On this edition of In Black America, producer/host John L. Hanson Jr. speaks with Dr. Aldon Morris, Leon Forrest Professor of Sociology and African American Studies at Northwestern University, and author of ‘The Scholar Denied: W.E.B. Du Bois: The Birth of Modern Sociology.’
In his book, Morris looks at the birth of modern sociology and argues W.E.B. Du Bois'work is the founding of the discipline. Based on extensive, rigorous primary source research; the book is the result of a decade of research, writing, and revision.
In exposing the economic and political factors that marginalized the contributions of Du Bois and enabled Robert E. Park and his colleagues to be recognized as the “fathers” of the discipline, Morris delivers a wholly new narrative of American intellectual and social history that places one of America’s key intellectuals, W. E. B. Du Bois, at its center. In 1895, Du Bois became the first African American to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard University. He wrote extensively and was the best known spokesperson for African-American rights during the first half of the 20th century. In 1909, he co-founded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Du Bois died in Ghana on Aug. 27, 1963, on the eve of the civil rights march in Washington, D.C. He was 95.
