By Adam Holmes, Assistant Director, W. E. B. Du Bois Center
In late 2018, the director of the W. E. B. Du Bois Center, Whitney Battle-Baptiste, set herself a challenge to read a chapter, article, essay, or speech by Du Bois each day for a month, immersing herself in his scholarship, analysis, and rhetoric. Benjamin Nolan ’25PhD, then a graduate student in the political science department at UMass Amherst and a fellow at the Du Bois Center, was inspired by this and approached the Center about establishing a weekly reading group. “I was in a liminal moment in my graduate studies, transitioning to the intense solitude of dissertation research and writing, and thought it would be amazing if we could come up with a way to develop a kind of community ritual in the same spirit,” Ben reflected later.
The Du Bois Center hosted the inaugural “Breakfast with Du Bois” on the 22nd floor of the Library on February 4, 2019. Ben facilitated a group reading and discussion of a speech Du Bois gave as a Harvard student in 1890, “Jefferson Davis as a Representative of Civilization.” Fittingly for this first iteration of the reading group, the piece was taken from the W. E. B. Du Bois Papers. The group met again the next week, and the next, and each week after that until the end of the semester. Throughout this time, the community which Ben had sought grew to encompass graduate students, library staff, undergraduate students, faculty members, and members of the local community. Following a unanimous group vote in May 2019, it was decided to keep the Breakfasts going over the summer, as many of the regular participants planned to remain in the area during that time. The Breakfasts with Du Bois would become one of only a few year-round programs at UMass Amherst.
Photo: L to R: Adam Holmes, Ben Nolan ’25PhD, Camesha Scruggs
At the beginning of the 2019-2020 academic year, facilitation of the Breakfasts with Du Bois was taken over by Aaron Yates, then a graduate student in the sociology department, now assistant professor of Black Studies at Denison University. His stewardship of the in-person reading group continued until its last meeting on March 9, 2020. A week later, staff, students, and faculty were sent home as the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic forced the community to go into lockdown for its own protection. Aaron was instrumental in designing and implementing the transition from in-person to online Breakfasts with Du Bois, observing that a space where people could come together to read, discuss, and share ideas was needed more than ever. The murder of George Floyd later that spring brought an increase in attendance at the Breakfasts as people began to feel a greater sense of urgency around questions of racist violence and anti-Blackness in America and globally. Reading and discussing Du Bois together helped the attendees at the Breakfasts not just to learn more about the long historical roots of the crisis, but also to form bonds of solidarity and express collective feelings in a moment of extreme stress.
The transition to Zoom allowed people to attend the reading group in greater numbers and from a greater variety of places. Since the spring of 2020, people have dialed into the Breakfasts from more than twenty different U.S. states, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, South Africa, Angola, Ghana, Portugal, Sweden, the United Kingdom, South Korea, and many other places. As such, when it was possible to return to in-person sessions, the Du Bois Center chose to keep the Breakfasts on Zoom to allow full participation. They continue to convene online each Monday at 9:30 am, Eastern Standard Time. Since Aaron stepped down in the summer of 2020, it has been my privilege to facilitate the Breakfasts and witness firsthand the wonderful ways in which they encourage discussion, shared learning, solidarity, and friendship.
Photo: Breakfast with Du Bois on Zoom
The strength of the community around the Du Bois Breakfasts comes across in the testimony of its most regular attendees. Onawumi Jean Moss, a local storyteller, told me that “becoming a Breakfast with Du Bois reader has been an absolute blessing for this elder. I have been a social justice advocate all my life. Yes, from childhood until now. Reading W. E. B. Du Bois’s writings with this intergenerational, multicultural group has been both intellectually and personally valuable for me.” Charles Walker-Hoover ’26, president of the UMass Amherst chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), writes that “in just one year of attending this group, I’ve gained a wealth of knowledge, including life lessons.”
“It’s hard to describe the power of immersing oneself into Du Bois’s work in this way; the act of reading aloud, with a group of voices representing different attributes; age, gender, race; people different from different geographies and backgrounds, brings the work alive. Reciting the words yourself and hearing people voice Du Bois’s words every week is an unique and enriching event.”
—Anthony Starks, Breakfast with Du Bois participant
What makes the Breakfasts with Du Bois so successful as a means of engaging with historical texts and coming to grips with contemporary issues of significance? The foremost reason is the profound relevance of Du Bois’s writings to our own time. Charles characterizes Du Bois as “a beacon of guidance for our contemporary society.” “There’s always something in his writings that connects to contemporary history and current events,” writes Phillip Luke Sinitiere, Senior Research Fellow at the Du Bois Center. “His observations often anticipated future trends or from the vantage point of the present provide insight into current political or cultural conditions. The Du Bois breakfast gatherings have demonstrated to me how durable Du Bois’s thoughts and ideas are.”
Du Bois’s writing also has a magisterial and lyrical quality, even at its most rigorously intellectual, that makes it ideal for reading out loud. Cheryl Townsend Gilkes says, “Du Bois writes to be understood but so richly that skimming does him a great disservice. Every word matters, and reading aloud makes us recognize that.” The poetic lyricism and rhetorical thrust of Du Bois’s use of English are not only a pleasure to experience but also give the texts a vividness and immediacy that is denied to writers not blessed with Du Bois’s immortal talents. Reading aloud, and actively listening to others do so, is an intimate and meaningful experience that opens up a text, revealing hidden subtleties.
“I forget how we came up with the idea of reading the texts aloud,” says Ben, “but to me the significance of it is that it makes sure that everyone’s voice is literally heard even before the open conversation begins. Moreover, it turns reading itself, which for me at least had become an overwhelmingly solitary practice, into a communal one, prompting each of us to engage with the text through the eyes and ears of every other reader in the circle.”
Photo: Breakfast with Du Bois in person
The success of the Breakfasts as a format embodies the Du Boisian ideals of making knowledge and scholarship accessible to all. No prior knowledge of the text being read in any particular week is expected or required, and the discussion is always generated organically by the group, not led by one individual facilitator. As such, it can take unexpected turns and lead to exciting and dynamic conversations.
Democratizing access to knowledge is one of the core principles of the University Libraries as well. The
W. E. B. Du Bois Papers are available digitally, in full, for free, to anyone with an internet connection. The power of this is testified to by another Breakfast with Du Bois regular, Donna Gouger. “Through the Du Bois archives we are presented with the opportunity to learn from his wisdom, and be inspired to strive for the world become a better, more just, place for all people,” she writes.
Donna describes the Du Bois Breakfasts as a “shared communion.” “We come together,” she writes, “young, elders…across the spectrum of age, circumstance, and life experience. We all carry our life experience and the weight of the future. Across not only the U.S. but worldwide connections. We come together for shared wisdom.”
The Breakfasts have been running now for seven years. At the time of writing, the reading group has met 307 times. Millions of words, thousands of pages, and scores of individual texts have been read and digested by an ever-changing community of dedicated individuals hungry for knowledge and determined to forge a better future for the country and the world.
To join the Breakfast with Du Bois, email Adam Holmes at holmes@umass.edu.