One of the most impactful methods of nonviolent activism at UW-Madison can be found in scholarships, the Chancellor Scholarship and Powers-Knapp Scholarship, now known as the Mercile Lee Scholars Program. This program, named after Mercile Lee, a lifelong advocate for Civil Rights and racial equality, aims “to attract, support and develop the abilities and potential of academically talented and outstanding individuals from underrepresented groups.”
biography
Barrier Breakers – Remembering Ada Deer
Earlier this month, on August 15th, the esteemed Menominee leader Ada Deer passed away. Her impact on Native communities across the nation, as well as her influence at UW-Madison, was enormous and serves as inspiration to all who hear her story.
America Bracho – Sharing Our Fire
This oral history interview was conducted by Gabe Sanders with America Bracho, a lifelong community organizer and has founded several health programs for Latinos across the country.
La Hora de Actuar (The Time to Act)
In the midst of a global pandemic and social reckoning, a contentious national election culminated in a Black woman assuming the office of Vice President for the first time in the country’s history. Her name is Francia Márquez, and she is the human and environmental rights activist who went from teenage mother working as a housekeeper to second in command of Colombia’s executive branch.
Juno Frankie Pierce: The Untold Story of a Southern Suffragist
Juno Frankie Pierce, more well-known as Frankie Pierce, was born in Nashville, Tennessee in 1864. She was the daughter of Frank Seay, a freedman, and Nellie Seay, a former slave to Colonel Robert Allen, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
How Martin Luther King Jr. found his Love-Force
This article explores King’s upbringing, influences, and his intellectual journey towards discovering the concept of Satyagraha.
The Final Flame: An Obituary to Venerable Thích Nhất Hạnh (1926-2022)
Dear Thay (as your students refer you ‘Master’)…
Nichidatsu Fujii: A Buddhist Pacifist?
Nichidatsu Fujii (1885-1985) was a Japanese Buddhist monk and peace activist who founded the Buddhist order Nipponzan Myōhōji in 1918. Nipponzan Myōhōji is a small lay and monastic order of about 1500 people that continues to be active to the present day, and scholars consider it to be one among Japan’s many new religious movements, albeit much smaller in terms of its size and scale than other groups in this category.
Toyohiko Kagawa: Gandhi of Japan?
Toyohiko Kagawa (1888-1960) was a Japanese social reformer, labor activist and Christian evangelist known as “Japan’s Gandhi.” As a social activist, pacifist and public figure, Kagawa was well-known during his lifetime – both in his home country of Japan as well as in the United States. He was nominated for the Nobel Prizes in literature and peace on numerous occasions.
Ready, Willing, and Able to Fight – How Judy Heumann Advanced the Disability Rights Movement
For the last three decades, millions of American parents have been able to park their minivans between parallel white lines – avoiding the spaces with the blue and white logos that depict a stick figure in a wheelchair – and usher their child into a stroller, which they can push up a portion of the curb gradually sloped from the asphalt up to the sidewalk, before guiding the stroller up a concrete ramp and through an entrance wide enough to fit it.