James D. Anderson,  University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

 September 2014

At AERA’s 2014 Brown Lecture in Education Research on October 23, Dr. James D. Anderson, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and noted expert on American education history and desegregation, will examine how landmark moments in the American struggle for political and education equality—including the Brown v. Board decision 60 years ago—continue to cast a long shadow over American social justice today.

This year’s Brown Lecture, titled “A Long Shadow: The American Pursuit of Political Justice and Education Equality,” will take place on October 23 at 6:00 p.m., at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, D.C.

The lecture is open to the public and also will be live-streamed online. To RSVP, visit the AERA website.

Anderson’s address will focus on the relationship between political justice and education equality since the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865: the alternative paths toward political justice that gripped the Reconstruction Congress; the five school-desegregation cases combined into Brown in 1954; the Civil Rights Act of 1964; the Voting Rights Act of 1965; and, finally, the current controversies over immigration and voter identification laws.

Anderson’s impressive body of scholarship focuses broadly on the history of U.S. education, with specializations in the history of African American education in the South, the history of higher education desegregation, the history of public school desegregation, and the history of African American school achievement in the 20th century. His book, The Education of Blacks in the South, 1860-1935, won the AERA outstanding book award in 1990. Anderson is senior editor of History of Education Quarterly.

At the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Anderson is the Edward William and Jane Marr Gutsgell Professor of Education; the head of the Department of Education Policy, Organization, and Leadership; the Executive Associate Dean for the College of Education; and affiliate Professor of History.

Anderson has served as an expert witness in a series of federal desegregation and affirmative action cases, including Jenkins v. Missouri, Knight v. Alabama, Ayers v. Mississippi, Gratz v. Bollinger, Grutter v. Bollinger.

The Brown Lecture—now in its 11th year—was inaugurated by AERA in 2004 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision, in which the U.S. Supreme Court took scientific research into account in issuing its landmark ruling. Each year a distinguished scholar notable for producing significant research related to equality in education is invited to give this public lecture in Washington, D.C.

This year’s Brown Lecture Selection Committee included 2014 AERA President Barbara Schneider, Michigan State University; 2015 AERA President Joyce E. King, Georgia State University; AERA Executive Director Felice J. Levine; AERA Director of Social Justice and Professional Development George L. Wimberly; AERA Social Justice Action Committee (SJAC) Chair Estela Bensimon, University of Southern California; and two additional SJAC members, Thandeka Chapman, University of California—San Diego; and Django Paris, Michigan State University.