Barbara Ransby is a historian, author and longtime activist and organizer. She has been involved in the Black freedom movement, feminist struggles, and social and economic justice projects for nearly forty years. Dr. Ransby received her undergraduate degree from Columbia University in New York and her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. As a student, she was deeply involved in the anti-Apartheid and Divestment movements. She later co-founded the United Coalition Against Racism at the University of Michigan; Ella’s Daughters, a national network of women working in Baker’s tradition; African American Women in Defense of Ourselves in 1991; and the Black Radical Congress in 1998.
Ransby is best known for her award-winning biography of civil rights icon, Ella Baker, entitled: Ella Baker: A Radical Democratic Vision. She also published a biography entitled: Eslanda: The Large and Unconventional Life of Mrs. Paul Robeson, which chronicles the subject’s anti-colonial work at the United Nations and beyond. Her most recent book is Making All Black Lives Matter: Reimagining Freedom in the 21st Century in which she maps the Black feminist roots of the movement. Dr. Ransby is a Distinguished Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago where she directs the Social Justice Initiative, a project that builds bridges between university-based scholars and community social change makers. She was also the editor and chief of the journal, Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture and Society (2013-2023), serves on the editorial board of the London-based journal, Race and Class, and publishes regularly in popular and scholarly outlets, including: In These Times, The Nation Dissent, and The Boston Review. She lectures widely at conferences and on college campuses across the country and internationally.
Barbara Ransby grew up in a working class Black neighborhood in Detroit in the 1960s and 70s, where her social and political activism began. She has been involved in many progressive campaigns over the years. Most recently she has worked with and lent support to, the Movement for Black Lives, and The Rising Majority. She is also a founding member of Scholars for Social Justice. She is a former board member of the Woods Fund of Chicago, and currently serves on the boards of Equity and Transformation, and Organized Communities Against Deportations. She is past president of the National Women’s Studies Association (2016 -2018), recipient of the 2018 Angela Davis Award for scholarship in the public good from the American Studies Association and the 2022 Franz Fanon Lifetime Achievement Award from the Caribbean Philosophical Association. She was co-chair of the Transition Team of Chicago’s progressive mayor, Brandon Johnson, who assumed office in 2023.