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Katherine Bankole-Medina, Professor of History

Dr. Katherine Bankole-Medina joined Coppin State University’s department of History, Geography and Global Studies as Professor of History and Chair of the Department in August 2008. She is a Distinguished Faculty Researcher at CSU. Before coming to CSU, she was a tenured Associate Professor of History in the Department of History at West Virginia University (Morgantown, WV). While holding a joint tenure-track faculty appointment, she also served as the administrative Director of the Center for Black Culture and Research; and Coordinator of the Africana Studies Program at WVU. In addition, Dr. Bankole-Medina was employed at several notable research institutions including: Xavier University (Department of History, New Orleans, LA), the University of Virginia (Luther Porter Jackson Black Culture Center, Charlottesville, VA), and Kean University (Africana Studies, Human Relations Center, Union, NJ).

Dr. Bankole-Medina is the author of many scholarly publications including the groundbreaking text Slavery and Medicine: Enslavement and Medical Practices in Antebellum Louisiana (Washington, D.C.: Liberated Scholars Press, 2017; and New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1998). Her paper, “In the Age of Malcolm X: Social Conflict and the Critique of African American Identity Construction” appears in James L. Conyers, Jr. and James Smallwood’s, Malcolm X A Historical Reader (Baltimore, MD: Carolina Academic Press, 2008). She published several entries in the Encyclopedia of African Religion (edited by Molefi Kete Asante and Ama Mazama), and book reviews including a review of slavery and botanical medicine for the Journal of Southern History. Building on her previous work as the Historical Consultant for Caminho De Sao Tome: A Documentary on Cape Verde, she published the chapter “Mulheres Africanas Nos Estados Unidos,” in Afrocentricidade: Uma Abordagem Epistemologica Inovadora (Sankofa: Matrizes Africanas Da Cultura Brasileira 4 by Elisa Larkin Nascimento, Sao Paulo, Brasil: Selo Negro Edicoes, 2009.) In twentieth century African American history, her articulation of the life and legacy of Charles Hamilton Houston was published in one book edited by James L. Conyers Jr., and another scholarly paper on Houston appears in a CSU conference proceeding. Dr. Bankole-Medina is founding editor of Africalogical Perspectives a scholarly journal and senior editor of Women of African Descent and Justice in World Societies (with Dr. Abena Lewis-Mhoon and Prof. Stephanie Yarbough). Currently, articles on Malcolm X and the history of antebellum diagnostic racism are pending peer review. Furthermore, Dr. Bankole-Medina is also author of the first book published on the Baltimore Uprising, entitled World to Come: The Baltimore Uprising Militant Racism and History (2016). In addition, she published in 2016 Self-Emancipated and Unforgotten Women with Dr. Abena Lewis-Mhoon; and a paper in the prestigious journal Phillis (edited by Dr. Claudia Nelson) on the life and legacy of Fanny Jackson Coppin.

Dr. Bankole-Medina has received numerous awards and grants for research and scholarship in higher education. In 2009 she received the Distinguished Faculty Researcher Award at CSU. Further, in 2007 she received the WV Humanities Council Grant for her research on Africana Women. In 2006 Bankole-Medina was named the Judith Gold Stitzel Endowment Teacher for her research addressing instructional themes, gender and enslavement. In 2004-2005 Bankole-Medina was named Humanities Scholar for the West Virginia Humanities Grant Project “Segregation and Integration of High School Sports in West Virginia” (Project Coordinators Drs. Dana Brooks and Ronald Althouse). Dr. Niyi Coker featured her in the documentary Black Studies USA and she served as Historical Consultant and Television Show Host for Dreamcatchers Productions and the Dolphi Media Group (2004-2006). In 2003 she was recognized for her contributions to the state at the West Virginia Black Heritage Festival; and received the “Living the Dream” Award for Scholarship, an honor from the state of West Virginia’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday Commission. Twice cited among West Virginia’s “most influential” people, Dr. Bankole-Medina is moderator of “History is a State of Mind,” an independent and facilitated faculty discourse (blog and YouTube video podcasts) on history, race, culture and the African American experience. In 2016 Dr. Bankole-Medina was awarded the Chester W. Gregory Colloquium Scholarship and Research Award for “her commitment to scholarly research and publication along with her efforts to promote History at Coppin State University”; and in 2017 she received the Keynote Speaker Excellence Award for the university’s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday Observance.

For more than twenty years, Dr. Bankole-Medina has taught an extensive selection of courses in history and Africana Studies including: African American Cultural and Intellectual History, African American History (I&II), African American Women’s History, United States History (I&II), History of Black Nationalism, History of Enslavement in the United States, History of Science, Medicine and Technology, Introduction to Latin American History, African History, and graduate (master’s and doctoral candidates) seminars in history and Black Studies.

