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The American Democratic Tradition & The Quest For Access & Equity In Higher Education: The Browns And Blues Of Social Change, Amilcar Shabazz

Afro-American Studies Faculty Publication Series

In this lecture I revisit the meaning of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision and the legal and social struggles that led to the ruling and its consequences especially in the area of higher educational opportunity. I develop the idea of the American Democratic Tradition not as a fossilized ideal but as a contested terrain. The Brown decision and the blues of social change as a protracted, continuous process of struggle is the moment I am trying to render here in this lecture.

The Cornell Law Review invited me to participate in its 2004 Symposium, particularly Panel One …