King to Speak on Black Americans for Democracy Thursday

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Whitney King

Whitney King, a recent graduate of the U of A's Master of Arts program in journalism, will discuss her research into the Black Americans for Democracy at 5:30 p.m., Thursday, March 3, as part of the Graduate Student Speaker Series, a collaborative initiative between the University Libraries Special Collections Division and the Graduate School and International Education. The talk will be held in the Special Collections reading room, located on level 1 of Mullins Library, and a recording of the event will be sent to all who register. 

The Black Americans for Democracy was a student organization at the U of A that was active in the 1960s and '70s and a precursor to today's Black Student Association. The University Libraries Special Collections Division is home to the Black Americans for Democracy Materials (MC 1915.UA), which contains issues of the organization's newspaper, the BAD Times. The libraries offer access to 20 digitized issues of the newspaper in the BAD Times digital collection, which is available to users worldwide at no cost.  

In 2021, King received a national journalism award for her work reporting on homeless felons in Northwest Arkansas. That same year, she worked on oral and visual histories for the Pryor Center and started her own production company. 

"Moving forward, I plan to continue working on projects that highlight minorities and people from the Northwest Arkansas region," she said. 

The Graduate Student Speaker Series affords graduate students the opportunity to present research or creative work they have done using materials from Special Collections and get feedback from the community as they continue their professional development. Graduate students from all disciplines are welcome to apply.