Located in western Massachusetts, UMass Amherst is the flagship campus of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' five-campus University of Massachusetts system. UMass Amherst is a nationally recognized teaching and research institution with a current enrollment of about 28,500 students.

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Advancing Democracy: African Americans and the Struggle for Access and Equity in Higher Education in Texas

Amilcar Shabazz has been a prominent voice in the movement to make reparations to descendants of former enslaved Americans. As a scholar, his work focuses on the political economy of social and cultural movements, education, and public policy.  

His book Advancing Democracy: African Americans and the Struggle for Access and Equity in Higher Education in Texas was the winner of the T.R. Fehrenbach Book Award and other scholarly recognitions. 

He was also a major proponent behind making Juneteenth a state holiday in Massachusetts.

Reparations for Slavery

Juneteenth

African American Educational History and Public Policy

Afro-Americans in the Caribbean, Central and South America

African American Biography

Reparations

UMass Amherst Faculty Profile

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Google Scholar Citations

Dec. 17, 2024: Getting the gang together

amilcar shabazz

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Slavery reparations in Amherst Massachusetts could include funding for youth programs and housing

Who should be eligible for reparations? That's the big question in Amherst

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Black American Heritage flag-raising ceremony in Springfield

Professor and Undergraduate Program Director, W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies

This Saturday marks the celebration of Juneteenth, short for June 19th. Juneteenth commemorates the announcement of the abolition of slavery in the state of Texas in 1865, and by extension the end of slavery in America.

In honor of that, we bring you this digital extra that takes a look at the history behind the holiday, as told by UMass Amherst Professor of Afro American Studies Amilcar Shabazz.

History of Juneteenth with Prof. Amilcar Shabazz | Connecting Point | Digital Exclusive

In this episode, our moderator, Anotida Chikumbu sits with Amilcar Shabazz, a professor of history and Africana Studies in the W. E. B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies since 2007, Shabazz served as the department’s seventh chair from 2007 to 2012. From 2013 to 2016, he was the Faculty Advisor to the Chancellor for Diversity and Excellence, and, since 2016, he has acted as the department's chair for an interim term. He continues to teach in the department with an emphasis on the political economy of social and cultural movements, education, and public policy. His book Advancing Democracy: African Americans and the Struggle for Access and Equity in Higher Education in Texas was the winner of the T.R. Fehrenbach Book Award and other scholarly recognitions. The Forty Acres Documents, a volume he co-edited with Imari Obadele and Johnita Scott Obadele and for which he wrote the introduction, was one of the earliest scholarly works in the modern movement for reparations for slavery and the racial oppression of people of African descent in North America. Shabazz has been a Fulbright Senior Specialist and has done work in Brazil, Ghana, Japan, Cuba, and other countries. Presently, he is completing an historical biography of lawyer-journalist-entrepreneur Carter Wesley, among other projects. Shabazz was selected for the 2014-15 class of the American Council on Education Fellows Program, the longest running leadership development program in the United States that focuses on identifying and preparing the next generation of senior leadership for the nation's universities.

Born in Beaumont, Texas, Shabazz graduated from Monsignor Kelly High School, followed by his earning a bachelor’s degree in economics from The University of Texas at Austin, a masters from Lamar University, and a Ph.D. from the University of Houston, both in history. He was an associate professor of History and Director of the American Studies Program at Oklahoma State University, as well as the founding director of its Center for Africana Studies & Development. Prior to that he served as the first director of the African American Studies Program at The University of Alabama while also becoming a tenured professor of American Studies. In 2014, and again in 2016, Shabazz was elected for a two-year term as Vice President of The National Council for Black Studies, the premier organization of Black Studies professionals in the world.

Reparations for Black Americans: Who Gets What, When and How? (Part 1 with Amilcar Shabazz)

Episode 23 of Human Rights and Justice features a timely conversation with Professor Amilcar Shabazz and host Nkechi Taifa, illuminating issues including the Florida DeSantis and College Board AP issue, banning books, reparations, and his long history in the Movement. Shabazz is Professor and Graduate Program Director in the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies at the University of Massachusetts, and the co-editor along with Dr. Imari Obadele of the Forty Acres Documents. Dr. Shabazz is also a member of the Town of Amherst's African Heritage Reparations Assembly.


recorded 2-8-23

Episode 23:  "Black Studies, A.P. classes, Reparations, &amp; more, with Dr. Amilcar Shabazz"

Dr. Shabazz speaks on the history of the Memorial Tablets that commemorated the service and sacrifice of men from Amherst who served as soldiers and sailors in the Civil War. These were the people who paid the ultimate price to make possible Juneteenth (the end of chattel enslavement of people of African descent in the U.S.)! Dr. Shabazz connects the history of Juneteenth to the struggle to remember the Civil War as a common fight for freedom and to form a “more perfect union.”

The lecture weaves the lives of men like Josiah Hasbrook Jr. in Amherst with
individuals like Frederick Douglass who was the keynote speaker at the 31st anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation on September 24, 1894, in Alexandria, Va. to John Mercer Langston who delivered keynote speeches there in 1895 and 1897. Alexandria like Amherst has in recent decades settled on celebrating Juneteenth as the date to commemorate the ending of chattel slavery. Dr. Shabazz answers why Juneteenth has become that special date across the country interweaving the remembrance of our veterans and the memory of the war and black liberation with the struggle right here, right now with the Memorial Tablets.

History Bites: Juneteenth feat. Dr. Amilcar Shabazz

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