Solutions To Violence | Zoharah Simmons & Frank Joyce | October 7, 2024

Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons, Ph.D. is a retired Professor Emerita in African American and Religious Studies and affiliated Faculty in Women Studies at the University of Florida. She obtained her BA from Antioch University in Human Service, her MA in Religious Studies & her Ph.D. in Islamic Studies from Temple University. Zoharah Simmons became a SNCC (Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee) field secretary in the summer of 1964 when she joined hundreds of other college age volunteers who traveled to Mississippi to work in the Mississippi Freedom Summer Project. Dr. Simmons worked in the NY Office of SNCC organizing High School and College Friends. Simmons and a group of those who had worked on Julian Bond’s campaign formed the Atlanta Project of SNCC, which became the organization’s first major Southern urban project. Since her years with SNCC, Simmons has served as an organizer with the National Council of Negro Women and later with the American Friends Service Committee. Dr. Simmon’s primary academic focus was on Islamic Law and its impact on Muslim women. Frank Joice is a member of the National Council Of Elders and active on the planning committee of the King and Breaking Silence project. He is a long time Board member of the Michigan Coalition for Human Rights (MCHR). Joyce works on antiracist organizing with CHANGE IS THE POINT in Grosse Pointe, Michigan. His writing has been published at AlterNet, Riverwise, Counterpunch, The Fifth Estate, The Detroit Free Press and in many anthologies. He and Karin Aguilar-San Juan, are co-editors of The People Make The Peace, Lessons From The Vietnam Anti-War Movement. He is currently writing a book about unlearning white supremacy.