Associate Professor of African American History

Year Joined RCNJ: 2005

Contact Information

• Phone: (201) 684-7568
• Email: dcolman@ramapo.edu
• Office: A-215
• Office Hours: TF 10:00-11:30 am

Education:

• B.A., Macalester College
• M.A., University of Iowa
• Ph.D., University of Iowa

Courses Offered:

• Age of Segregation
• Black Power Years
• Introduction to African American History I
• Introduction to African American History II
• American Foreign Relations in the 20th Century
• Cold War
• Twentieth Century United States Social History
• Introduction to United States History II
• Contemporary Africa
• Social Issues
• History Seminar
• Hip Hop & Society
• Political Legacy of Malcolm X

Teaching Interest:

• African American History
• U.S. Foreign Relations
• U.S. Labor and Social history.

Research Interest:

• African American Social and Political Movements
• African Americans and Global Affairs
• Race and Liberalism
• Race and the American Working Class.

Recent Publications:

Books:

• IT’S A HARD ROCK LIFE: GROWING UP WITH CRACK COCAINE AND NEW YORK CITY. (In Progress)
• RACE AGAINST LIBERALISM: BLACK WORKERS AND THE UAW IN DETROIT. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2008.
• A HISTORY OF THE LABOR MOVEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES. Des Moines, IA: Iowa Federation of Labor-AFL-CIO, 2001.
• STANDING STRONG: A HISTORY OF CEDAR RAPIDS CARPENTERS UNION 308. Iowa City, Iowa: Parker Davis Graphics, 1999.

Articles:

• “From Fellow Traveler to Friendly Witness: Shelton Tappes and the Politics of Race and Anti-Communism in the United Auto Workers.” In Labor’s Cold War: Local Politics in a Global Context, ed. Shelton Stromquist, Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2008.

Conference Presentations:

• 2012      “Roundtable: David Golland’s Constructing Affirmative Action: The Struggle for Equal Employment Opportunity,” Annual Meeting of the National Association of Ethnic Studies, April 5-7, 2012, New Orleans, Louisiana.
• 2011      “Roundtable: Ethical and Personal Responses to Hurricane Katrina,” 25^th Anniversary Celebration of the Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African-American Studies, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York.
• 2010      “Roundtable: Philip Muehlenbeck, ed., Race, Ethnicity, and the Cold War: A Global Perspective,” Race and Identity in World History Conference, November 11-13, Monmouth University, Monmouth, New Jersey.
• 2009      Chair, “A Common Dilemma: History and Self Image in the Classroom,” Annual Meeting of the Organization of American Historians, March 26-29, 2009, Seattle, Washington.
• 2007      “Separate Lanes: Race, Bowling, and Working-Class Solidarity,” Annual Conference of the Working Class Studies Association, June 14-17, 2007, Macalester College, Minneapolis, Minnesota.