This week our first and second-year cohorts of Ph.D. students have worked at refreshing the shelves of the Brockway room library, adding to our collection hundreds of books that used to belong to our beloved Leith Mullings (1945-2020), distinguished professor of anthropology at the Graduate Center. A pioneer of Black feminism, Prof Mullings’ scholarship was deeply committed to social justice, and her legacy will inspire generations of students to come.

Mullings’ daughter, Alia Tyner-Mullings, an associate professor of sociology at Guttman Community College and a Graduate Center alumna (Ph.D. ’08, Sociology) said, “Beyond her family, our mother’s greatest joy was her students. She gave her all to her students.” 

Professor Mullings obtained her Ph.D in anthropology from the University of Chicago in 1975, before joining Yale University as a lecturer (1972-1974). She then took on the title of assistant professor of anthropology at Columbia University in 1975, and became associate professor in 1981. In 1983, Mullings left Columbia for the Graduate Center where she served as distinguished professor until her retirement in 2016.