The Role of Geographic Mobility in the African American Freedom Struggle

FAIN: ES-272511-20

University of Tennessee, Knoxville (Knoxville, TN 37916-3801)
Derek Hilton Alderman (Project Director: March 2020 to present)
Joshua Lang Kenna (Co Project Director: August 2020 to present)

A three-week institute for 25 school teachers on the role of geographic mobility in the African American experience.

A three-week summer institute for teachers of grades K-12 that will provide opportunities to study geographic mobility as it relates to the African American freedom struggle. The goal of the institute is to contribute to the intellectual growth of participating educators and prepare them to create and disseminate important synergies between the teaching of history and the teaching of geography. The institute offers a model of critical thought, instruction, and pedagogical application that supports ongoing calls for greater numbers of social studies educators to address power and inequity. Participants will attend lectures, fieldtrips, and lab exercises, learn methodologies and classroom activities from curriculum specialists, and participate in discussions. They will develop standards-based lesson plans that they will take back to their classrooms.

Associated Products

Invited Conference Keynote: "The Geography of Mobility: Teaching History, Geography, and Civil Rights" (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Invited Conference Keynote: "The Geography of Mobility: Teaching History, Geography, and Civil Rights"
Author: Alderman, Derek H.
Abstract: Dr. Alderman recently co-directed a National Endowment for Humanities summer institute hosted by the University of Tennessee and the Tennessee Geographic Alliance. In July of this year, eighteen K-12 educators from across the country came to Knoxville to examine the central role of migration, transportation, travel and tourism in structural racism and the historical and contemporary fight for African American freedom and self-determination. The workshop featured guest lectures and hands-on lessons from experts on geographic mobility, race and racism, Black geographies, oral history, digital mapping, and educators participated in local and state-wide field trips. Dr. Alderman highlights the institute’s foundational ideas and innovations, the value of creating spaces of dialogue and care for teachers during these tough times, and the need to create greater synergies between teaching history, geography, and civil rights.
Date: 10/15/2022
Primary URL: https://ncge.org/uncategorized/speakers/
Primary URL Description: Information on keynote and other speakers highlighted at annual meeting of National Council for Geographic Education in Minneapolis, MN, October 14-16, 2022.
Conference Name: Annual Meeting of the National Council for Geographic Education, 2022

Living Clearinghouse of Black Mobility Resources (Database/Archive/Digital Edition)
Title: Living Clearinghouse of Black Mobility Resources
Author: Kenna, Joshua
Author: Alderman, Derek H.
Author: Stack, Katrina
Abstract: Living Clearinghouse of Black Mobility Resources is an open access spreadsheet listing numerous readings, videos, pedagogical guides, and other resources of help in teaching about the role of geographic mobility in the African American Freedom Struggle. It is living in that it will be under continual construction as new resources come to light.
Year: 2022
Primary URL: https://tinyurl.com/3syhrecd
Primary URL Description: Tiny URL directs public user to open access spreadsheet of Black mobility teaching resources
Secondary URL: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/12XNcf6YoDDmLn-xUmdJX2E9EGrEOD5ASBx-aEdN7Ig8/edit#gid=0
Secondary URL Description: Original URL directs public user to open access spreadsheet of Black mobility teaching resources
Access Model: Open access

Pedagogical Projects During NEH Black Mobilities Summer Institute (Course or Curricular Material)
Title: Pedagogical Projects During NEH Black Mobilities Summer Institute
Author: Participating Educators
Abstract: The NEH summer institute (Role of Geographic Mobility in African American Freedom Struggle) culminated in participating educators presenting a pedagogical project, lesson plan, or other curricular materials they produced during the 3 week workshop. Participants were asked to produce something inspired by the theme of the institute and aligned with standards that they could use in their classroom. Note: These project ideas were preliminary.
Year: 2022
Primary URL: https://tinyurl.com/4x5mev9y
Primary URL Description: Tiny URL to the pedagogical projects created by educators participating in the NEH summer institute.
Secondary URL: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FB61qyWv-tKk41eEJnFHRTNyyPcx3wJfrUxvknyE5jg/edit
Secondary URL Description: Original URL to the pedagogical projects created by educators participating in the NEH summer institute
Audience: K - 12

