What would justice look like for Emmett Till 64 years after his death became a symbol of the U.S. civil rights movement?
Rutgers scholar Christine Zemla traveled to the Mississippi Delta to pose that question to the Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., Till’s cousin and the last living eyewitness to his abduction, in preparation for her new fall course, “Remembering Emmett Till.”
“Till’s story is Trayvon Martin’s story. It’s Michael Brown’s story. It’s the continuing story of African-American boys who are still being targeted without justice served,” said Zemla, a professor in the Department of American Studies in the School of Arts and Sciences at Rutgers University–New Brunswick. “I want students to know the roots of his history, so they can have a deeper understanding of what still needs to be done.”
