Office
Box 90245
Durham, NC 27708-0245
112 Sanford Inst Bldg
Durham, NC 27708
Phone
(919) 613-7335
Links
Robert Korstad
Professor Emeritus of Public Policy
Bass Fellow
Areas of Expertise
- Ethics
- Leadership
- Race
Education
Ph.D., University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill (1987)
"America is at war with itself over the right to vote, or, more precisely, over the question of who gets to exercise that right and under what circumstances. North Carolina is a battleground for this debate, and its history can help us understand why--a century and a half after ratification of the 15th Amendment--we remain a nation divided over the right to vote." - Fragile Democracy
View the Fragile Democracy Online Exhibit
Prof. Bob Korstad taught K-12 teachers how to use grassroots stories of the civil rights movement in their classrooms:
In The News
Awards and Honors
Bio
Robert Korstad is Emeritus Professor of Public Policy and History at Duke University. He received his B.A. and PhD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
His research interests include twentieth century U. S. history, labor history, African American history, and contemporary social policy.
His publications include: Fragile Democracy: The Struggle Over Race and Voting Rights in North Carolina (coauthor, University of North Carolina Press, 2020); To Right These Wrongs: The North Carolina Fund and the Battle to End Poverty and Inequality in 1960s America (coauthor, University of North Carolina Press, 2010); Civil Rights Unionism: Tobacco Workers and the Struggle for Democracy in the Mid-Twentieth-Century South (University of North Carolina Press, 2003); Remembering Jim Crow: African Americans Talk About Life in the Segregated South (coeditor, The New Press, 2001); Like a Family: The Making of a Southern Cotton Mill World (coauthor, University of North Carolina Press, revised edition, 2000).
His research interests include twentieth century U. S. history, labor history, African American history, and contemporary social policy.
His publications include: Fragile Democracy: The Struggle Over Race and Voting Rights in North Carolina (coauthor, University of North Carolina Press, 2020); To Right These Wrongs: The North Carolina Fund and the Battle to End Poverty and Inequality in 1960s America (coauthor, University of North Carolina Press, 2010); Civil Rights Unionism: Tobacco Workers and the Struggle for Democracy in the Mid-Twentieth-Century South (University of North Carolina Press, 2003); Remembering Jim Crow: African Americans Talk About Life in the Segregated South (coeditor, The New Press, 2001); Like a Family: The Making of a Southern Cotton Mill World (coauthor, University of North Carolina Press, revised edition, 2000).
Representative Publications
Curing my historical schizophrenia (01/2016)
Reformers to Radicals: The Appalachian Volunteers and the War on Poverty Journal of Southern History (08/2010)
Civil Rights Unionism and the Black Freedom Struggle American Communist History (12/2008)
Selected Grants
Hart Leadership Fellows Program (Principal Investigator)
Bull City 150 (Principal Investigator)
Challenging the Master Narrative of the Civil Rights Movement (Principal Investigator)
J. Kirk Felsman Program on Children in Adversity: Felsman Fellowships (Principal Investigator)
Fund for Social Entrepreneurship (Principal Investigator)