Professor Rachel Marie-Crane Williams (GWSS, School of Art & Art History) has recently published two graphic novel-style books on race relations during the world wars.
Williams' graphic novel-style books—or "graphic historiographies," as she calls the true accounts—detail often-forgotten chapters of American history during the world wars.
Run Home If You Don't Want to Be Killed recounts the civil unrest of 1943 Detroit, which was dubbed the Detroit race riots. That June, a wave of violence and destruction swept the city. Though it remains unclear what sparked the riots, thousands were arrested and 34 people killed, most of whom were Black and nearly half of whom were killed by police.
Her second new book, Elegy for Mary Turner, chronicles a spate of lynchings during World War I in Valdosta, Georgia. Through artwork, collages, and historical documents, Williams details a grieving widow's efforts to bring her husband's killers to justice, only to suffer the same horrific fate.