Teaching for Change and Busboys and Poets Bookstore welcome Shirley Sherrod to discuss and sign her new book ”\;The Courage to Ho pe: How I Stood Up to the Politics of Fear.”\; Sherrod will be interv iewed by Clarence Lusane\, Howard University alumnus and author of the boo k ”\;The Black History of the White House.”\;
\nIn the sum mer of 2010\, Shirley Sherrod was catapulted into a media storm that blew apart her life and her job doing what she had done for decades: helping po or\, hardworking people live the American dream. She was a lifelong activi st who served as Georgia’s first black director of rural development. A ri ght-wing blogger\, the now late Andrew Breitbart\, disseminated a video cl ip of a speech Sherrod had given to the Georgia NAACP\, intending to make her an example of “reverse racism.” The right-wing media ramped up the out rage\, and before Sherrod had a chance to defend herself\, the Obama admin istration demanded her resignation from her appointed position as Georgia State Director of Rural Development for the United States Department of Ag riculture. Then\, after hearing from Sherrod herself and learning the enti re truth of what she had said in that speech\, the administration tried to backtrack. As public officials and media professionals admitted to being duped and apologized for their rush to judgment\, Sherrod found herself th e subject of a teachable moment.
\n“\;The Courage to Hope” \; addresses this regrettable episode in American politics\, but it also t ells Sherrod’s own story of growing up on a farm in southwest Georgia duri ng the final violent years of Jim Crow. As a child\, she dreamed of leavin g the South\, but when her father was murdered by a white neighbor who was never brought to justice\, Sherrod made a vow to stay in Georgia and comm it herself to the cause of truth and racial healing. With her husband\, Ch arles\, a legend in the civil rights movement\, she has devoted her life t o empowering poor people and rural communities—Americans who are most in n eed.
\nFor information\, click here.
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