A sought after lecturer, Dr. Bankole-Medina delivered major addresses (The Merze Tate, Carter G. Woodson and African American History Month lectures) on such topics as “The Historical Legacy of the Nadir and the Moral-Jurisprudential Principles of Charles Hamilton Houston,” “Evidence of Africans in the Vanguard of American Citizenship: The Primacy of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution,” and “Slavery and Antebellum Medicine: Historical Perspectives on the Study of the Science of Healing.”

Dr. Bankole-Medina has served the community in various areas: educational access, historical and cultural competency in Africana Studies, diversity, public health, race relations, labor studies, and social justice. She founded two Black women’s community associations in the 1980s and 1990s, served as a consultant in conflict mediation with secondary school students and adults in the urban corridor (New Orleans, New Jersey, and Tennessee); and developed and supervised three Black heritage academies (Saturday schools) for K-12 youth. Her service activities involved chairing the 20th annual Cheikh Anta Diop International Conference plenary where she introduced the keynote speaker, Creator and Founder of the African American holiday celebration of Kwanzaa, Dr. Maulana Karenga. She was one of six scholars across the nation appointed to the executive planning board of the Diopian Institute for Scholarly Advancement (DISA), which assumed leadership for the Cheikh Anta Diop International Conference. At that time she was also named conference historian/archivist, and in 2016 she was named Executive Director. Dr. Bankole-Medina edited the special edition of the scholarly journal Africalogical Perspectives, commemorating the legacy of the Cheikh Anta Diop International Conference.

In addition, Dr. Bankole-Medina is a member of several national professional historical organizations. She is a life member of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, the Association of Black Women Historians, and the African American Intellectual History Association. Dr. Bankole-Medina is also a founding member (with noted Cuban Linguist and Latin American Studies scholar Caridad Morales-Nussa) of the Tau Epsilon Chapter of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. In addition, she was named a fellow to the Molefi Kete Asante Institute in Philadelphia.

Recent Publications

Katherine Bankole-Medina, Professor of History

RESEARCH AND PUBLICATIONS

Academic Books:

Katherine Bankole-Medina, Self-Emancipated and Unforgotten Sisters: Memorial Accounts of Africana Women, 1815-1898, Silver Spring, MD: Society of Africana Women Studies Scholars, 2016.

Katherine Bankole-Medina, World To Come: The Baltimore Uprising, Militant Racism and History. Washington, D.C.: Liberated Scholars Press, 2016.

Katherine Bankole, Slavery and Medicine: Enslavement and Medical Practices in Antebellum Louisiana, New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1998.

Editorial Work:

Women of African Descent and Justice in World Societies, Vol. 1 (2014), Katherine Bankole-Medina, Abena Lewis-Mhoon, and Stephanie Yarbough (eds).

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (2014) Vol. 10, No. 1, The Decade Edition, Katherine Bankole-Medina and Abena Lewis-Mhoon (eds).

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (2013) Vol. 8/9, No. 1. Katherine Bankole-Medina (ed.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (2011) Vol. 7, Nos. 1, Katherine Bankole-Medina and Elizabeth Clark-Lewis (eds).

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (2009) Vol. 6, Nos. 1, Katherine Bankole-Medina and Roger A. Davidson, Jr. (eds.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (2008) Vol. 5, No. 1. Katherine Bankole-Medina (ed.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (December 2006/January 2007) Vol. 3/4, No. 1. Katherine Bankole-Medina (ed.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, (November/ December, 2005) Vol. 2, No. 2. Katherine Bankole (ed.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, Special Edition, Brown v. Board of Education in West Virginia (September/October, 2005), Vol. 2, No. 1. Katherine Bankole (ed.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, Special Edition, Africana Women (October/November, 2004) Vol. 1 No. 2. Katherine Bankole (ed.)

Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies (January/February, 2004) Vol. 1, No. 1. Katherine Bankole (ed.)

Articles, Chapters in Books, Reviews, Entries and Essays:

Katherine Bankole-Medina, “Introduction to the Life and Legacy of Fanny Jackson Coppin,” Phillis: The Journal for Research on African American Women (edited by Dr. Claudia D. Nelson and Dr. Natalie Tindall), 2016.

Katherine Bankole-Medina, “The Historical Legacy of the Nadir and Houstonian Jurisprudence in the Origins of the Modern Civil Rights Movement,” in Charles H. Houston: An Interdisciplinary Study of Civil rights Leadership, edited by Dr. James L. Conyers (Lexington Books, 2012).

Katherine Bankole-Medina, “Commanding Pestle and Mortar: Research Notes on the Odyssey of Black Women’s Studies, History and Pedagogy,” edited by Ida Jones and Lopez Matthews, (September, 2012).

