Miriam DeCosta-Willis

Biography

Miriam DeCosta-Willis (November 1, 1934 – January 7, 2021) was an American educator, writer, and civil rights activist. The first African-American faculty member at Memphis State University, having previously been denied admission to the school as a graduate student due to her race, she spent her career as a professor of Romance languages and African-American studies at a variety of colleges in Memphis, Tennessee, and the Washington, D.C., area. From the 1960s, she was active in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

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