From the 1820s — when East Tennessee was the epicenter of the abolitionist movement to the 1950s — when The Highlander Center played a key role in the Civil Rights Movement, the Appalachian Region has been the tip of the spear in the Civil Rights Movement. Speaker Dr. William H. Turner  has spent his professional career studying and working on behalf of marginalized communities, helping them create opportunities in the larger world while not abandoning their important cultural ties. One time chair of the Department of Social Sciences at Winston-Salem State University, Dr. Turner has also served as the Dean of Arts and Sciences and Interim President of Kentucky State University and as Distinguished Professor of Appalachian Studies and Regional Ambassador at Berea College. He is the author of The Harlan Renaissance: Stories of Black Life in Appalachian Coal Towns (2023 Kentucky Historical Society Governor’s Award and 2021 Weather Award) and co-editor of Blacks in Appalachia (1985). "Bill Turner knows more about black life and culture in the mountains of the American South than anybody in the world.” — Alex Haley, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Roots & The Autobiography of Malcolm X