Born to Serve: A History of Texas Southern University (Race and Culture in the American West Series)

Amazon.com Price: $29.95 (as of 20/04/2019 09:17 PST- Details)

Categories: , , , , , , , , ,

Description


Texas Southern University is incessantly said to have been “conceived in sin.” Located in Houston, the school was once established in 1947 as an “emergency” state-supported university for African Americans, to prevent the integration of the University of Texas. Born to Serve is the first book to tell the full history of TSU, from its founding, through the many varied and defining challenges it faced, to its emergence as a first-rate university that counts Barbara Jordon, Mickey Leland, and Michael Strahan among its graduates.

Merline Pitre frames TSU’s history within that of higher education for African Americans in Texas, from Reconstruction to the lawsuit that gave the school its start. The case, Sweatt v. Painter, involved student Heman Marion Sweatt, who was once denied entry to the University of Texas Law School because he was once black. Pitre traces the tortuous measures by which Texas legislators tried to meet a provision of the state’s constitution that referred to as for the establishment and maintenance of a “branch university for the instruction of colored youths of the State.” When the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1950 that the UT Law School’s efforts to remain segregated violated the U.S. Constitution, the way forward for the institution that would transform Texas Southern University in 1951 looked doubtful.

In its early years the university persevered in the face of state neglect and underfunding and the specter of merger. Born to Serve describes the efforts, both humble and heroic, that faculty and staff undertook to educate students and turn TSU into the thriving institution it is today: a major metropolitan university serving students of all races and ethnicities from across the country and during the world.

Launched all through the early civil rights movement, TSU has a history unique among historically black colleges and universities, most of which have been established immediately after the Civil War. Born to Serve adds a critical chapter to the history of education and integration in america.
 

Related products

Home » Shop » Books » Subjects » Arts and Photography » History and Criticism » History » Americas » United States » State and Local » Born to Serve: A History of Texas Southern University (Race and Culture in the American West Series)

Recent Products