Dr. Ronald Sharps Publishes Book on African American Identity Celebrating African American Art and Culture

Dr. Ronald L. Sharps, Associate Dean of the College of the Arts, recently published a book, Black Folklorists in Pursuit of Equality: African American Identity and Cultural Politics, 1893-1943. He also contributed historical chronologies on black Catholics in two books published last year: The Fire This Time: A Black Catholic Sourcebook, Kim R. Harris, M. Roger Holland II, and Kate Williams, eds. (GIA Publications, 2023), and Slavery and the Catholic Church in the United States: Historical Studies, David J. Endres, ed. (Catholic University of America Press, 2023).

In Black Folklorists in Pursuit of Equality, Dr. Sharps traces characterizations of the inner life of African Americans after the Civil War regarding two questions posed by folklorists–what do legends, folk songs, superstitions, sayings, and traditions reveal about who we are as a people and how might this folklore suggest a path forward as a people in society? In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, folklorists asked each nation and race to investigate these questions. Intersecting with their struggle for survival, during the Jim Crow era, blacks aligned this effort with their pursuit of civilization and equality. From this perspective, Sharps’ research refutes previous scholarship that asserts that blacks had no culture while in slavery, that blacks were only informants of that culture, or that they primarily sought to make their folk culture seem less foolish. Sharps details interpretations of African American folklore by nine black and interracial groups, noting their conflicting conclusions and identifying paths toward equality.

A former student of American culture at George Washington University, Sharps has taught American cultural history, art history, and arts management. He was formerly the Executive Director of the Maryland Commission on African American History and Culture and, prior to that, Program Director for Culture and Worship at the National Office for Black Catholics. Through his recent publications, Sharps has continued to contribute to these areas of interest and engagement. Each of the black Catholic chronologies include over 400 historical entries, suggesting shifts in the relationship between the Catholic Church and African Americans since the 15th century. Like his cultural history of black folklore, Black Folklorists in Pursuit of Equality, the black Catholic chronologies are the most comprehensive available on the subject.