Dr. Russ Wigginton, president of the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee, will deliver the commencement address to Maryville College’s Class of 2023 during a ceremony scheduled for 10 a.m. Saturday, May 6, on Humphreys Court, located between Anderson and Fayerweather halls on the MC campus.
During the ceremony, Wigginton will receive an honorary doctor of public service degree from the 204-year-old liberal arts college.
“Dr. Wigginton’s extensive background in higher education and the liberal arts, as well as his longstanding focus on matters of race and equity, make for an outstanding match with Maryville College,” said MC President Dr. Bryan F. Coker. “He is a most worthy candidate for this honorary doctorate, and I know our graduates will thoroughly enjoy hearing from him.”
Like Coker, Wigginton is a graduate of Rhodes College in Memphis, and after earning a Ph.D. in history from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, he returned to his alma mater, where he served eight years in the History Department. He specialized in African American and community history, and he’s the author of “The Strange Career of the Black Athlete: African Americans and Sports,” in addition to numerous articles and essays on African American social and labor history.
“The liberal arts education, offered at both Maryville and Rhodes, inspires people to think about humanity and to maximize analytical and strategic skills,” Wigginton said. “Inherent in the liberal arts tradition, you understand and develop a sense of community in whatever environment you are in.”
From 2006 to 2017, he served as vice president for external programs and vice president for college relations at Rhodes, broadening the institution’s strategy in the Memphis area and beyond. His coordination of alumni relations, communications, career services and more led to his appointment as vice president for student life and dean of students at Rhodes from 2017 to 2019.
From 2019 to 2021, he served as the chief postsecondary impact officer for Tennessee State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE), leading the organization’s efforts for postsecondary access, retention and completion. On Aug. 1, 2021, he was introduced as the newly appointed president of the National Civil Rights Museum, located at the historic Lorraine Motel, where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated on April 4, 1968.
Through the display of more than 250 artifacts, more than 40 films, oral histories, interactive media and external listening posts that guide visitors through five centuries of history, the National Civil Rights Museum is dedicated to “sharing the culture and lessons from the American Civil Rights Movement and exploring how this significant era continues to shape equality and freedom globally.” Established in 1991, the historical center’s continued evolution has Wigginton in a reflective mood, and while he has no title in mind yet for his Commencement address, the ever-changing nature of the civil rights movement will undoubtedly play a role in his message, he said.
“As we plan for a renovation of the museum, I have been reflecting on Dr. King’s last book, ‘Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community,’” Wigginton said. “What we have seen emerge from the history of the movement since Dr. King’s death is less linear and more issue-based. The movement is more on a continuum that fluctuates back and forth between chaos or community. It is important, because it is part of our history, and because the only way we teach people civility is to see challenging situations as teaching and learning moments.
“Too often there is an expectation or cultural norm to be knee-jerk or reactionary without pausing for a moment to think about someone’s experience or life story that could be dramatically different than your own. Diving into this history can be uncomfortable, but one commonality is that it is uncomfortable for everybody, particularly for the offspring of those who experienced it. Let’s be uncomfortable together and not measure success by convincing people to think the same way we do. Respecting others cautions you from doing harm to someone different than you.
“If we ignore this history, we don’t have a foundation by which to handle the discomfort in our world today or in the future,” he added. “A lot of the people who participated in the civil rights movement were college-aged students who were on their own journey with an unknown outcome. These lessons in courage, conviction and calculated risk apply to life beyond the civil rights movement.”
Original source can be found here
Alerts Sign-up