African American historian Bernice Johnson Reagon to deliver Syracuse University’s 17th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Public Affairs Lecture

African American historian Bernice Johnson Reagon to deliver Syracuse University’s 17th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Public Affairs LectureJanuary 29, 2002Kelly Homan Rodoskikahoman@syr.edu

Prominent African American historian Bernice Johnson Reagon will deliver the 17th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Public Affairs Lecture Feb. 7 as part of Syracuse University’s Black History Month celebration. The lecture, sponsored by the Department of African American Studies in The College of Arts and Sciences, will take place at 7 p.m. in Shemin Auditorium, located in the Shaffer Art Building. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Reagon, Distinguished Professor of History at American University and curator emerita at the Smithsonian Institution, will speak on “Everybody Sing Freedom: Contemporary Notes From the Journal of a Freedom Singer.”

Reagon is a specialist in African American oral, performance and protest traditions. She performs and is artistic director of Sweet Honey in the Rock, the world-renowned a capella ensemble she founded in 1973.

She has served as a music consultant, composer and performer for several award winning film and video projects. She was the principal scholar, conceptual producer and host of the Peabody Award-winning Smithsonian Institution and National Public Radio series “Wade In The Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions,” which began broadcasting in 1994.

A reception and book signing will follow in the Shaffer Galleria at 8:30 p.m.