Black Hands in the Biscuits- Not in the Classrooms

The Author: Sherick A. Hughes earned his B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, his M.A. from Wake Forest University, and his M.P.A. and his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Hughes also earned an esteemed Phi Delta Kappa award for the dissertation that inspired this book. Currently, he teaches courses in the College of Education at the University of Toledo as a tenure track professor. He has particular interests in the relationships between society, school, and home. In addition to numerous professional journal articles and book chapters, Dr. Hughes is an author and editor of What We Still Don’t Know About Teaching Race (forthcoming).

«Sherick Hughes has reversed the presumed story of Black America. In the usual story, struggles of African Americans end up presumably in despair and become social problems to be dealt with by public policies. What Dr. Hughes reveals to us is that racial struggle can also be understood in the contexts of hope and faith. Indeed, this book demonstrates that hope is the pedagogy used by African Americans in this southern community to survive the turmoil of desegregation and slow and violent pace of cultural and social change. Hope is the pedagogy that families use to prepare their African American children to survive racism and to prepare them for the challenges to come. Dr. Hughes’s analysis has the potential for more racial uplift than any governmental policy could effect. (George W. Nobit, Joseph R. Neikirk Distinguished Professor, School of Education, The University of North Carolina)«Sherick A. Hughes captures my soul with this book. I see my story in his story, his elders are my elders, and his family is my family. The narratives presented in this book represent the many narratives of hope, promise, and uplift many Black folks receive from their elders. In many ways this book is a «homecoming» because you can feel the love, pride, and energy that are present in each family’s quest for education. This book is appropriate for students and scholars alike because it represents the space between hope and struggle.» (Robert Berry, Assistant Professor, Curry School of Education, University of Virginia)