Saturday, December 11, 5pm – Non-Fiction
Thabiti Lewis author of Ballers of the New School: Racism and Sports in American Culture ($17.95 Third World Press)
Thabiti Lewis teaches English and Black Studies at Washington State University Vancouver. The former editor, radio show host, columnist, and freelance writer for The Source. The St. Louis American and News One lectures on topics ranging from images of African Americans in popular culture (sports and hip hop) to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the responsibility of youth. His forthcoming book Ballers of the New School: Race and Sports in America challenges to alter the landscape of race and sport culture.
Thabiti Lewis is an emerging, fresh, studied voice. Dr. Lewis has been sought to do lecture[s] at Vancouver University, Princeton University, University of Virginia, Lenoir-Rhyne, Evergreen State University, and Northern Arizona University, among others. He has served as a community member on the editorial board of The Statesman Journal newspaper. His work has also appeared in anthologies, journals, and newspapers such as Mosaic Literary Magazine, Oregon Humanities, and The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, AmeriQuests and book chapters.
In addition to teaching courses about African American literature and culture he teaches courses on hip-hop and film, black masculinity, and race and sport in America.
Dr. Lewis’s forthcoming book, Ballers of the New School: Race and Sports in America challenges the notion that sports culture has been a pioneer for racial progress. He contends that American sport has not contributed to racial progress as much as it is mythologized to have done. This is more media spin than truth, he contends; a figment of imagination aided by a modern technology armed with 24hour sports reporting, unlimited sports television channels, and a culture that cultivates anti-intellectualism.
