Research Guides: Structural Racism Resource Base: Campus Events

Spring Semester

January 20, 2023

As we begin our extended celebration of Dr. King’s birthday, please reflect on Birmingham, Alabama as a pivotal moment in the contemporary Civil Rights Movement and in the life of Dr. King with a re-reading of his “ Letter from a Birmingham Jail ” and joining us on Friday, January 20, 2023, on the fifth floor of Kindlon from 12:00 – 3:00, for a viewing of the Spike Lee film, “ Four Little Girls.” It will be followed by a discussion with our new assistant professor of African American Studies , Dr. Theodore Foster.

The event is co-sponsored by the Benedictine University Faculty/ Staff Workshop on Structural Racism, the Black Student Organization, and the Benedictine University Library. This is an opportunity for students, faculty, and staff to come together as a community to reflect on the life of Dr. King and his unfinished work.

Letter from a Birmingham Jail

Link to the full text
Martin Luther King, Jr.: “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” (2010). In Milestone Documents in African American History : Exploring the Essential Primary Sources (Vol. 3, pp. 1284–1301).

Spike Lee - Four Little Girls.

View Film Online
In his documentary (and HBO) debut, renowned director/producer Spike Lee takes an in-depth look at one of America's most heinous crimes, a racially motivated bombing that may have been caused by -- and most definitely helped define -- the emerging civil-rights movement championed by Dr. Martin Luther King and others. 4 Little Girls is at once a moving human account by family members and friends of the four girls who perished in the September 15, 1963 bombing, as well as an important historical account of the forces that shaped race relations in Birmingham (called by King "the most thoroughly segregated city in the U.S.") and the nation in the 1960s. An HBO Production. An HBO Production.