Valerie Grim Research Collection

Permanent link for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/2022/27340

Dr. Valerie Grim is a Professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Indiana University-Bloomington. She holds a M.A. and Ph.D. in history from Iowa State University and received the undergraduate degree from Tougaloo College, a Historically Black College located in Tougaloo, Mississippi. She currently holds positions as Director of Undergraduate Studies and Director of the Thomas I. Atkins Living Learning Community. She is the former chair (12 years) of the Department of African American and African Diaspora Studies as well as former Director of Graduate Studies. Dr. Grim is an affiliate of the Center for Research on Race & Ethnicity in Society at Indiana University Bloomington, She has engaged in diverse committee work in and outside of the academy. These efforts have spanned more than 30 years and over 60 different committees, many of which involved engagement with students and collaborations with academic and living communities throughout the United States and Africa. As a scholar, Grim researches and publishes in the area of twentieth and twenty-first centuries African American rural history. She has conducted research and provided lectures in North America, Europe, South America, Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean. This collection comprises a selection of her work on land justice.

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    Q&A Session Land, Wealth, Liberation: The Making & Unmaking of Black Wealth in the USA Launch Event
    ([Bloomington, Ind.] : Indiana University, 2022-03-24) Grim, Valerie; Gifty Opoku-Agyeman, Anna
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    Land, Wealth, Liberation. Dr. Valerie Grim - Struggles in Building Black Wealth
    ([Bloomington, Ind.] : Indiana University, 2022-03-24) Grim, Valerie
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    African American Rural Culture, 1900-1950
    (University of Missouri Press, 2003) Grim, Valerie
    Between 1900 and 1950, the social, political, and economic conditions of African Americans living in rural communities throughout the United States were atrocious. Housing, for the majority, was poor, wages were low, and educational opportunities were limited for rural black children. Many felt oppressed, exploited, and in serious need of relief. Opportunities for self-identity and expression of beliefs and values evolved, however, within rural enclaves throughout the South. African American rural culture was quite diverse and represented interactions across institutional, religious, social, racial, class, recreational, and gender lines. Culture, as defined here, includes any act, behavior, idea, value system, or activity that illustrates how blacks lived and celebrated life at work, school, church, home, and throughout the community. Landowners, tenants, renters, sharecroppers, day laborers, and simple rural nonfarming residents composed this rural population. Businesspeople, teachers, and preachers provided leadership.
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    Between Forty Acres and a Class Action Lawsuit: Black Farmers, Civil Rights, and Protest against the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1997-2010
    (University Press of Florida, 2012) Grim, Valerie
    In 1999, for the first time in American history, black farmers brought a successful class action law suit, Pigford v. Glickman, against the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the institution they called the “Last Plantation.” For years black farmers claimed discrimination in federally funded agricultural programs (for example, Extension Service, Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service, and Farmers Home Administration). The USDA did nothing to prevent local and state agricultural agencies charged with implementation of its federal farm programs from establishing oppressive and racist operational practices and procedures. Grim claims that black farmers placed their land loss and other related agricultural and farming struggles right in the middle of the contentious civil rights struggle in the United States.
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    The 1890 Land-Grant Colleges: From the New Deal to the Black Farmers' Class-Action Lawsuit, 1930s-2010s
    (University of Alabama Press, 2015) Grim, Valerie
    The chapter focuses on a broad range of issues and topics to examine how the 1890 land-grant institutions addressed issues that Black families faced living in rural and agricultural America. Discussions focus on presidential leadership and the president’s operating philosophies concerning the mission of Black land-grants, their reactions to and assessment of certain components of the New Deal and related subsequential federal farm programs, educational outreach that addressed farm, family, and community needs, partnerships with government agencies and organizations, and Black land-grants’ responses to the Black farmers’ lawsuit against the USDA.
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    African American Landlords in the Rural South, 1870-1950: A Profile
    (Agricultural History, 1998) Grim, Valerie
    African American landlords in the post-Civil War American South have been underrepresented in historical accounts. The landlords were relatively few in number, but they had significant impact on the African American community. African American landlords acted as spokespersons for the community, negotiated with whites about political matters and offered better opportunities to black laborers than white landlords did.
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    Women as Agricultural Landowners: What Do We Know About Them?
    (Agricultural History, 1993) Effland, Anne B.W.; Rogers, Denise M.; Grim, Valerie
    Evidence suggests that American women have owned and had control over more agricultural land than generally believed, but they have not always operated the land they own. Women's landownership is sometimes disguised because researchers considered land jointly owned by husband and wife as male-owned. Statistics, relevant laws, summaries of interviews with women landowners and other information on land ownership, methods of acquisition and land use by women are presented.
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    The Impact of Mechanized Farming on Black Farm Families in the Rural South: A Study of Farm Life in the Brooks Farm Community, 1940-1970
    (Agricultural History, 1994) Grim, Valerie
    Advances in farming mechanization effectively put most African American farmers in the South out of business. Wealthier White farmers were able to invest in farming techniques that were less labor-intensive and more capital-intensive. Consequently, African American farmers were forced to either cease their operations and migrate or find alternative, low cost farming techniques that would allow them to stay in business. Most migrated or went out of business, and those that stayed were probably financially unable to leave.
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    The High Cost of Water: African American Farmers and the Politics of Irrigation in the Rural South, 1980-2000
    (Agricultural History, 2002) Grim, Valerie
    Only in the last two decades have African American and southern farmers had to think about drought and irrigation needs in a significant way. Since 1980 farmers in the South have been slowly adopting schemes to address the economic stress of drought and a lack of irrigation systems. For many producers, especially African Americans, insufficient water for irrigation has resulted in low yields, low profits, long-term debt, and a need for resources to reverse these trends. You can also read the article on the Duke University Press platform for 'Agricultural History' at https://read.dukeupress.edu/agricultural-history.
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    Black Participation in the Farmers Home Administration and Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service, 1964-1990
    (Agricultural History, 1996) Grim, Valerie
    Lack of access to federal farm agencies has handicapped African American farmers. Before the civil rights movement in the 1960s, farm support programs openly discriminated against black farmers. Despite a later policy by the USDA to end discrimination in federal programs, African Americans continued to be separated from assistance programs due to lack of knowledge of available opportunities and loans. Conservative attitudes and the drive to eliminate special minority favors in the 1980s have made discrimination against black farmers more acceptable.
This collection contains the published version of selected articles by Dr. Grim, under special permission from the publishers who hold these rights. Special thanks to the Agricultural History Society, Taylor & Francis, the University of Missouri Press, the University of Alabama Press, and the University of Florida Press.