On Doing Justice to Black Mobility and Movement in the Classroom (Article)
Title: On Doing Justice to Black Mobility and Movement in the Classroom
Author: Derek H. Alderman
Author: Ethan Bottone
Abstract: This paper offers the intellectual goals and content that guided a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) K-12 Summer Institute entitled “The Role of Geographic Mobility in the African American Freedom Struggle.” Readers are provided background and concepts for exploring Black geographies of mobility in classrooms. Geographic mobility is a core demo-cratic principle important to understanding the African American Freedom Struggle and the politics of mobility, a rec-ognition that the very dynamics of where, when, and how we move is a product of the exercise of social power and the distri-bution of rights. Institute teachers worked to develop content expertise and knowledge necessary to answer three major ques-tions: (1) In what ways has geographic mobility been used as a means of racial control and exclusion against African Americans? (2) In what ways have African Americans used geographic mobility as a form of resistance, resilience, and world-making? (3) In what ways have racialized mobility patterns and practices shaped U.S. landscapes and people’s experiences, well-being, and vulnerability in those places?
Year: 2024
Primary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/19338341.2024.2315528
Primary URL Description: URL to an open access copy of the journal article resulting from 2022 NEH summer institute "Role of Geographic Mobility in African American Freedom Struggle," hosted by the University of Tennessee.
Secondary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rget20/21/1
Secondary URL Description: URL to special journal issue containing award product. The special journal issue devoted to disseminating innovations from 2022 NEH summer institute.
Access Model: Open Access
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: The Geography Teacher
Publisher: Taylor & Francis

NEH Institute on Black Geographies of Mobility: Toward New Frameworks for Teaching Movement (Article)
Title: NEH Institute on Black Geographies of Mobility: Toward New Frameworks for Teaching Movement
Author: Derek H. Alderman
Author: Ethan Bottone
Author: Kurt Butefish
Author: Joshua Kenna
Author: Katrina Stack
Abstract: In July of 2022, the University of Tennessee and the Tennessee Geographic Alliance hosted a three-week summer institute funded by the National Endowment for Humanities as part of its “A More Perfect Union” initiative to promote a deeper understanding of United States history and culture. Eighteen K-12 educators from across the country came to Knoxville to explore “The Role of Geographic Mobility in the African American Freedom Struggle.” The institute focused on Movement as one of geography’s five fundamental themes and highlighted the central role that migration, transportation, and travel and tourism have played in maintaining structural racism and facilitating Black antiracist resistance, self-determination, and world-making across multiple scales and historical periods. Our institute sought to expand and even rethink the ways we have traditionally taught geographic movement and its relationship with civil rights. This is not accomplished by simply inserting the Black experience into traditional notions of geography but allowing the African American freedom struggle to enrich our understanding of geographic mobility and what it means to national race relations. Ultimately, our institute developed four conceptual frameworks that the wider geographic education community might consider incorporating more universally into its curriculum and classroom teaching: (1) sense of movement, (2) right to mobility, (3) bodily work of mobility, and (4) consequences of movement on wellbeing.
Year: 2024
Primary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19338341.2024.2315526
Primary URL Description: URL for award product for 2022 NEH summer institute "Role of Geographic Mobility in African American Freedom Struggle," hosted by the University of Tennessee.
Secondary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rget20/21/1
Secondary URL Description: URL for special journal issue in which award product is found. Special issue is devoted to the 2022 NEH summer institute.
Access Model: subscription only
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: The Geography Teacher
Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Tent City/Freedom City Geographies: Teaching Beyond the “Canon” of Civil Rights Movement Memory (Article)
Title: Tent City/Freedom City Geographies: Teaching Beyond the “Canon” of Civil Rights Movement Memory
Author: Derek H. Alderman
Author: Katrina Stack
Abstract: The background and resources presented here support teaching about two Tent/Freedom Cities—in Fayette County, Tennessee, and in Lowndes County, Alabama—that were built as a form of civil rights resistance and for housing Black sharecroppers and tenant farmers evicted by oppressive white landlords for marching, attending mass mobilization meetings, and trying to register to vote. We conceptualize these Tent/Freedom Cities as forms of Black place-making and anti-racist mobility work and suggest that teaching about these insurgent encampments represents a neglected chapter within the “canon” of what has tended to be commemorated and taught about the Civil Rights Movement. We identify photographs, first-person accounts, and other primary source documentation for exploring and teaching Tent/Freedom City geographies. In doing so, there is an opportunity to focus on the under-discussed intersection of civil rights struggle and the production of home—complete with moments of lived resistance, resourcefulness, community-building, self-defense, and joy.
Year: 2024
Primary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19338341.2024.2315533
Primary URL Description: URL for award product for 2022 NEH summer institute "Role of Geographic Mobility in the African American Freedom Struggle," hosted by the University of Tennessee.
Secondary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rget20/21/1
Secondary URL Description: URL for special issue containing award product. Special issue devoted to 2022 NEH summer institute.
Access Model: Subscription Only
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: The Geography Teacher
Publisher: Taylor & Francis

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