KINGSTON, R.I. – November 21, 2016 — Jelani Cobb, a staff writer at The New Yorker and professor of journalism at Columbia University, will speak Tuesday, Nov. 29, at the URI Honors Colloquium, “Inequality and the American Dream.”

Cobb will address what is to be done about inequality at the free public lecture at 7 p.m. in Edwards Hall, 64 Upper College Road. It is the final lecture of this fall’s Honors Colloquium series.

Cobb has been contributing to The New Yorker and newyorker.com since 2012, and became a staff writer in 2015. He writes frequently about race, politics, history, and culture. His most recent book is “The Substance of Hope: Barack Obama and the Paradox of Progress.” He won the 2015 Sidney Hillman Prize for Opinion and Analysis Journalism, for his columns on race, the police, and injustice.

Cobb joined the Columbia University School of Journalism in 2016. He was most recently an associate professor of History and director of the Africana Studies Institute at the University of Connecticut where he specialized in post-Civil War African American history, 20th century American politics and the history of the Cold War. Cobb is also a recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright and Ford Foundations.

He is also the author of “To the Break of Dawn: A Freestyle on the Hip Hop Aesthetic.” His articles and essays have appeared in The Washington Post, The New Republic, Essence, Vibe, The Progressive, and TheRoot.com. His collection “The Devil and Dave Chappelle and Other Essays” was published in 2007. He has also contributed to a number of anthologies including “In Defense of Mumia,” “Testimony,” “Mending the World” and “Beats, Rhymes and Life.”

Born and raised in Queens, N.Y., Cobb is a graduate of Howard University and Rutgers University where he received his doctorate in American History.

Sponsors

URI Office of the President  •  URI Office of the Provost  •  The Mark and Donna Ross Honors Colloquium Humanities Endowment  • The Thomas Silvia and Shannon Chandley Honors Colloquium Endowment  •  URI College of Arts & Sciences  •  URI College of Pharmacy  •  URI John Hazen White Sr. Center for Ethics and Public Service  •  URI Gender and Women’s Studies Program  •  URI Multicultural Student Services Center  •  URI Theatre Department  •  URI College of Engineering  •  URI College of the Environment and Life Sciences  •  URI College of Health Sciences  •  URI College of Business Administration  •  URI College of Nursing  •  URI Division of Student Affairs  •  URI Department of Communications and Marketing  •  URI Department of Publications and Creative Services  •  URI ITS Instructional Technology and Media Services  •  URI Feinstein College of Education and Professional Studies  • URI Charles T. Schmidt, Jr. Labor Research Center