This spring, Blair Kelley, associate history professor at N.C . State, Tim Tyson, associate history professor at Duke University and author of Blood Done Sign My Name, and Mary Williams, acclaimed gospel singer, are collaborating on an off-campus course focused on southern black history. This will be the second time the three educators are collaborating for this course.
The course is called The South in Black and White (HI 498, Section 003) and is being held at the American Tobacco Campus in downtown Durham Tuesday evenings.
Kelley said the community atmosphere and the co-teaching method benefits students in that it broadens their experience and provides a view of southern history from different perspectives.
”It was really exciting for the students to sort of be in a different kind of environment. I think it was different for them to see two professors who didn’t always agree on issues and sort of hash out things in an active classroom. I think it was incredibly interesting for them to see Mary Williams, who sings the spirituals, the freedom songs, and so that the songs and the language of the movement through song becomes another text for the course,” Kelley said.
“It was really a great chance for us to work collaboratively, and really I think it’s an interesting racial dynamic to have a black woman and a white man teach the same kind of thing, and he’s a white southerner so he has a particular experience with this history,” Kelley said.
Cara Smelter, a senior in history, was enrolled in Kelley and Tyson’s class the last time it was offered. She discussed how the community affected her experience in the class.
”I believe one of the best aspects of the class is the sense of community that is created. Since people are coming from different universities and the local community, it makes for quite the lively experience. We all had different opinions and perspectives on race in the south, but the course had the ability to unify all of us under the umbrella of striving to understand our place in history,” Smelter said.
”The South in Black and White was by far the best and most unique class I have ever taken. Dr. Kelley and Dr. Tyson, along with Mrs. Mary Williams, are an amazing team, each bringing something different to the class. Mrs. Mary Williams teaches the spirituals and freedom songs, which I remember to this day. The songs created a sense of community in such a diverse class,” Liz Paul, a senior in history and previously enrolled student, said.
Above all, Kelley said the class aims to educate students on their own history so they can better understand the present. The course covers from before the civil rights movement, up through it, and even reaches modern day with issues on the Wake County School Board and immigrants in North Carolina.
”I think teaching students to think critically about the ways in which older scripts of oppression are being sort of recycled, reused and re-imagined against new communities doesn’t necessarily change what’s fundamentally wrong,” Kelley said.
Considering the recent vandalism on campus and that of the past, Kelley emphasized the importance of how a class like this can pertain to issues beyond what it covers.
“I think today’s civil rights questions have interesting tie-ins to the civil rights questions of the previous generations. We can look at ‘Don’t Ask Don’t Tell’ and the comparison between the segregation of the military with African-Americans. There are really important parallels that we learn from those types of struggles that have gone in other generations, and those lessons make the push for equity easier if we can be good students of the past,” Kelley said.
When questioned if the class will continue to be offered, Kelley said she hopes it will, but it depends on student interest in the course.
Derin Alabi , a senior in computer engineering, said the class sounded interesting, but she wasn’t sure if she would be able to take it.
“I would get really sad and probably very emotional during this class, and I don’t think I could subjugate myself to that, but I feel like for those who are willing to learn and understand our past and other people, I think it’s a very important class to have,” Alabi said.
In order to enroll in the class, students must contact Kelley. She said she encourages anyone interested to apply, regardless of major.
“I am interested in anyone who is serious from across campus, no matter what discipline they’re from,” Kelley said. “I’d like to bring as many people who are sincerely excited about it. I think it would be great for people in education, for people who would like to take a break from some science and engineering and do something really different, people who have read Tim Tyson’s book and would like a chance to hear from him and explore the meanings of that.”
