“Black Classicism in the United States” by Michele Valerie Ronnick

Michele Valerie Ronnick is a Professor at the Department of Classical and Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, Wayne State University, and Curator of the exhibition ’14 Black Classicists’ which will be on at the ADA Museum and the UCSB Library from Jan 14^th to April 30^th.

For many years only well-born Americans had access to a classically–based liberal arts education. But after the Civil War newly freed slaves aspired to the same. Thus arose black classicists who studied and taught Greek and Latin successfully in an era when few believed that black people could or should.

Sponsored by the Art, Design and Architecture Museum, the Argyropoulos Endowment for Hellenic Studies, and the Departments of Black Studies and Classics.