Tim Danube
associate director of the Nebraskan Student Union, 308.865.8523
Pam Smith and E. Ann Neel will present Entangled Lives: A Dialogue Between Descendants of Master and Slave at 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 12, in the Nebraskan Student Union Great Room on the University of Nebraska at Kearney campus.
Smith and Neel will speak of their startling discovery as Smith contacted Neel for assistance in researching her family history in Randolph County, Mo., in 1991. After two years of sharing ideas and resources, the two found that Smith’s great-great grandfather was enslaved and owned by a member of Neel’s family.
The presentation, which is a part of African American History Month observances on the campus, will explore the emotional and sociological implications of African slavery for black/white relations today. It ties a connection to all ethnic groups, and speaks of the painful and rewarding experience of creating a working relationship and
re-creating a friendship through this exceptional historical connection.
Smith is currently a communications consultant in Chicago, Ill. Before starting her own business in 1999, she worked as a public information manager for Rotary International, and for two years, worked on educational projects in Africa. While there, she visited slave ports in Ghana, Senegal and Benin, and has traveled extensively to heighten her understanding of African cultures. She also served as national communications director of the 1980 Jesse Jackson for President Campaign, based in Washington, D.C.
Teaching since 1975, Neel is professor emeritus of Comparative Sociology and Women Studies at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Wash. She received her Ph.D. in sociology from UC Berkeley, and has specialized in the areas of historical sociology of gender, race and class inequality in the Americas, deviance and social control, and in feminist research.
The program is sponsored by UNK Loper Programming Activities Council.
