Created Equal Film Lectures to Address Americas Civil Rights History

To commemorate and educate about the history of civil rights in America, The University of Southern Mississippi Gulf Park campus will host “Created Equal: America's Civil Rights Struggle,” which will feature three different discussions and their accompanying documentary films. Each discussion will be held from 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. and follow with the film at 6 p.m.

The film lectures will begin with “The Loving Story,” on Monday, Feb. 10, which asks the question, “How hard would you fight for love?” Dr. Emily Clark, professor of history at Tulane University, will lead the film discussion and also present her new book, “The Strange History of the American Quadroon: Free Women of Color in the Revolutionary Atlantic World.”

The second of the film lectures will be held Wednesday, Feb. 12, and feature the film, “Slavery by Another Name.” The film will address whether slavery actually ended after the Civil War. Dr. Kern Jackson, associate professor of English at the University of South Alabama, will first discuss segregated Mardi Gras rituals and festivals in Mobile.

The final film lecture to be held Thursday, Feb. 20 will feature Dr. James Pat Smith, professor of history at Southern Miss Gulf Coast, as he compares the violence endured by Freedom Riders in 1961 to that of the Biloxi Beach Wade-In riot in 1963. The film lectures will conclude with the film, “The Freedom Riders.”

The Created Equal film set is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as part of its Bridging Cultures initiative, in partnership with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. Southern Miss Gulf Coast is one of 473 institutions across the country awarded the set of films chronicling the history of the civil rights movement.

All events will be held in the library room 204 on the Gulf Park campus in Long Beach. For more information about the Created Equal Film Lectures, visit www.usm.edu/gulfcoast/exhibits.