At the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, celebrating Black history lifts the topic out of the textbook, highlights current scholarship on campus, and engages the community in further research.
The activities are very much in the spirit of “sankofa,” a word from the African Twi language that refers to looking to the past to inform the future, explained Shaina Anderson, humanities librarian at the John C. Hodges Library, who chaired the 2025 Frederick Douglass Day committee.
The week leading up to Frederick Douglass Day, observed on Feb. 14, offered multiple activities, and dovetailed with the UT Libraries Love Data Week.
“We’re progressing into more data-driven scholarship, so It’s important for us to make sure that we are making things accessible,” Anderson said.