The Mississippi Link celebrates Women’s History Month with a four-part series honoring the achievements and stories of 12 extraordinary black women in the areas of history, education, medicine and religion.
Each week we will share the accomplishments of a woman currently making strides in her field who will share information on a “shero” – a woman who paved the way for her success – as well as an up and coming younger woman.
The achievements of women were officially recognized in the United States when Women’s History Week was celebrated beginning March 7, 1982. In 1987, the National Women’s History project sought a designation for the entire month of March to honor women. Congress granted the designation, and the first Women’s History Month was recognized in 1987.
History is the category of part one of this series. In this category Daphne Chamberlain Wilson, Ph.D., of Tougaloo College is featured. She has chosen Jean Diane Kelly Chamberlain, Ph.D., as her “shero” and Hilary Micah Word as a future star in the industry.
By Judy Willis
Special to The Mississippi Link
“My mother is my shero because of what she instilled in me as my first teacher,” said Daphne Chamberlain Wilson. “She was humble, quiet, modest and had a tremendous work ethic – all attributes I greatly admire.”
Wilson’s mother is Jean Diane Kelly Chamberlain, Ph.D. Chamberlain was born in Utica May 16, 1951. She passed away March 10, 2015. She was many things to many people. She was a daughter to John Henry and Mattie Burks Kelly, a faithful and loyal Christian, a kind, loving, and gracious spirit, a cherished childhood friend and classmate, a distinguished alumna, a scholar blessed with a brilliant mind, an innovative academian, an outstanding educational leader and a constant and unselfish presence in the lives of her students. She remains a jewel in the crown of her children Nicholas, Marcellus and Daphne, leaving a legacy of excellence for a life well lived.
Wilson, 35, traces her allegiance to scholarship to her maternal grandmother, Mattie Burks Kelly, and her beloved mother, who is described as a formidable educator in her own right.
Wilson formerly served first as project manager and then director at the Council of Federated Organizations Civil Rights Education Center at Jackson State University. She returned to Tougaloo, where she is chair and assistant professor in the Department of History and Political Science and coordinator of the institution’s Civil Rights and Social Justice Initiatives.
Her work as a historian, scholar/activist is to assist students in understanding the system of inequality that prevails despite the struggle for social and political equality waged during the civil rights era. Her doctoral dissertation is the focus of a book she is writing on children (age 7 to 18) in the Jackson movement and the critical roles they played in the city’s struggle for freedom.
She cautions that we must acknowledge and work through the generational differences that exist as it relates to social movements. “Although young people often employ the same strategies their peers did in the 1960s, social media now offers new places to disseminate information. With a click of a button you can see what’s going on in the world,” she said.
Chamberlain makes certain her students understand that her emphasis will always be on those who have been marginalized. “Our nation was built on the backs of these people,” Wilson said.
“We must train more scholars, who will tell those stories and be deliberate and unapologetic in the language we use regarding the roles we’ve played historically.”
She has witnessed the powerful effect education and self-knowledge can have. “I’ve seen young people change their minds about who they were and who they could be. I always want to be in the classroom, continuing to produce scholarship as an active part of the academic community,” Wilson said.
Hilary Word, 21, is dynamically gifted in her verbal expression, writing, scholarship and student activism, according to Wilson. She understands the erasure of African-American women from the narrative.
Word holds laudable intentions for her future success. A former UNCF Mellon Fellow, she sees herself graduating from Tougaloo College, where she’s currently a junior, and writing her doctoral dissertation in either history or American studies. Word believes that it is the academy’s duty to move beyond reverence for scholarship that offers no help to marginalized communities, and that it must firmly address past and current social and societal ills.
“My grandmother, Dr. L.C. Dorsey, instilled in me a great sense of compassion and the understanding that without knowledge, we are left powerless to dismantle the oppressive systems that plague are communities and society-at-large,” Word said.
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