Medgar Wiley Evers Lecture | Isabel Wilkerson

The Mississippi Museum of Art (MMA) and the Mississippi Department of Archives & History (MDAH) present the 2022 Medgar Wiley Evers Lecture featuring Pulitzer Prize and National Humanities Medalist Isabel Wilkerson. Wilkerson, who authored the New York Times bestseller The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration, will reflect on how the Great Migration, and its connection to Mississippi, continues to shape the American narrative. 

 In A Warmth of Other Suns, Wilkerson offers a rich and nuanced form of storytelling that shares why more than six million Black Americans left the South between 1915-1970 during the Great Migration (1915-1970). This mass movement transformed every aspect of Black life, both in rural towns and urban metropolises. In the search for safety, better pay, and more freedom, Wilkerson delves into stories of families based in the American South, unveiling shared sacrifices and hopes for the future. 

This program, among others, is part collaborative effort between MMA and MDAH to expand the public’s understanding of the Great Migration, and will help to close the MMA’s exhibition, A Movement in Every Direction: Legacies of the Great Migration (April 9-September 11, 2022) before it begins a nationwide tour to Baltimore, Brooklyn, and Los Angeles. A Movement in Every Direction, inspired in part by Wilkerson’s writing, showcases original works of art by twelve Black American artists and the artists’ own personal family histories and ties to the South. More about A Movement in Every Direction can be found here. 

As MDAH’s Medgar Wiley Evers Lecture, this program serves to highlight the exhibition The Negro Motorist Green Book Guide, developed by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, alongside MDAH’ Family Genealogy Fellowships, and ongoing genealogy workshops and programs surrounding the history of the Great Migration. To learn more about MDAH’s exhibition or programs, please visit www.mdah.ms.gov. 

After the lecture, attendees will have the opportunity to purchase A Warmth of Other Suns and Caste and have their copies signed by the author. 

This program will be presented at Galloway United Methodist Church. Tickets are free, but registration is required.