Toni Morrison

Robert F. Goheen Professor in the Humanities, Emerita

308 185 Nassau Street

609-258-1071

Professor Toni Morrison is recognized as one of the most influential writers in American literary history. She served on the faculty of the creative writing program and is the founder of the Princeton Atelier, which brings to campus renowned artists from all fields to collaborate with students on original performances, productions and exhibitions. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 1989 Pulitzer Prize for Beloved, the 1993 Nobel Prize for Literature and the 2000 National Humanities Medal.

Selected Publications:

• The Bluest Eye (1970);
• Sula (1974);
• Song of Solomon (1977);
• Tar Baby (1981);
• Beloved (1987);
• Jazz (1992);
• Playing in the Dark: Whiteness in the Literary Imagination (Harvard University Press, 1992);
• Paradise (1998);
• Love (2003).
• A Mercy (2008)
• Home (2012)

Nell Irvin Painter

Edwards Professor of American History, Emerita

Nell Irvin Painter is a leading historian of the United States. Until her recent retirement from teaching, she was the Edwards Professor of American History at Princeton University. She was the director of Princeton's Program in African American Studies from 1997 to 2000. In addition to her doctorate in history from Harvard University, she has received honorary doctorates from Wesleyan University, Dartmouth College, State University of New York-New Paltz and Yale University.

As a scholar, Professor Painter has published numerous books, articles, reviews and other essays. Her most recent books are Creating Black Americans and Southern History Across the Color Line. Six earlier books are also still in print.

Professor Painter's prominence has been recognized by her selection to be the president of the Southern Historical Association for 2007 and the president of the Organization of American Historians for 2007-08. The Southern Historical Association promotes research in the history of the United States' South. The Organization of American Historians, which draws its members from around the world, is the largest learned society devoted to the study of American history.

Professor Painter has also served on numerous editorial boards and as an officer of many other professional organizations, including the American Historical Association, the American Antiquarian Society, the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History and the Association of Black Women Historians. She is currently a councillor of the prestigious Society of American Historians. For a full list of her publications and professional activities, see her personal site. It includes links to the full text of some of her articles and reviews.

Howard Taylor
Ph.D., Yale University, 1966

Professor, Department of Sociology

147 Wallace Hall

609-258-4547
0756353@princeton.edu

Professor Howard Taylor has taught at Princeton since 1973. His teaching and research interests include social psychology, small groups, Afro-American studies, sociology of education and research methods. Professor Taylor is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 1998 Du Bois-Johnson-Fraizer Award from the American Sociology Association and the 2000 President's Award for Distinguished Teaching at Princeton. He has recently conducted research on African American leadership and elites, to be summarized in the forthcoming book The Black Elite Network in America. He is also at work on a book entitled Race, Class, and The Bell Curve in America.

Selected Publications:

• The IQ Game: A Methodological Inquiry into the Heredity-Environment Controversy (Rutgers University Press, 1980);
• Sociology: Understanding A Diverse Society (Wadsworth, 2000 (first ed), 2002 (second ed), 2004 (third ed).

Recent Courses Taught:

• AAS 391/SOC 391 - Race, Class, and Intelligence in America
• AAS 202/SOC 202 - Introductory Research Methods in African-American Studies
• SOC 241 - The Social Basis of Individual Behavior

Cornel West
Ph.D., Princeton University, 1980

Class of 1943 University Professor in the Center for African American Studies, Emeritus
www.cornelwest.com

Cornel West is a prominent and provocative democratic intellectual. He is the Class of 1943 University Professor at Princeton University. He graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard in three years and obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. in Philosophy at Princeton. He has taught at Union Theological Seminary, Yale, Harvard and the University of Paris. He has written 19 books and edited 13 books. He is best known for his classic Race Matters, Democracy Matters, and his new memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud.

He appears frequently on the Bill Maher Show, Colbert Report, CNN and C-Span as well as on his dear Brother, Tavis Smiley’s PBS TV Show. The Smiley and West radio show began October 1, 2010. He made his film debut in the Matrix – and was the commentator (with Ken Wilbur) on the official trilogy released in 2004. He also has appeared in over 25 documentaries and films including Examined Life,Call & Response, Sidewalk and Stand.

Last, he has made three spoken word albums including Never Forget, collaborating with Prince, Jill Scott, Andre 3000, Talib Kweli, KRS-One and the late Gerald Levert. His recent spoken word interludes were featured on Terence Blanchard’s Choices (which won the Grand Prix in France for the best Jazz Album of the year of 2009), The Cornel West Theory’s Second Rome and the Raheem DeVaughn’s Love & War: Masterpeace.

In short, Cornel West has a passion to communicate to a vast variety of publics in order to keep alive the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. – a legacy of telling the truth and bearing witness to love and justice.

Selected Publications:

• Prophesy Deliverance: An Afro-American Revolutionary Christianity (Westminster John Knox, 1982)
• Prophetic Fragments: Illuminations of the Crisis in American Religion and Culture (Eerdmans, 1988)
• The American Evasion of Philosophy: A Genealogy of Pragmatism (University of Wisconsin Press, 1989)
• The Ethical Dimensions of Marxist Thought (Monthly Review Press, 1991)
• Race Matters (Beacon, 1993)
• Keeping Faith (Routledge, 1994)
• The Future of the Race (Random House, 1997) (Henry Louis Gates Jr., co-author)
• The Cornel West Reader (Basic Civitas, 2000)
• Democracy Matters (Penguin Press, 2004)
• Hope on a Tightrope (SmileyBooks, 2008)
• Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud (SmileyBooks, 2009)

Recent Courses Taught:

• AAS/REL 369 - The Religious, Dimensions of Du Bois, Baldwin and Morrison
• REL 507 - Studies in Religion and Philosophy: Hegel and His Influence