His book on the Greensboro sit-in movement, "Civilities and Civil Right," won the first Robert F. Kennedy book award in 1981.
CHAPEL HILL, NC, November 11, 2022 /24-7PressRelease/ -- William H. Chafe has been included in Marquis Who's Who. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
Dr. Chafe came to the Duke History department in 1971, five months after receiving his Ph.D. from Columbia. Within a year, he and his colleague Larry Goodwyn (also five months out of graduate school) started the Duke Oral History Program. They raised millions of dollars to support graduate students who wished to use oral histories to better understand the origins of Black and white activists in the civil rights movement. Over forty years, their program graduated 38 Ph.D.s. Twenty-eight of these published their dissertations as books, and 16 of these won national book awards. To carry forward this program, Chafe founded the Duke Center for Documentary Studies in 1989.
In 1981, Chafe was named the Alice Mary Baldwin Distinguished Professor of History. He has taught a broad range of courses, focusing on women's history (he has written four books in that field), racial and civil rights issues (another six books), and political history since the New Deal. He was chosen as chair of the History Department in 1990, then became Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and Vice-Provost of undergraduate education from 1995-2004.
The author of fourteen books, Dr. Chafe has garnered widespread recognition for his scholarly achievements and administrative skills. While Dean, he increased the number of Black faculty by 150 percent, and the non-white composition of the undergraduate student body from 15 to 35 percent. His textbook, "The Unfinished Journey: America Since World War II," is now in its ninth edition. His book on the Greensboro sit-in movement, "Civilities and Civil Right," won the first Robert F. Kennedy book award in 1981.
As a result of his achievements, Dr. Chafe was chosen as president of the Organization of American Historians during the late 1990s, and in 2010, was selected as recipient of the Roy Rosenzweig Distinguished Service Award from the Organization of American Historians. He is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
After officially retiring in 2012, Dr. Chafe has continued to teach seminars in both the History Department and the Sanford School of Public Policy, while also writing additional books related to his expertise in race and gender equality.
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