Fireside Chat with Clint Smith – virtual

VIRTUAL event: Fireside Chat with Clint Smith, in partnership with Northern Illinois University

This fall the Arts in Action project has a series of programs planned, including New York Times best-selling author, Clint Smith. He will be part of a virtual conversation that will explore his book, How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning With the History of Slavery Across America along with his YouTube series, Crash Course Black American History.

“It is such an honor to have the opportunity to have Clint Smith be part of our Arts in Action conversation. His insights to understanding slavery as part of our country’s history are also relevant as the History Center and Ellwood House Museum are committed to shifting the local history narrative from a predominantly white experience to a more inclusive and accurate account,” explained Michelle Donahoe, DeKalb County History Center’s Executive Director. She continued, “We are extremely grateful to the DeKalb County Community Mental Health Board for funding this event, and for Northern Illinois University’s partnership.”

Clint Smith is a staff writer at The Atlantic. He is the author of the bestselling books, How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning With the History of Slavery Across America, which was a #1 New York Times Bestseller and a 2021 National Book Critics Circle Award Winner for Nonfiction, and the NYT bestselling poetry collection Above Ground (2023). Smith is also the author of Counting Descent, which won the 2017 Literary Award for Best Poetry Book from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association and was a finalist for an NAACP Image Award. He has received fellowships from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, New America, the Emerson Collective, the Art For Justice Fund, Cave Canem, and the National Science Foundation. His essays, poems, and scholarly writing have been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The New Republic, Poetry Magazine, The Paris Review, the Harvard Educational Review and elsewhere.

Previously, Clint taught high school English in Prince George’s County, Maryland where he was named the Christine D. Sarbanes Teacher of the Year by the Maryland Humanities Council. He is the host of the YouTube series Crash Course Black American History.

Additional Arts in Action programs funded by the DeKalb County Community Mental Health Board include: Dr. Anthony Delgado “Early Mexican Settlements in Railroad Boxcar Communities, the Chicago Metro Area and Midwest Region” on October 18, 6:00 at the DeKalb County History Center; “Too Close to Home: Tim Egan’s ‘Fever in the Heartland'” on November 9 at 6:30 at the DeKalb County History Center; and sponsored by Illinois Humanities, Ted Williams “1619: The Journey of a People, the Musical” on November 16 @ 6:30 p.m. DeKalb Public Library

The Clint Smith virtual program is on October 11 at 6:30 p.m. To sign up and learn more about all of the Arts in Action programs, visit the DeKalb County History Center’s website dekalbcountyhistory.org. For more information email info@dekalbcountyhistory.org or call 815-895-5762.