The Bob Graham Center for Public Service provides a wide variety of programs for students and the larger public on topics related to public service, public leadership and civic engagement.
- This event has passed.
The Time is Now! MLK and Democratic Stewardship
January 12, 2023 @ 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm
Dr. Randal Maurice Jelks, author of Letters to Martin: Meditations on Democracy in Black America, spoke at the Graham Center on January 12, 2023 in the Pugh Hall Ocora.
View photographs of the event at the Bob Graham Center Flickr.
View a recording of the event on the Bob Graham Center YouTube.
In celebration of Martin Luther King Day, Dr. Jelks discussed how black citizens throughout U.S. history have been the country’s most avid supporters and protectors of democracy when resisting oligarchical forms of leadership and power. Dr. Jelks also examined the reflections and meditations outlined in his book through the Civil Rights Movement that King initiated, and progress made.
This program was presented in partnership with the University’s African American Studies Program, Bob Graham Center for Public Service, Office of Black Student Engagement in the Center for Inclusion & Multicultural Engagement, Chief Diversity Officer, Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, Department of History, and College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Associate Dean of Equity and Inclusion.
This in-person program was free and open to the public.
An alternate livestream was provided.
About the Speaker
Randal Maurice Jelks is an author, documentary film producer and a professor at the University of Kansas. He is the author of four books. His latest book is Letters to Martin: Meditations on Democracy in Black America . He is also a contributor to the Boston Review, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and Truthout as well as national blogs, journals, magazine and newspapers.