African Modernism in America

Building Bridges not Walls: Applying Lessons from Contemplative Science to Enhance Equity and Inclusion in the Classroom, Clinic and Beyond

Activism, Scholarship, and Radical Self-Care: a Conversation with ericka huggins

The virtually-moderated discussion between Huggins and Angela LeBlanc-Ernest will cover Huggins’ academic and community work, Black Panther Party Community Programs, and Huggins’ recent co-authored publication, Comrade Sisters: Women of the Black Panther Party.

Speaker Information

Ericka Huggins is an educator, Black Panther Party member, former political prisoner, human rights advocate, and poet. For 50 years, Ericka has used her life experiences in service to community. From 1973-1981, she was director of the Black Panther Party’s Oakland Community School. From 1990-2004 Ericka managed HIV/AIDS Volunteer and Education programs. She also supported innovative mindfulness programs for women and youth in schools, jails and prisons.

Ericka was professor of Sociology and African American Studies from 2008 through 2015 in the Peralta Community College District. From 2003 to 2011 she was professor of Women and Gender Studies at California State Universities- East Bay and San Francisco. Ericka is a Racial Equity Learning Lab facilitator for WORLD TRUST Educational Services. She curates conversations focused on the individual and collective work of becoming equitable in all areas of our daily lives. Additionally, she facilitates workshops on the benefit of self care in sustaining social change. She is co-author, with Stephen Shames, of the book, Comrade Sisters-Women of the Black Panther Party, published in 2022.

Angela D. LeBlanc-Ernest is an independent scholar, documentarian, multi-media content creator, oral historian, and community archivist whose projects focus on 20th-century social movement history, gender, education, and culture. She received a Bachelor’s in Afro-American Studies from Harvard University and a MA in History from Stanford University. She has spent her 30+ year career bridging the divide between academic institutions and communities by developing and participating in projects that have public history components and incorporating narrators themselves in the process. Most recently, she was a photographic archival and an oral history consultant for Comrade Sisters: Women of the Black Panther Party (2022), author of the books companion guide, the Comrade Sisters Women of the Black Panther Party Discussion and Resource Guide, and co-organizer of the Comrade Sisters book tour. Angela is the founding director of The OCS Project LLC, an academic research project that focuses on the Oakland Community School, one of the Black Panther Party’s educational institutions and flagship community programs. She also is the recipient of a 2022-2023 Oral History Association and National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for her to work on the Oakland Community School Oral History Project.