Alison Parker
Alison Parker
Founder, 91原创 Anti-Racism Initiative (91原创ARI)
Biography
Alison M. Parker is Richards Professor of American History. She has research and teaching interests at the intersections of gender, race, disability, citizenship and the law in U.S. history. She majored in art history and history at the University of California, Berkeley and earned her Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University. In 2017鈥2018, Parker was an Andrew W. Mellon Advanced Fellow at the James Weldon Johnson Institute for the Study of Race and Difference at Emory University, where she worked on her biography of the civil rights activist and suffragist Mary Church Terrell,听听(University of North Carolina Press, 2020; second edition, paperback, March 2025). Her op-ed ",'"听appeared in the听New York Times (February 6, 2020). Parker is also the author of two historical monographs,听Articulating Rights: Nineteenth-Century American Women on Race, Reform, and the State听(2010)听补苍诲听Purifying America: Women, Cultural Reform,听and Pro-Censorship Activism, 1873鈥1933听(1997). She has co-edited three anthologies and authored numerous articles and book chapters.听Her most recent article is 鈥淥scar Stanton DePriest: Republican Politics, the Strategy of Non-Partisanship, and the Struggle for Civil Rights,鈥 in The Journal of African American History (V, 108, n. 4, Fall 2023). Parker is now working on a new book on a social movement organizer, the civil rights activist Mary Hamilton, who served as field secretary and Southern Regional Director for the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in the early 1960s.
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Education
- Ph.D., The Johns Hopkins University, History, 1993.
- M.A., The Johns Hopkins University, History, 1990.
- B.A., University of California, Berkeley, History and the History of Art, Phi Beta Kappa, 1988.
Recent Media
Interviewed & quoted in 鈥溾,鈥 by Katja Iken, Der Spiegel, Edition 2, 2026.
Black History Month Celebration: , WJLA ABC 7 News, Arlington, VA, Feb. 13, 2025.
Research Interview with Mary Church Terrell Papers Interns, Connecting Communities Digital Initiative (CCDI), Library of Congress, Fall 2023.鈥
Podcast Interview by Caree Banton, for KUAF's听Undisciplined鈥,听Spring 2023.听
Radio Interview by Gerald Horne on听Unceasing Militant, for KPFK's听Freedom Now, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara, June 2022.听
Publications
Books
(University of North Carolina Press, John Hope Franklin Series in African American History and Culture, 2020; second edition, paperback, March 2025). Chosen as one of 鈥,鈥 African American Intellectual History Society (AAIHS), Black Perspectives, December 21, 2020.
Articulating Rights: Nineteenth-Century American Women on Race, Reform, and the State,听Northern Illinois University Press, 2010.听
Purifying America: Women, Cultural Reform, and Pro-Censorship Activism, 1873-1933, University of Illinois Press, 1997.
Edited Books
Interconnections: Gender and Race in American History, edited by Alison M. Parker & Carol Faulkner (Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2012, paperback 2014).
Beyond Black and White: Race, Ethnicity and Gender in the U.S. South and Southwest, edited by Stephanie Cole and Alison M. Parker, Texas A&M University Press, 2004.
Women and the Unstable State in Nineteenth-Century America, edited by Alison M. Parker and Stephanie Cole, Texas A&M University Press, 2000.
Upcoming & Recent Invited Talks
鈥淢ary Church Terrell鈥檚 Voting Rights Activism in Delaware,鈥 Delaware Historical Society,听Wilmington, Delaware, March 2026.
鈥淟eadership & Representation: Mary Church Terrell鈥檚 Black Feminism,鈥 National Women鈥檚听Hall of Fame, Seneca Falls, New York, October 2025.
鈥淏iographies in Bold: Black Women and U.S. Systems of Power,鈥 Baylor University, Waco,听Texas, October 2025.
鈥淏lack Women and Voting Rights: Mary Church Terrell鈥檚 Suffrage Activism,鈥 Women鈥檚 Rights听National Historic Park (National Park Service), Seneca Falls, New York, May 2025.
鈥淐hampions of Equality: Unceasing Militant Mary Church Terrell,鈥 Alice Paul Center for听Gender Justice, Mt. Laurel, New Jersey, May 2025.
鈥淏lack Girl鈥檚 and Young Women鈥檚 Clubs: The Mary Church Terrell Clubs,鈥 for the History of听Women and Gender series, New York University, April 2025.
Book Club Talk on Unceasing Militant (2nd ed.), Lillie Jackson Carroll Civil听Rights Museum, Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland, April 2025.
鈥淲omen鈥檚 Leadership Styles in Historical Perspective,鈥 talk for the National听Women鈥檚 History Museum Speakers Bureau, April 2023, March 2025.
Recent Conference Presentations
鈥淐reating their Own Worlds: The Insurgent Education Practices of Black Girls鈥 and听Women鈥檚 Clubs, Conference of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH), Atlanta, September 2025.
Roundtable on Amrita Myers鈥檚 The Black President鈥檚 Wife, Society for Historians of the Early听American Republic (SHEAR) conference, Providence, RI, July 2025.
鈥淎frican American Women鈥檚 Internationalism & Cosmopolitanism,鈥 commentator, Organization听of American Historians, Chicago, April 2025.
鈥淗ine/Horne Book Roundtable on Natanya Duncan鈥檚听An Efficient Womanhood: Women and the听Making of the Universal Negro Improvement Association,鈥 & 鈥淎dvancing the Field: Cambridge Studies on Black Women in the United States,鈥 for the 2024 Annual Meeting and Conference of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH), September 2024.
鈥淐onfronting Continuing Racism and Inequality in Women鈥檚 History Organizations,鈥 International Federation for Research in Women鈥檚 History Conference, Sendagaya Campus-Tsuda University, Tokyo, Japan, August 2024.
鈥淗idden No More: Uncovering Black Women鈥檚 History Through National Parks,鈥 American Historical Association, January 2024.
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March 19, 2026 | Written by Katja Iken, Der Spiegel (German)Mary Church Terrell, the daughter of a slave, fought against lynching, discrimination and prejudice in the USA around 70 years ago, advocating for the rights of African Americans. The Trump era could reverse the pioneering woman's achievements.
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February 13, 2025 | Written by ABC 7News StaffFebruary is Black History Month, and 7News is speaking to experts about some noteworthy and historic African American figures that impacted the D.C. area.
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Uncovering Black histories at 91原创
February 03, 2025 | Written by Amy WolfA virtual tour ties previously overlooked histories to sites on campus. The Black Histories at 91原创 StoryMap traces stories of Black community members, students, faculty members and racial justice activists to specific sites on the 91原创 campus and the greater Newark area.