IRAAS Conversations Lecture Series - Fall 2005
“Performing Venus: The Historical Legacy of Black Female Commodification.” with speakers Yaba Blay and Kaila A. Story

**Dr. Yaba Blay is a professor, producer, and #ProfessionalBlackGirl. As a researcher and ethnographer, she uses personal and social narratives to disrupt fundamental assumptions about cultures and identities. Dr. Blay received her BA in Psychology (Cum Laude) from Salisbury State University, M.Ed. in Counseling Psychology from the University of New Orleans, and M.A. and Ph.D. in African American Studies from Temple University with a Graduate Certificate in Women’s Studies. She is currently the Dan Blue Endowed Chair in Political Science at North Carolina Central University.


**Dr. Kaila Story is Associate Professor, Women's and Gender Studies, with a joint appointment in the Department of Pan-African Studies. She holds the Audre Lorde Chair in Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Dr. Story and Jaison Gardner also host a weekly radio show of musings on politics, pop culture and black gay life called Strange Fruit. It airs every Saturday night after Tavis Smiley on wfpl (89.3). You can find past episodes here: http://wfpl.org/programs/strange-fruitand here: http://strangefruitpod.org.

Performing Venus: The Historical Legacy of Black Female Commodification.Fall 2005

IRAAS is an intellectual community that bridges scholarship, teaching, and public life.
 
We envision the project of African American Studies as a multi-disciplinary enterprise. Our faculty employ an array of theoretical approaches and methodological strategies to examine historical and contemporary formations in black culture, politics, and society.
 
The Institute has a rich tradition of scholarship which capitalizes upon our unique location in New York City, especially the dynamic community of Harlem. Currently, IRAAS engages in a broad program of research and teaching that attends to the diversity of black experiences in the global diaspora.

The Institute for Research in African-American Studies of Columbia University, founded in July 1993 by Dr. Manning Marable, is an academic resource center. The purposes and activities of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies are grounded within the best scholarship of the black intellectual tradition.

Performing Venus: The Historical Legacy of Black Female Commodification.Fall 2005

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