Sharpton, Dyson speaking at Tennessee State commencements

Friday, April 26, 2019, Vol. 43, No. 17

NASHVILLE (AP) — Civil rights leader and activist the Rev. Al Sharpton and Georgetown University professor and author Michael Eric Dyson are speaking at graduation ceremonies at Tennessee State University.

More than 1,000 undergraduate and graduate students are receiving degrees in ceremonies Friday and Saturday.

Sharpton was at Tennessee State in 2014 to urge induction of the 1957-1959 men's basketball team into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. The team won three national titles back to back. The team is to be one of 12 honorees enshrined this year. Sharpton is speaking Friday.

Dyson, who will speak Saturday, has written or edited more than 20 books on subjects including Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., Marvin Gaye and Hurricane Katrina. He's received awards including three NAACP Image Awards, the Southern Book Prize and the American Book Award.