Did you learn much about African-American pioneers in social work and social welfare in your social work education? Clearly, with our nation's first African-American President and his historic achievements, we'd like to honor others who have accomplished much in their lives and work.
Before social work became an established profession, there were many African-American women - especially Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth - who used social work principles in their lives. Lugenia Burns Hope (1871-1947) dedicated her life to community work in the south, working through a network of African American women's clubs, creating self-help models to address poverty, unemployment, and illness. She also helped create the first African American School of Social work, now known as the Whitney M. Young, Jr. School of Social Work.(http://www.naswdc.org/diversity/black_history/2005/hope.asp).
And, of course, W.E.B. Dubois worked with Jane Addams and others to found the NAACP? We invite you to add to the list here - and highlight the work of distinguished African-American social workers who have left their mark?
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I'm extremely impressed by the work of Dr. Fred Ssewamala. He is a pioneer in international social work and researches the feasibility of economic empowerment programs in poor African communities. He also teaches at Columbia University School of Social Work, and students are able to travel with him to carry out his research- http://www.columbia.edu/cu/ssw/faculty/profiles/ssewamala.html
Dorothy Height stands out as social worker extraordinare, maybe not in her formal education but certainly in her activism, organizing and advocacy work. The YWCA, an organization she helped to draft the mission statement for says in part, "to thrust our collective energy towards the elimination of racism, wherever it exists and by any means necessary"..pretty radical for the time and a clarion call for the ages.
I've always had a soft spot for Fred Hampton. He organized kids with the NAACP, was the well-loved chairman of the Illinois Black Panthers, and spent his short time on Earth quelling gang violence, forging a "rainbow coalition" (popularized by Jesse Jackson), and instituting free breakfast programs, among other things.
But he talked about class-based revolution, so J. Edgar Hoover declared the Black Panthers the foremost internal security threat to the U.S. and Hampton was murdered in his sleep in 1969 at the age of 21 by Chicago police in conjunction with the FBI. Social work can be dangerous!
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