Reparations, Resistance & Radical Imagination: Queen Mother Moore

Join us for an evening of conversation and reflection with historian Dr. Ashley Farmer, author of Queen Mother: Black Nationalism, Reparations, and the Untold Story of Audley Moore, a groundbreaking portrait of one of the most influential yet overlooked figures in twentieth-century Black freedom movements.

Through Queen Mother, Farmer reintroduces audiences to Audley “Queen Mother” Moore, whose decades of activism helped shape movements for reparations, Black nationalism, and Pan-African liberation from Harlem to Ghana. Farmer’s work reframes Moore as a political visionary whose ideas remain foundational to current struggles for racial justice, self-determination, and repair.

Dr. Farmer will be joined in conversation with Dr. Brandi T. Summers, Associate Professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Columbia University. A book signing will follow.

Copies of Queen Mother: Black Nationalism, Reparations, and the Untold Story of Audley Moore will be available for purchase from the Schomburg Shop in Harlem. Also, view photographs of Audley “Queen Mother” Moore by Kwame Braithwaite (1938-2023) in our current exhibition, 100: A Century of Collections, Community, and Creativity.

Accessibility requests can be made by e-mail [email protected].

Dr. Ashley D. Farmer is an award-winning writer, researcher, and cultural analyst who explores Black history and its implications today. She is the author of Queen Mother: Black Nationalism, Reparations, and the Untold Story of Audley Moore. And her first book, Remaking Black Power, was shortlisted for numerous awards. Farmer’s ideas and insights have appeared in numerous venues, including Harper's Bazaar, NPR, The Washington Post, and Teen Vogue. Farmer is an Associate Professor at the University of Texas at Austin.

Brandi T. Summers, PhD is Associate Professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies and Director of Graduate Studies at Columbia University. Prior to joining the faculty at Columbia in 2024, Dr. Summers was Associate Professor of Geography at UC Berkeley. Her research examines the relationship between and function of race, space, urban infrastructure, and architecture. Her first book, Black in Place: The Spatial Aesthetics of Race in a Post-Chocolate City (UNC Press, 2019), explores how competing notions of blackness organize efforts to structure economic relations and develop land in gentrifying Washington DC. Her second book, Oakland Echoes: Reimagining and Reclaiming the Black City (under contract with the University of California Press), highlights the roots and routes of resistance and reclamation, not only as a response to urban renewal, gentrification and related economic policies, but also as a quest to think about the past, present, and future of a Black city. Dr. Summers is a Contributing Writer for Places Journal and has published several articles and essays that analyze the relationship between race, power, aesthetics, and urbanization that appear in both scholarly and popular publications, including New York Times, The Boston Globe, and Antipode.

This year, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture is celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding! Join us all year long for a wide array of special events, exhibitions, and more as we celebrate this milestone and continue the legacy of Arturo Schomburg.

Schomburg100 | Exhibition | Special-Edition Library Card | Become a Member

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FIRST COME, FIRST SEATED Events are free and open to all, but due to space constraints registration is requested. Registered guests are given priority check-in 15 to 30 minutes before start time. After the event starts all registered seats are released regardless of registration, so we recommend that you arrive early. We generally overbook to ensure a full house.

GUESTS Please note that holding seats in the Langston Hughes Auditorium is strictly prohibited and there is no food or drinks allowed anywhere in the Schomburg Center.

ACCESSIBLILITY Accessibility requests can be made by e-mail [email protected].

E-TRANSPORTATION NYPL policy prohibits electric transportation devices (e.g., motorbikes, e-bikes, e-scooters, e-skateboards) from being brought into or stored at library sites for any length of time, as this is the best way to keep our spaces & people safe.

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PRESS Please send all press inquiries (photo, video, interviews, audio-recording, etc) at least 24-hours before the day of the program to Leah Drayton at [email protected].

Please note that personal and professional video recordings are prohibited without expressed consent.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, 515 Malcolm X Blvd, New York, United States

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