Dr. Toure Reed

- About
- Education
- Awards & Honors
- Research
Biography
Dr. Reed earned his BA in American Studies from Hampshire College (Amherst, MA), and his PhD in History from Columbia University (New York, NY). He is a fourth generation African American educator and third generation professor. Having spent his formative years in South West Atlanta, GA and New Haven, CT, Dr. Reed's research interests center on race, class, and inequality. In addition to being a historian of African American and 20th Century US History, Dr. Reed is a shred guitar enthusiast.
Current Courses
HIS 258.001 Afro-American History Since 1865
HIS 499.016 Independent Research For The Master's Thesis
HIS 287.001 Independent Study
HIS 400.002 Independent Study
HIS 490.007 Readings -- Field Of Study
HIS 421.001 Seminar: Topics In American Racial & Ethnic History
HIS 257.001 Afro-American History To 1865
HIS 111.001 American Diversity: Contested Visions Of The U.S. Experience
HIS 287.002 Independent Study
HIS 490.009 Readings -- Field Of Study
HIS 328.001 The Modern Civil Rights Movement, 1933-1968
Teaching Interests & Areas
Professor Reed's courses center on black social, political, and intellectual history. His courses draw from US urban and labor history.
Research Interests & Areas
Professor Reed's research projects focus principally on the impact of race and class ideologies on African American civil rights politics and US public policy from the Progressive Era through the Presidency of Barack Obama. Dr. Reed is the author of Not Alms But Opportunity: The Urban League and the Politics of Racial Uplift, 1910-1950 (UNC Chapel Hill Press, 2008) and Toward Freedom: The Case Against Race Reductionism (Verso Books, 2020). He is also co-author of Renewing Black Intellectual History: The Ideological and Material Foundations of Black American Thought (Paradigm Publishers, 2009 hardcover, 2010 paperback). Professor Reed's articles have appeared in the Journal of American Ethnic History, LABOR, nonsite.org, Catalyst, Blackagendareport.com, Commondreams.org, Dissent Magazine, Jacobin, the Nation, and The New Republic.
Dr. Reed is currently engaged in research for two monographs. Menace II Equality: How the Entertainment Industry Sold Reaganism to African Americans and New Deal Civil Rights: Class Consciousness and the Quest for Racial Equality, 1933-1948.
Dr. Reed has received numerous grants and fellowships including the prestigious Kluge Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Library of Congress in support of New Deal Civil Rights.
Ph D History
M Phil History
MA History
BA American Studies
Influential and Inspirational Professor
Influential and Inspirational Professor
Distinguished Lecturer
Influential and Inspirational Professor
Influential and Inspirational Professor
Influential and Inspirational Profesor
Influential and Inspirational Faculty
Impact Award
Outstanding College Researcher in the Humanities
Influential and Inspirational Faculty
Book Review
Book, Authored
Book, Chapter
Reprint of “Black Exceptionalism and the Militant
Capitulation to Economic Inequality,” New Politics Vol. 17, No. 2 (Winter 2019)
Encyclopedia
Journal Article
8-11, https://newpol.org/authors/rred-toure-f/
Democracy and the Complexities of Black Politics”
in Symposium in Honor of Judith Stein, nonsite.org, No. 29 (Fall 2019),
https://nonsite.org/grangers-challenge-to-the-youth-steins-challenge-to-historians-industrial-democracy-and-the-complexities-of-black-politics/
https://catalyst-journal.com/vol1/no4/between-obama-and-coates
Magazine/Trade Publication
Reprint of “Blinded by a Moralistic Outrage: From the 1994 Crime Act to Trump 2.0,” in The Road to Trumpism—Two of the Paths that Brought Us Here a Special Section nonsite.org, No. 50, 6/14/25
Other
nonsite.org No. 17 (Fall 2015), https://nonsite.org/issues/issue-17-the-moynihan-report-and-the-crescent-city/
Presentations
Americans,” Illinois State University, College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Lecture, 3/27/24, https://news.illinoisstate.edu/2024/03/dr-toure-reed-history-professor-to-deliver-spring-college-lecture-march-27/?utm_source=Relay&utm_medium=Email