Our Mission
Teaching, Studying and Promoting Civil Rights and Social Change
The Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change advances its mission of teaching, studying, and promoting civil rights and social change primarily through education, research, innovative campaigns, and community engagement.
The Frances Dancy Hooks Social Change Art Award and Exhibition
Change is all around us and can often require intense struggle and sacrifice, but it can also be a space of transcendent beauty and inspiration. The Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change at the University of Memphis invites you to experience the work of our finalists and winner of the inaugural Frances Dancy Hooks Art Award. Join us for one of our two public open-house events for this inaugural exhibition. Tickets are free and available online.
Click here for more info and to get tickets!
"Uplift the Vote" Exhibit Now on Display
The Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change at the University of Memphis invites you to experience the return of their acclaimed exhibit, "Uplift the Vote," which can be viewed back in it’s original location in the rotunda of the Ned McWherter Library on the Central Campus of the University. This dual exhibit is focused on both the historical and contemporary importance of our most basic civil right – the right to vote.
Historical context on the urgency and importance of voting is given through an exploration of the Fayette County, TN “Tent City” civil rights movement of the late 1950s and 1960s. Using photographs, documents and reflections primarily collected by the activists and their families, visitors will learn how Fayette County African Americans' demand for the right to vote changed their lives, the community and, ultimately, the nation. Viewers will then learn information about current Tennessee voter registration laws, and non-partisan best practices on how to research candidates, issues, and prepare to cast one’s ballot in an election.
“Uplift the Vote” reminds visitors that everyone should have a voting story . . . what will be theirs?
The exhibit will be in the rotunda of the Ned McWherter Library on the University of Memphis campus Friday, August 16 – Friday, Nov. 8, from 7 a.m. to midnight. For weekend and holiday hours, visit Libraries Hours of Operation. This exhibit is free and open to the public. Convenient paid parking available at the public garage on Zach Curlin Street.
Read the 2024 Hooks Institute Policy Papers
Reimagining The Criminal Legal System to Create a More Equitable Society
The policy papers in this edition help us begin to answer Ruth Wilson Gilmore’s pertinent question: “Instead of asking whether anyone should be locked up or go free, why don’t we think about why we solve problems by repeating the kind of behavior that brought us the problem in the first place?”
The series is arranged intentionally to engage with the criminal legal system from beginning to end—from its roots, to its policies and ideologies, to its lasting effects. Each paper focuses on one critical issue in the criminal legal system in the United States, and then presents a set of policy recommendations that could lead to real change.
- In the paper titled “Ending Mass Incarceration by Understanding Critical Race Theory,” Dr. Miriam Clark, a Research Associate at the Oregon Social Learning Center, describes why it is imperative we face systemic racism head-on when reimagining the criminal legal system.
- The next policy paper moves us from the systemic causes of mass incarceration to a person’s initial contact with the criminal legal system, that of policing and the courts. Dr. Brenna Breshears, Assistant Professor of Clinical Mental Health Counseling at Eastern Michigan University, writes the paper titled “Identifying and Serving Those with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities: An Equitable Approach for Jails and Prisons.”
- Moving further into the vast criminal legal system, the next policy paper encourages us to understand and advocate for change regarding jail practices in Shelby County, TN. The criminal legal system is a complex multi-stage process, and jails theoretically exist within this process to detain individuals before they are sentenced. Yet as Josh Spickler, Executive Director of the Memphis nonprofit Just City, describes in “No Escape: Jail and the Myth of Innocence,” the actual role of jail has come to serve as a site of sanctioned violence and harm far beyond its stated purpose.
- Dr. Lindsey Raisa Feldman, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of Memphis, in the paper titled “Profiting from Punishment Drift: The Case for Abolishing For-Profit Prison Communication,” describes the experience of social isolation for families of incarcerated loved ones. Drawing on ethnographic research with women in Memphis, TN, she argues that charging fees for communication between prison and the outside world causes undue harm, and calls to undo the for-profit communication regime currently at work in U.S. prisons. Although there are many features of the U.S. prison system that must be addressed, Dr. Feldman underscores that communication is fundamental to humanity, which is stripped away in this current era of mass incarceration.
- In her paper titled “Mental Health Services as a Mandatory Necessity for Returning Citizens,” Dr. Crystal DeBerry, Owner of DeNovo Clinical Strategies LLC and Founder of the Memphis nonprofit Indomitable Families Affected by Incarceration, describes the importance of mental health resources and support for those impacted by incarceration. She argues that wrap-around mental health services, including counseling, supportive programs, and support for families of incarcerated loved ones, should be a mandatory component of reentry. Just as the first paper makes clear that mass incarceration begins far before any individual person is imprisoned, this paper underscores the fact that the criminal legal system does not simply end when a person is released from detention. The effects of the criminal legal system are vast and long-lasting.
Tennessee General Assembly Honors Fayette County Activists and the University of Memphis Hooks Institute with Resolution
The Tennessee General Assembly recently passed a resolution to honor the activists from the Fayette County Movement and the documentary, website and exhibitions created by the University of Memphis Hooks Institute to preserve and analyze the history of this movement.
Before the General Assembly voted on the resolution, Hooks Institute Executive Director Daphene R. McFerren made brief remarks on the critical importance of preserving this historical work to help ensure equity and social justice for future generations. Her remarks received a standing ovation from the General Assembly.
See What Hooks Has Been Up To
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Who We Are
- We transform adults and students through our work including financial literacy training, public lectures, and documentaries on civil rights and social justice.
- We provide ongoing coaching and mentoring to African American male and female college students to help them achieve successful graduation and professional outcomes.
- We have trained federal and local government personnel on community inequalities by using research from Hooks Institute. This research has also been cited by the media and included in documentary broadcasts.
- We use the collective scholarship of the university to eradicate inequality and to create prosperity in our communities.
- We are the only university Institute in the State of Tennessee with a community engagement, scholarship, and research mission to remove discrimination and inequality in Memphis and beyond.
Who We Serve
- The University of Memphis community, Memphis and Shelby County, the state and the nation. These entities connect to our work through our publications, lecture series, documentaries, and social media.
- Teachers who receive training from Institute staff on civil rights history and use our materials in their classrooms.
- African American male students and female students enrolled in HAAMI or ASATT.
- Faculty at the University of Memphis who receive grants that enable them to fund research focused on societal disparities and their causes.
- Individuals, grassroots leaders, government officials and business leaders who can find valuable research and policy conclusions set forth in the Institute’s Policy Papers.
- Historians who are researching or seeking information about social justice or civil rights especially as it applies to events in the Mid-South.