Geneva Napoleon Smitherman

Dr. Geneva Napoleon Smitherman is University Distinguished Professor Emerita at Michigan State University, USA. A former high school English and Latin teacher in Detroit and a scholar-activist in Black Studies, she has been at the forefront of the struggle for language rights since the 1960s. She is author of six books, including Black Language and Culture, Talkin and Testifyin, Talkin That Talk, and Routledge Linguistics Classic Word from the Mother. She is coauthor or editor of ten books, including Articulate While Black (with Dr. H. Samy Alim).