Renaming Distinguished Scholarship Award to Honor DuBois

Among W. E. B. Du Bois's many remarkable accomplishments was his attention to family issues in ways that pre-figure work of the Second Wave feminist movement. For example, "DuBois observed that there were in 1910 two and a half million Negro homes in the United States. Out of these homes walked daily to work two million women and girls over ten years of age,-one half of the colored female population as against a fifth in the case of white women (DuBois, 1970 [original 1924], p. 141)." (From a forthcoming paper by Aldon Morris, to appear in Sociology in America, edited by Craig Calhoun)

Our proposal to name the ASA Career of Distinguished Scholarship award after W.E.B. Du Bois has already gained a great deal of support. Our list of endorsers now exceeds 100 people, including 14 ASA presidents, 11 members of the current ASA Council, and four of the most recent winners of the Distinguished Career of Scholarship Award. (To see the full list, click on the list of endorsers or see below.)

We are now ready to make a formal petition to the ASA Council to consider and include on the spring ballot. In order to get this proposal accepted, we need to collect the electronic endorsement of at least 3% of the ASA membership, so now I really am asking for your support. I urge you to think carefully about it.

As most of you know, I think this could be a wonderful moment for the ASA, finally acknowledging the greatest American sociologist and adding visibility and luster to the Association's most important award. If you have any doubts, read out long statement which you can access here (or see below) We need to get our signatures by December 31, so please consider this soon. I would also appreciate it you could forward this appeal to everyone who might be interested (including listserves).

The formal proposal is:

We propose that the American Sociological Association (ASA) Distinguished Career of Scholarship Award be renamed the W.E.B. Du Bois Career of Distinguished Scholarship Award and that the existing ASA Du Bois-Johnson-Frazier Award be renamed the Cox- Johnson-Frazier Award.

In order for your signature to count...

...We must receive an email from you containing the text of the resolution (above) and the following statement:

I, [your name], a voting member of the American Sociological Association, support the proposal to change the name of the current ASA Career of Distinguished Scholarship Award to the W. E. B. Du Bois Career of Distinguished Scholarship Award, and the name of the current ASA Du Bois-Johnson-Frazier Award to the Cox-Johnson-Frazier Award.

Address [the address you gave the ASA]:
City:
State and Zip:
Date:

The easiest way to sign is to forward this email to Aldon Morris (amorris@northwestern.edu)

DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS

1. Insert YOUR NAME, ADDRESS and DATE in the appropriate spaces above.
2. Name and address must be the same as you give the ASA
3. Send to Aldon Morris: amorris@northwestern.edu 
4. You must be a voting member of ASA
5. You must provide a date.

REMEMBER:
Graduate student members of ASA are eligible to sign this petition

We need valid signatures from at least 3% of the ASA membership by December 31 in order to insure that this proposal will be on the Spring ASA ballot. We are hoping for 1000, both to guarantee against imperfect signatures and as an expression of strong support for the proposal. For a full list of supporters to date, click on the list of endorsers (or see below)

WE ASK YOU TO SIGN THE PETITION AND ALSO FORWARD IT TO COLLEAGUES (INDIVIDUALS AND ON LISTSERVES) WHOM YOU THINK MIGHT SUPPORT THE PROPOSAL).

Here is a short statement in support of the name change. (To view a detailed argument for why this change is appropriate, please click here or see below).

Over a long career W.E.B. Du Bois, one of the founders of American sociology, established an impressive intellectual record of multidimensional scholarly achievements. He was extremely prolific. The high quality of his work is evidenced by the fact that Du Bois continues to be one of the most cited sociologists today.

Du Bois was also the consummate public intellectual. He fought for the rights of people of color, not just in the United States, but also around the world. He fought for women s rights, worker s rights, Jewish freedom, a peaceful world without nuclear weapons, and for human dignity and democracy across the globe.

The ASA already recognizes the outstanding achievements of Charles Johnson and E. Franklin Frazier with the award bearing their names. Oliver Cox s stature as a pioneering Black sociologist is commensurate with theirs, and we therefore propose that the ASA Du Bois-Johnson-Frazier Award be renamed the Cox- Johnson-Frazier Award.

A list of endorsers of this proposal can be found online by clicking on the list of endorsers or by going to the following internet address: http://edit.store.yahoo.com/lib/audiobook1/ListOfEndorsers.doc

A more detailed argument for the Du Bois Award can be found online by clicking on the Proposal to name the ASA Career of Distinguished Scholarship after W. E. B. Du Bois or by going to the following internet address: http://edit.store.yahoo.com/lib/audiobook1/DuBoisAwardProposal.pdf

PLEASE CIRCULATE THIS DOCUMENT TO ALL ASA MEMBERS
WHO MIGHT BE INTERESTED. WE THANK YOU.

Thank you all for taking time to think about this issue