Conversation with Robert Hodge and Dr. Jeff Littlejohn (Digital: Registration Required) The Sankofa Project Dialogues

Jeffrey L. Littlejohn serves as Professor of History at Sam Houston State University. A native of Dallas, Texas, he completed his undergraduate degree at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, and his MA and PhD at the University of Arkansas.

He is the co-author or co-editor of three books: Elusive Equality: Desegregation and Resegregation in Norfolk’s Public Schools (University of Virginia Press, 2012); The Enemy Within Never Did Without: German and Japanese Prisoners of War at Camp Huntsville, Texas, 1942-1945 (Texas Review Press, 2015); and The Seedtime, the Work and the Harvest: New Perspectives on the Black Freedom Struggle in America (University of Florida Press, 2018).

Littlejohn has published numerous articles with his co-author Charles H. Ford, including: “The Cabiness Family Lynching: Race, War, and Memory in Walker County, Texas” (Southwestern Historical Quarterly); “Booker T. Washington High School: History, Identity, and Educational Equality in Norfolk, Virginia” (Virginia Magazine of History and Biography); and, “Arthur D. Morse, School Desegregation, and the Making of CBS News, 1951-1964” (American Journalism).

Littlejohn is also an active digital/public historian. His co-curricular projects include: Lynching in Texas; East Texas History; and Historical MX. These websites, his podcast Living History, and his other projects (The Underground Railroad in Virginia, The Brown Decision in Norfolk, Virginia, and Democracy and Diversity in Walker County, Texas) have been funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, Humanities Texas, Norfolk State University, Sam Houston State University, and other organizations.  

Littlejohn lives with his wife, Mary, and son, Brant, in Spring, Texas. He can be reached on the web at: http://studythepast.org.

Robert Hodge is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice explores themes of memory and commemoration. Born in Houston, TX, and raised in the city’s Third Ward district, the artist studied visual art at the Pratt Institute in New York and the Atlanta College of Art before returning to Houston. Hodge has exhibited his work in numerous national and international institutions. The artist has also received grants from the Joan Mitchell Foundation, Houston Arts Alliance, and The Idea Fund. In Spring of 2017, Hodge was a resident artist at Artpace San Antonio, TX. Hodge currently lives and works in Houston. Hodge’s current projects include an album he executive produced called Two and 1/2 Years: A Musical Celebration to the Spirit of Juneteenth and his traveling installation called The Beauty Box.

Tierney L. Malone is a visual artist and modern day storyteller who uses the canon of African-American history and pop culture to create mixed media works that challenge contemporary culture and politics.

Malone has exhibited his art widely throughout Texas and the United States, including numerous solo exhibitions. His works are in the permanent collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Kansas City Jazz Museum, Kansas City, Missouri; Goldman Sachs, New York, New York; and the Federal Reserve Bank, Houston, Texas. He is the recipient of the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant, a CACHH Visual Artist Grant, and a Kimbrough Visual Artist Grant.

Collaboration with the jazz community is also at the forefront of Malone’s practice, including commissions to create the jacket covers for jazz musician Don Byron’s 1999 CD, Romance of the Unseen, on the Blue Note Label and for jazz pianist Randy Weston’s 2003 performance at the Miller Outdoor Theater. In 2008, Malone completed two jazz-related major commissions: a limited edition print celebrating Da Camera of Houston’s 20th Anniversary and an outdoor mural entitled “Southern Sounds” for the Coleman Art Center in York, Alabama. Additionally, Malone is the creator of the Jazz Church of Houston and the host of the Houston Jazz Spotlight on 90.1 KPFT, both of which recognize and preserve Houston’s remarkable contribution to the musical genre of Jazz.

Born in Los Angeles and based in Houston’s historic Third Ward, Malone was raised in Mississippi and Alabama and considers himself a Southern Seed.