September 25 – 28, 2025
The Pyle Center
702 Langdon St.
Madison, WI 53706
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Note: this Symposium is fee-free for attendees
Melvina Young
Class of 1990
Master Writer and Creative, Hallmark Cards, Inc.
Melvina Young and her work have been featured in the New York Times, on CNN.com, the Grio, Emmy Award winning daytime talk show The Real, and elsewhere. An academic expert trained in African American history and Black cultural studies, Melvina Young is a Hallmark Master Writer and Creative, Cultural Sensitivity Consultant, and Hallmark global DEI trainer, as well as Mahogany Brand specialist and Brand Ambassador for both Mahogany and Hallmark Cards. She is also the creator of Vibrant Voices, an in-house blog making space for respectful discussions of identity, compassion, connection, and the power of empathy through storytelling.
Dr. Reverend Alex Gee
Class of 1985
Founder of Nehemiah Center for Urban Development and The Center for Black Excellence and Culture
Rev. Dr. Alexander Gee is the Lead Pastor of Fountain of Life Church, president and founder of the Nehemiah Center for Urban Leadership Development and its renowned initiative, Justified Anger. Gee is a husband and father, as well as a writer, adjunct faculty worker, community activist, life coach, international lecturer, and relief worker. Gee is the co-founder of The Center for Black Excellence and Culture in Madison, WI.
Crystal Moten
Class of 2006
Curator of Collections and Exhibitions, Obama Presidential Museum
A south side Chicago native, Dr. Crystal M. Moten is a public historian, curator and writer who focuses on the intersection of race, class and gender to uncover the hidden histories of Black people in the Midwest. The recipient of numerous awards and honors, her research has appeared in books, journals, documentaries, and other media. Dr. Moten has taught at colleges and universities across the country and prior to joining the Obama Foundation as the inaugural Curator of Collections of Exhibitions, she worked as Curator of African American History in the Division of Work and Industry at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. Her most recent, award-winning book is Continually Working: Black Women, Community Intellectualism and Economic Justice in Postwar Milwaukee (Vanderbilt University Press, 2023).
Tanisha Ford
Class of 2005
Professor of History, Graduate Center at The City University of New York
Tanisha C. Ford is Professor of History and Biography and Memoir at The Graduate Center, CUNY. She is the author of Our Secret Society: Mollie Moon and the Glamour, Money, and Power Behind the Civil Rights Movement (Amistad/HarperCollins, 2023), which won the 2024 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work of Biography/Autobiography. It received Honorable Mention for the Organization of American Historians’ coveted Darlene Clark Hine Award for Best Book on African American Women’s and Gender History. Our Secret Society was also named one of Vanity Fair’s and Ms. Magazine’s Best Books of 2023. Ford has also written three other books: Liberated Threads: Black Women, Style, and the Global Politics of Soul (UNC Press, 2015), winner of the OAH Liberty Legacy Foundation Award for Best Book on Civil Rights History; Dressed in Dreams: A Black Girl’s Love Letter to the Power of Fashion (St. Martin’s, 2019); and Kwame Brathwaite: Black is Beautiful (Aperture, 2019). Her scholarship has been published in the Journal of Southern History, NKA: Journal of Contemporary African Art, the Black Scholar, and QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking. She writes regularly for public audiences, with stories in the Atlantic, New York Times, Time, Elle, and Harper’s Bazaar, among others. In 2019, Ford was named to The Root’s 100 Most Influential African Americans list for her innovative, public-facing scholarship. She is an OAH Distinguished Lecturer. Her research has been supported by institutions including New America/Emerson Collective, the Institute for Advanced Study, the Smithsonian Museum of American History, Harvard Radcliffe Institute, Ford Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.
Questions? Contact us:
Veneta Kovacs | Administrator
Hope Kelham | Communications and Events Specialist
Sandra Adell | Professor & Organizer