Katherine Bankole-Medina, “Trust God…But Makin’ Our Tea: The Slave Narratives and Indications of African Agency in the Treatment of Illness in Louisiana,” Synergy, edited by Elizabeth Clark-Lewis, Washington, D.C.: The A.P. Foundation Press, 2011.

Katherine Bankole (Medina). “Mulheres Africanas Nos Estados Unidos,” Afrocentricidade: Uma Abordagem Epistemologica Inovadora (Sankofa: Matrizes Africanas Da Cultura Brasileira (4)) by Elisa Larkin Nascimento (org.) Sao Paulo: Selo Negro Edicoes, 2009. [Katherine Bankole (Medina), “African Women in the United States,” Afrocentricity: An Innovative Epistemological Approach (Sankofa: Matrices of Brazilian Culture Vol. 4) by Elisa Larkin Nascimento (ed.) Black Stamp Editions, 2009]).

Katherine Bankole (Medina), Encyclopedia Entries, “Goddesses,” “Babalawo,” “Clitorectomy,” “Creation,” “Cultural Relocation,” “Disease,” “Medicine Man and Woman,” “Ase, Ase,” “Birth,” “Sankofa (Film)” Entries to the Encyclopedia of African Religion, Vols. 1 & 2, edited by Molefi Kete Asante and Ama Mazama. Los Angeles: Sage Reference Publication, 2009.

Katherine Bankole Medina, “The Historical Legacy of the Nadir and the Moral-Jurisprudential Principles of Charles Hamilton Houston,” Coppin State University Faculty Research and Development Conference Papers, edited by Emmanuel Anoruo, Jacqueline Brice-Finch, Harry Legum and Elias L. Taylor, Coppin State University: Baltimore, Maryland 2008, pp. 23-44.

Katherine Bankole (Medina), Chapter, “In the Age of Malcolm X: Social Conflict and the Critique of African American Identity Construction,” in James L. Conyers, Jr. and James Smallwood, Malcolm X A Historical Reader. Baltimore, MD: Carolina Academic Press, 2008.

Katherine Bankole Medina, Book Review: African American Slave Medicine: Herbal and Non-Herbal Treatments by Herbert C. Covey, Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2008.

Katherine Bankole, “Researching the Lives of the Enslaved: The State of the Scholarship,” in The Handbook of Black Studies, edited by Molefi Kete Asante and Maulana Karenga. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2006.

Katherine Bankole, Book Review: John Brown Russwurm and the American Civilizing Efforts in Liberia and Maryland in West Africa, 1799-1851 by Amos Beyan, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

Katherine Bankole, “Instructional Themes in Twentieth Century African American Women’s History,” in Africalogical Perspectives: Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Race and Africana Studies, Special Issue on Africana Women (October/November, 2004) Africalogical Perspectives.

Katherine Bankole, Entry “James Derham,” African American National Biography, edited by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, W.E.B. DuBois Institute for Afro-American Research at Harvard University and Oxford University Press, 2003.

Katherine Bankole, “The Use of Electronic Information Technology in Historical Research on African Diaspora Studies and the Emigration to Liberia (1827-1901),” Liberian Studies Journal, Fall, 2001.

Katherine Bankole, “A Critical Inquiry of Enslaved African Women and the Antebellum Hospital Experience,” Journal of Black Studies, Vol. 31, No. 5, 517-538, May 2001.

Katherine Bankole, “Plantations Without Slaves: The Legacy of Louisiana Plantation Culture,” book chapter, Plantation Society and Race Relations, edited by Thomas J. Durant and J. David Knottnerus, New York: Praeger, 1999.

Katherine Bankole, “The Human/Subhuman Issue: Notes on Physiological and Pseudo-Scientific Theories and Slave Medicine in Louisiana,” Race, Gender & Class, Vol. 5, No. 3, 1998.

Katherine Bankole, “Beyond Black History Month and Toward the Curriculum of Inclusion,” Black Issues in Higher Education,” February 11, 1993, Vol. 9, No. 25.^[1]

[1]The name of the journal was changed to Diverse: Issues in Higher Education.

Media Coverage

Dr. Bankole-Medina was awarded sabbatical and a prestigious 2018-2019 Inclusion Imperative Visiting Faculty Fellowship from the Dresher Center for the Humanities at UMBC, funded by the Mellon Foundation (https://dreshercenter.umbc.edu/inclusion-imperative

Social Media

@KBankoleMedina

Country Focus

United States

Expertise by Geography

Africa, Atlantic, Caribbean, Latin America, United States

Expertise by Chronology

19th century, Early Modern, Modern, 20th century, 21st century

Expertise by Topic

Colonialism, Emancipation, Medicine, Public History, Race, Rebellion & Revolution, Science, Slavery, Technology, Women