Back to Institute Archive" Distinguished Expert on Black Family Life to Speak at USF"
One of the nation's leading experts on African American culture will be the featured speaker as part of the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute's Black Heritage Celebration.
Author and scholar, Dr. Andrew Billingsley, will speak at 2:00 p.m. on February 10, 2000 at the University of South Florida's College of Public Health Auditorium. The topic of his lecture will be "Hope and History: The Black Church and Social Reform." Following the lecture, Dr. Billingsley will be available to sign copies of his most recent book, Mighty Like a River: The Black Church and Social Reform.
Dr. Billingsley is a professor in the Department of Sociology, the Institute for Families in Society and the African American Studies Program all at the University of South Carolina. He is emeritus Professor of Family Studies at the University of Maryland and Visiting Scholar-in-Residence at Benedict College. He was also a Fulbright Fellow in the Department of Sociology at the University of Ghana in 1997-98.
In addition to his most recent book, Dr. Billingsley authored five other books and more than 250 professional papers. In Mighty Like a River, the author looks at the role the black church has played in addressing social, economic, and political issues within the black community and society. His previous books include Climbing Jacob's Ladder, Black Families in White America, and Children of the Storm.
Dr. Billingsley was educated at Hampton University in Virginia and Grinnell College in Iowa where he earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science. He later earned a Master of Social Work Degree at Boston University, a Master of Arts in Sociology at the University of Michigan, and a Ph.D. in Social Policy and Social Research at the Florence Heller School of Brandeis University.
The event, sponsored by the de la Parte Institute, the USF Collaborative for Children, Families and Communities, and the Institute on Black Life, is free and open to the public.