University of Pennsylvania Names W.E.B. DuBois Honorary Emeritus Professor: After emerging from Philadelphia’s Black 7th Ward at the turn of the century with groundbreaking sociological research disproving the prevailing thought of the day that Blacks were inherently inferior to Whites, and even after writing two major books, including the Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study published by the University of Pennsylvania Press, W.E.B. DuBois still couldn’t get a job teaching at the University of Pennsylvania in the late 1890s.
That changed Friday when the university’s board of trustees unanimously voted to posthumously appoint DuBois Honorary Emeritus Professor of Sociology and Africana Studies. Arthur McFarlane, great-grandson of DuBois, received the resolution that granted his great-grandfather a professorship.
