by Julianne Sun (BSJ24)
Northwestern’s African American Studies Department (AFAM) will be hosting and celebrating its 50th anniversary on May 20, 2022. The event will celebrate all that the department has achieved to date since its inception, as well as map out what they hope the next 50 years will look like. The anniversary celebration will be available both in-person at the Block Museum of Art and virtually over Zoom. Current students and faculty are welcome to attend, as well as alumni and anyone else who might be interested.
AFAM finds its roots in the Bursar’s Office Takeover in 1968, according to Northwestern’s commemorative web page of the historical event. Otherwise known as the May 4th Agreement, it marks the 38-hour peaceful occupation of the Bursar’s Office by 120 Black Northwestern students. The occupation protested the issues of racism Black students encountered on campus, but presented a list of demands for the university. These included increasing the percentage of Black students in the incoming student population, providing more and greater scholarships for Black students, designating separate living spaces for Black students, and creating a separate Black student union. The Black House on Sheridan is a direct result of the occupier’s efforts, and functions as the Black student union to this day.
“It is important to celebrate this 50-year milestone to give honor and respect to all of the people who did the work and made the sacrifices for us to exist today,” said Mary Pattillo, the Harold Washington Professor of Sociology and African American Studies and chair of AFAM, “and to celebrate the people who have been educated by this department over the years.” The research done by AFAM alumni – from law to medicine to journalism to education to social justice – is all encompassing, and AFAM’s overarching goal is to “address that research to the aims of Black liberation.”
Despite the progress made by the May 4th Agreement and AFAM’s 50 years of work, the goals expressed during the Bursar’s Office Takeover remain unchanged. AFAM faculty have published hundreds of scholarly books and academic articles challenging the boundaries of studying race, gender, sexuality, and culture, but they have also led and participated in countless struggles, from increasing Black enrollment and faculty to the anti-apartheid movement.
“Our impact on our students,” said Pattillo, “on Northwestern, on academic fields, and on Evanston and Chicago and beyond, will continue to be our work in the years to come.”
Raedell Boateng, a Northwestern alum who graduated from her undergrad in 2007 with a major in journalism and a minor in AFAM, said “My decision to minor in AFAM studies was 100 percent grounded in how much my Black femininity was not seen/valued and [that was] why the telling of our stories became very important to me during my undergrad. I found that the promoting of objectivity in journalism wasn’t going to work for me, but how to craft a story—the visuals, the words, the sources of information—is the most important thing I learned in Medill.”
Realizing in her senior year that she didn’t want to be a journalist, Boateng went on to become a teacher through Teaching for America, a nonprofit organization that trains teachers to expand opportunities for low-income students. She is now an educator and liberation life coach and uses Black women’s stories and experiences as a launching point across all of her work.
“I can’t imagine not being an educator,” she said, “and my experiences in Medill and AFAM studies play a huge role in how I approached teaching and in what I do now. I also entered into teaching wanting students to see the world through windows and mirrors—to value others and value who they are—and to understand how privilege creates barriers to holding such values, but literature, storytelling, and justice will help us overcome.”
Regarding this momentous anniversary, Pattillo said, “We decided to make this like a reunion and to celebrate the students who have come through the classrooms over the last half-century. Come to see old classmates. Come to see former professors. Come to see old colleagues. Come to find out what people have done since you last saw them. Come to see how strong the department is because of the people who make it up. Come to hear how African American Studies acts in the world to make it better.”
Registration for the in person anniversary can be found here, and the virtual event registration can be found here.
Juan C. Cappello’s work as a journalist and strategic communications executive has been recognized by professional and civic organizations in the U.S. and overseas. Early in his career, Cappello received the Inter American Press Association Award for Young Journalists. In the field of strategic communications, he was the senior vice president, corporate affairs/marketing for ITT Corporation for almost two decades – the first Latin-born top corporate officer at a U.S.-based Fortune 500 company. Before founding his own strategic communications consulting firm in 2009, Cappello was president and partner of Hill & Knowlton in Latin America. He has been recognized by nongovernmental organizations and international groups, and he has also received official decorations from the governments of Austria, France and Chile, after its return to democracy in the 1990s, for his participation in human rights and cultural initiatives.
Melissa Grady Dias was appointed global chief marketing officer of Cadillac in September 2019. As CMO, Grady Dias leads strategic marketing for the Cadillac brand around the world. Recently, Grady Dias was recognized by Forbes as one of “The 50 Most Influential CMOs in the World.” Prior to joining Cadillac, she was senior vice president of performance marketing, digital and e-commerce of Jackson Hewitt, where she was responsible for all demand driving activities including television and jacksonhewitt.com as well as the implementation of a hyper-local digital media program across several thousand locations. Before Jackson Hewitt, Grady Dias led digital acquisition on the global marketing team at MetLife where she led digital strategy for the U.S. market and acquisition programs for several lines of business, resulting in large year-over-year growth, and managed metrics plans and insights across all key global markets. Prior to MetLife, Grady Dias led the global analytics, e-commerce marketing, and CRM teams at Motorola.
Clinton Kelly co-hosted TLC’s wildly popular makeover show “What Not to Wear” for 10 years, and for seven he moderated ABC’s daytime talk show “The Chew,” for which he won an Emmy. He has also been regularly featured on HGTV and Food Network. A former magazine editor (Marie Claire, Mademoiselle and others) and freelance writer, Kelly has authored several books, including the critically acclaimed “I Hate Everyone, Except You,” a collection of humorous personal essays. In 2020 Kelly took a break from television to focus on his writing, working with personal styling clients and hosting regular Style Esteem workshops, through which he helps people evaluate their wardrobes to fine tune their nonverbal messaging.
Mike McGrew assumed the role of executive vice president, chief communications, CSR & diversity officer for Constellation Brands in April 2020. In this role, he leads a team responsible for developing and executing the company’s corporate communications, investor relations, corporate social responsibility, and diversity, equity and inclusion strategies designed to enhance the company’s reputation with key stakeholders and advance the company’s business strategy. Prior to joining Constellation Brands, McGrew held various roles with increasing responsibility at Grainger, then a $9B global provider of industrial supplies and equipment. Prior to joining Grainger, he worked in corporate communications for Alliant Foodservice (one of the nation’s largest, privately held broad-line foodservice distributors) and Morton International (a leading manufacturer of salt and specialty chemical products). McGrew received his bachelor’s degree in organizational studies from the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern.
Stephanie Mehta is CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures, the business media company that publishes Fast Company and Inc. She previously spent nearly four years as editor-in-chief of Fast Company, overseeing its print, digital and live journalism. Mehta has held senior writing and editing positions at Vanity Fair, Fortune, Bloomberg Media and The Wall Street Journal. She received a BA in English from Northwestern and her MSJ from Medill. A Chicago-area native, she now lives with her husband and two daughters in Scarsdale, New York.
Michael Paul Williams is a Pulitzer Prize-winning metro columnist whose opinion pieces appear on the Op-Ed page of the Richmond Times-Dispatch. In 2021, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary “for penetrating and historically insightful columns that guided Richmond, the former capital of the Confederacy, through the painful and complicated process of dismantling the city’s monuments to white supremacy.” Williams, a Richmond native, is a graduate of Virginia Union University and Medill. He won Virginia Press Association awards for column writing in 1992, 1994, 2007 and 2014. During 1999-2000, he was one of 24 U.S. and international journalists awarded a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard University.
