RICHLAND – Societal changes started by Martin Luther King Jr., but left dormant until the election of President Barak Obama are the focus of a lecture Tuesday at WSU Tri-Cities.
“Martin Luther King’s Last Campaign and Unfinished Agenda in the Era of Obama” will be delivered by Michael Honey at 7 p.m. April 27 in the East Building Auditorium. As part of the Chancellor’s Lecture Series, co-sponsored by Battelle, the event is free and open to the public. It is preceded by a 6:30 p.m. meet-and-greet with Honey and followed by a book signing.
The lecture is based on Honey’s book, “Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike, King’s Last Campaign.” The book is available for purchase at the campus bookstore, The Bookie, which is open Monday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Tuesday from 10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.
“This is an opportunity to reflect on the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and the challenges that he posed to U.S. society through his campaigns for economic and social justice,” Honey said.
Honey teaches African-American and U.S. history, civil rights and labor studies and specializes in work on Martin Luther King Jr. He holds the Fred T. and Dorothy G. Haley Endowed Professorship in the Humanities at the University of Washington.
A former civil rights and civil liberties organizer in the 1970s, Honey’s talks are well known for taking a critical perspective on the past and present using narrative, images and song. He is an award-winning historian of the civil rights and labor movements and author of three prize-winning books: “Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike, Martin Luther King’s Last Campaign,” “Black Workers Remember: An Oral History of Segregation, Unionism and the Freedom Struggle” and “Southern Labor and Black Civil Rights: Organizing Memphis Workers.”
For more information on Honey, visit http://faculty.washington.edu/mhoney/ or contact him at mhoney@u.washington.edu.