Black Culture Builders of Baltimore & Helena Hicks Speaker Series 2025-2026
The Helena Hicks Speaker Series brings the topics, questions, and methods of Black Studies out of the “Ivory Tower” and into the places of its origin – the community schools, organizations, cultural centers and houses of worship that nurtured 20th-century black social movements. The monthly speaker series endeavors to bridge the intellectual life of Johns Hopkins University with historic Baltimore neighborhoods and cultural institutions. It highlights African American scholars at Johns Hopkins whose recently published books explore questions of race, culture, history, inequality, and social change in the U.S., from the era of enslavement to the present.
The series was named in honor of civil rights activist Helena Hicks, a veteran of Baltimore’s earliest anti-segregation sit-ins of the 1950s. While a student of Morgan State University, Ms. Hicks entered the then-segregated Read’s Drug store in Baltimore with a group of classmates – actions that would lead to the desegregation of the drug store chain a few months later. Please click here to listen to Helena Hicks on Maryland Morning.
2025-2026
- October – Dr. Dennice Gayme
- November – Dr. Avonne E. Connor
- December – Dr. Lisa Cooper
- February – Terry Thompson
- March – Dr. Jude Phillip
- April – Dr. Amaka Okechukwu
2024-2025
- October – Dr. Maria Trent
- November – Dr. Deidra Crews
- December – Dr. Damani Piggott
- February – Dr. Odis Johnson
- March – Dr. Leslie King Hammond
- April – Dr. Monica Prasad
2023-2024
- October – Dr. Lester Spence
- November – Dr. Zophia Edwards
- December – Professor Richard Johnson
- February – Dr. Sabine Mohamed
- March – Dr. Raynetta Wiggins-Jackson
2021-2022
Helena Hicks Emancipation School
Guided by an ethical imperative to usher Hopkins’ abundant resources out of the “ivory tower” and into the sanctuaries of liberation, the Helena Hicks Emancipation School of the Billie Holiday Center for Liberation Arts sought to support Baltimore’s oldest African American churches in fulfilling their time-honored roles as keepers of memory, sites of civil dialogue, and agents of ethical and intellectual advancement. By hosting scholarly events at multiple churches throughout the year, the Billie Holiday Center aspired to share Hopkins’ human resources more equitably while also stimulating fellowship and the cross-fertilization of ideas across congregations.
Churches have been the centers of African American intellectual life for over two centuries. In the present political moment, historic African American churches with longstanding commitments to social justice – Bethel A.M.E., St. James Episcopal, Sharp Street, among others – remain particularly vital to the defense of personal liberties and collective freedoms in our city.
Alongside our community partners, we were pleased to present four mini-courses involving a virtual 40-minute presentation and a 20-minute Q&A session. Registered participants of all mini-courses received a certificate of completion from the Johns Hopkins University Billie Holiday Center for Liberation Arts: Helena Hicks Emancipation School.
Fall 2021
- October 24
- November 18: “Worlds of Hip-Hop” – Minkah Makalani
Spring 2022
- April 6 – “Worlds of Hip-Hop: A Black Art Form in Evolution,” Minkah Makalani
- April 13 – “Black Theater as Liberatory Education,” Jasmine Blanks Jones
- May 4 – Sasha Turner “Gender, Race, and Medicine in Historical Perspective,” Sasha Turner
- May 11 – “School-to-Prison Pipeline in Baltimore: What can be done?” Richard Lofton