Karsonya "Kaye" Wise Whitehead is an American educator, author, radio host, speaker, and documentary filmmaker who is known as the #blackmommyactivist. She is the founding director of The Karson Institute for Race, Peace, and Social Justice, a Professor of Communication and African and African American Studies at Loyola University Maryland, and the host of Today With Kaye on WEAA.[1][2] Whitehead is also an Opinion Editorial columnist for the Baltimore Afro-American.[3]
Whitehead was a middle school teacher in Baltimore City. She was also a documentary filmmaker with Metro TV, a PBS-affiliate and a senior producer for Music Television Networks (MTV). In 2001, she directed and produced The Twin Towers: A History which was nominated for a New York Emmy Award,[7] her third nomination.
Whitehead had served as the National Secretary for the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH),[8] the National Secretary and as the National President (2020-2023) for the National Women's Studies Association (NWSA).[9]
Awards
In 2020, Whitehead was selected by the Daily Record as one of Maryland's Top 100 Women;[10] by the Baltimore Sun as the Best Radio Host.[11] In 2019, Whitehead received the Collegium Visionary Award from the college of Holy Cross;[12] the Exceptional Merit in Media Award (EMMA) from the National Women's Political Caucus for her work editing and compiling #BlackGirlActivism: Exploring the Ways We Come Though the Storm,[13] a special issue of the Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism journal (Duke University Press); the Baltimore Sun named her as one of Baltimore's 25 "Women to Watch in 2019"; and, Essence magazine included her on the 2019 "Woke 100 List," of "black women advocating for change."[14][15]
In 2021, Whitehead was named a "Leader in Diversity" by Baltimore Business Journal.[16] In 2016, Whitehead received the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies' "Distinguished Alumni" Award from the University of Notre Dame.[17][18] In 2014, she received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Progressive National Baptist Convention. In 2013, she received the Faculty Award for Excellence in Engaged Scholarship from Loyola University Maryland.[19]
In 2021, Kaye received the Edward R. Murrow Regional Award in the inaugural category, Excellence in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (Region 12); 2021 Chesapeake Associated Press Award for Outstanding Editorial or Commentary; and, was selected by the Baltimore Business Journal to receive the Leaders in Diversity Award.[20] She also received The Amistad Award for her contributions to human rights and social justice from the Amistad Committee.
Writing
Whitehead is a curriculum writer who created and compiled the crowd-sourced Trump Syllabus K12 curriculum: Lesson Plans for Teaching During this New Age of Resistance.[21]
Whitehead is the author of four books including Letters for My Black Sons: Raising Boys in a Post-Racial America[22] and Notes from a Colored Girl: The Civil War Pocket Diaries of Emilie Frances Davis[23] which was reviewed in Journal of American History.[24] A documentary film The Women of Philadelphia was made about the book [25] and it received both the 2015 Darlene Clark Hine Award from the Organization of American Historians[26] and the 2014 Letitia Woods Brown Book Award from the Association of Black Women Historians.
