Rhodes, Jane 1955-

PERSONAL:

Born October 7, 1955. Education: Syracuse University, B.A., 1977, M.A., 1984; University of North Carolina, Ph.D., 1992.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Macalester College, 1600 Grand Ave., St. Paul, MN 55105. E-mail—rhodes@macalester.edu.

CAREER:

Scholar, educator, journalist, and writer. State University of New York at Cortland, assistant professor in the department of communication, 1985-91; Indiana University, Bloomington, assistant professor in the School of Journalism, 1991-96; University of California, San Diego, associate professor in the department of ethnic studies and an affiliated associate professor in the department of communication, 1999-2005; Macalester College, St. Paul, MN, dean for the study of race and ethnicity and professor and chair of the American studies department, 2005—. Also worked as a newspaper and radio reporter and producer.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Outstanding Book Award, History Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, for Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Press and Protest in the Nineteenth Century; also has held the University of California, San Diego Chancellor's Postdoctoral Fellowship, a Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship, and a fellowship in U.S. studies at the University of London.

WRITINGS:

Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Press and Protest in the Nineteenth Century, Indiana University Press (Bloomington, IN), 1998.

Framing the Black Panthers: The Spectacular Rise of a Black Power Icon, New Press (New York, NY), 2007.

Author of articles on race, journalism and mass communication.

SIDELIGHTS:

Jane Rhodes is a former journalist who subsequently entered academia, where her research interests include race and mass media and African American history and culture. Her first book, Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Press and Protest in the Nineteenth Century, received an Outstanding Book Award from the History Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. In the book, the author presents an in-depth biography of an outspoken nineteenth-century African American political activist who worked as a teacher, journalist, and lawyer. During her life, Shadd Cary's primary focus was on fighting slavery and oppression both in the United States and Canada. As a member of a small cadre of free black elite who were educated and somewhat financially independent, she participated in numerous social and political movements, including abolition, black emigration and nationalisms, women's rights, and the temperance movement. She taught fugitive slaves in Canada, where she im- migrated in the 1850s, and also founded a newspaper. Shadd Cary was also the second black woman attorney in the United States.

Journal of Women's History contributor Leslie M. Alexander wrote that the author "grapples with the complexity of Shadd Cary's personality." In a review of the biography on the H-Net Reviews Web site, Shirley J. Yee noted: "The significance of Rhodes's book is that in addition to chronicling Shadd Cary's life, it provides an important window into Black activist politics in the United States and Canada during this period, the uneven development of the Black press, the complicated internal struggles with Black abolitionist leadership circles, the evolution of race relations in Canada, and Shadd Cary's own personal struggles as an educated Black woman to carve out a place for herself and her voice in the male-dominated world of Black abolitionist and emigrationist discourse."

Rhodes's next look at black political activism is the book Framing the Black Panthers: The Spectacular Rise of a Black Power Icon. This time the author outlines the rise of the black nationalist Black Panther Party of the 1960s and early 1970s as media icons whose reputation and iconic status remains powerful in the twenty-first century. The author provides a history of the group's origins and their transformation from a radical political party that had numerous run-ins with the police to media superstars and symbols of black power. She details how the party's media-savvy members used pamphlets, buttons, posters, ubiquitous press appearances, and photo ops to achieve their renown. The author includes many photographs that have never been published.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Atlantis, March 22, 2000, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Press and Protest in the Nineteenth Century, p. 160.

Choice, April, 1999, R. Detweiler, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 1520.

Journalism History, autumn, 1999, Felecia Jones Ross, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 113.

Journal of American History, March, 2000, Carol Lasser, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 1777.

Journal of Southern History, May, 2000, Merline Pitre, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 428.

Journal of the Early Republic, summer, 1999, Kathryn M. Tomasek, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 330.

Journal of Women's History, spring, 2000, Leslie M. Alexander, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 228.

Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature, spring, 1999, Jennifer Bernhardt Steadman, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary, p. 118.

Women: A Cultural Review, March 22, 2000, "‘Lace’ and the Difference It Makes," p. 156.

ONLINE

H-Net Reviews,http://www.h-net.org/ (February 26, 2008), Shirley J. Yee, review of Mary Ann Shadd Cary.

KQED.org,http://www.kqed.org/ (February 26, 2008), brief profile of author.

Macalester University American Studies Web site,http://www.macalester.edu/ (February 26, 2008), faculty profile of author.

New Press Web site,http://www.thenewpress.com/ (February 26, 2008), description of Framing the Black Panthers: The Spectacular Rise of a Black Power Icon.

Selected Works,http://works.bepress.com/ (February 26, 2008), brief profile of author.