By Brian Mcdermott
Associate Professor Kathy Roberts Forde served as the lead editor of Journalism and Jim Crow: White Supremacy and the Black Struggle for a New America, a new book scheduled to be published by the University of Illinois Press in November 2021.
Journalism and Jim Crow is the first extended work to examine the foundational role of the press at the critical turning point in U.S. history after Reconstruction. The book offers a bold reinterpretation of the role of the white press in building white supremacy in the South and the United States while documenting the struggle between two different journalisms — a white journalism dedicated to building an anti-Black, anti-democratic America and a Black journalism dedicated to building a multiracial, fully democratic "New America." The stakes could not have been higher: The future of liberal democracy in the newly restored United States was on the line.
Dr. Forde brought colleagues and students into her historical research. Senior Lecturer Razvan Sibii wrote a chapter, while UMass Rising Researcher award winner Bryan Bowman, class of 2018, co-authored a chapter with Forde. Ethan Bakuli and Natalie DiDomenico, now graduated, also offered research support.
Public scholarship and debate based on the upcoming book has been published in the Washington Post, The Conversation and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.