Educator Book Club
This book club is a professional development series for educators. Though educators will be engaging with the book and participating in discussions and activities, the purpose is to ensure that participants are able to takeaway strategies to use each text in educational spaces with their students.
Goals for This Book Club
- Learn about, interact with, and commit to teaching the Black Historical Consciousness Principles (Power, Oppression, & Anti-Blackness, Agency, Resistance, & Justice, Africa & the African Diaspora, Black Emotionality, Black Identities, Historical Contention, Community, Local, & Social Histories, and Black Futurism).
- Create a collection of resources and layered texts to pair with each book.
- Engage in critical discussions and inquiry with other educators.
- Build a community of educators to connect with and support within and outside of the book club.
- Acknowledge that we too can learn Black histories through texts written for our students.
Title: The Three Mothers: How The Mothers of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and James Baldwin Shaped a Nation
Author: Anna Malaika Tubbs
Facilitator: Daphanie Bibbs
Time: All sessions will be held from 10-11 a.m. ET by Zoom.
Dates: Jan. 25, Feb. 1, Feb. 8, Feb. 15
Abstract: Berdis Baldwin, Alberta King, and Louise Little were all born at the beginning of the 20th century and forced to contend with the prejudices of Jim Crow as Black women. These three extraordinary women passed their knowledge to their children with the hope of helping them to survive in a society that would deny their humanity from the very beginning―from Louise teaching her children about their activist roots, to Berdis encouraging James to express himself through writing, to Alberta basing all of her lessons in faith and social justice. These women used their strength and motherhood to push their children toward greatness, all with a conviction that every human being deserves dignity and respect despite the rampant discrimination they faced.
These three mothers taught resistance and a fundamental belief in the worth of Black people to their sons, even when these beliefs flew in the face of America’s racist practices and led to ramifications for all three families’ safety. The fight for equal justice and dignity came above all else for the three mothers.
These women, their similarities and differences, as individuals and as mothers, represent a piece of history left untold and a celebration of Black motherhood long overdue.
