History Makers
Event tonight will celebrate unsung African-American leaders
For every Martin Luther King, Jr. (GRS’55, Hon.’59), Billie Holiday, and Jackie Robinson, there are scores of lesser-known black leaders, entertainers, and sports figures who have made their mark on history. That’s the message of The Lives of Others: A Tribute to the Makers of Black History, a collection of song, dance, spoken word, and other performances that takes place tonight at 7:30 in the George Sherman Union Conference Auditorium. Admission is free.
“We wanted to put on a program in which students portray these unsung heroes from the worlds of music, cinema, dance, politics, science, writing, sports, and religion,” says Francesca Okolie (CAS’08), president of UMOJA, BU’s Black Student Union, which is hosting the event. “We wanted to put on a program that was fun, and we wanted it to have flow.”
Among the evening’s performances will be the dances of Josephine Baker, who toured the world in the 1920s and 1930s, the words of Edward Brooke (LAW’48,’50, Hon.’68), who in 1966 became the first African-American elected to the U.S. Senate since Reconstruction, and a presentation on hip-hop by Tyrone Porter, a College of Engineering assistant professor of aeronautical and mechanical engineering.
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