public schools. His latest book, “Confronting the Urban: How City Schools can Respond to Social Inequality,” was published by the Teachers College Press in January of this year.

The summit is sponsored by the Wake Forest Office of Multicultural Affairs. To register for the summit or to obtain more information on the events, contact the office at 336-758-5864. The registration deadline for the summit is March 28. Registration is free.

Categories: Arts & Culture, Events, Speakers