Other Lectures

The Annual Dr. Bertha Maxwell-Roddey Distinguished Africana Lecture

The Africana Studies Department at UNC Charlotte inaugurated The Annual Dr. Bertha Maxwell-Roddey Distinguished Africana Lecture in 2008 to honor Dr. Bertha Maxwell-Roddey’s pioneering contributions to the development of Africana Studies as an academic discipline at UNC Charlotte. Dr. Maxwell-Roddey was the first chair of the then African-American and African Studies Department which began at UNC Charlotte in 1969.

The annual Maxwell-Roddey Lecture fulfills the vision of the UNC Tomorrow on University Outreach and Engagement. The lecture is envisioned as an annual intellectual and social forum to engage with and connect to the Charlotte region’s diverse populations by facilitating the communication and translation of research, scholarship, and original ideas on the African Diaspora to a broad audience.

Recent Speakers

2016 Speaker: Dr. Bernard E. Powers, Professor of History, College of Charleston, On Jordan’s Stormy Banks: Racial Violence and the Quest for Home in America.

2015 Speaker: Dr. Paul Zeleza, Vice-Chancellor of the United States International University Africa (Kenya), Africa Rising: The Role of Higher Education and the Diaspora.

2014 Speaker: Dr. Yele Aluko, Senior Vice President at Novant Health, and Medical Director of the Novant Health and Heart Vascular Institute, North Carolina’s Rejection of Medicaid Expansion: Politicizing the Health of Our Society

2013 Speaker: Dr. Charles V. Willie, The Charles W. Elliot Professor of Education Emeritus at Harvard University, African American Families in the Twenty-first Century.

2012 Speaker: Dr. J. Lorand Matory, The Lawrence Richardson Professor of Cultural Anthropology, Global Migrations and the Crisis of Identity in Black America.

2011 Speaker: Honorable Terry Bellamy, Mayor of the City of Ashville (NC), Youth Empowerment: Structure for Developing Tomorrow’s Workforce.

2010 Speaker: Dr. Ronald L. Carter, President of Johnson C. Smith University, Avoiding the Perfect Storm: A Vision of Excellence in the Emerging New Majority

2009 Speaker: Mr. James Ferguson III, President of Ferguson, Chambers & Sumter, The Future of Charlotte as a Global City: The Black Dimensions.

For more information, email: oshands@uncc.edu