5 Alabama Women Named to Black Women's Hall of Fame

It's always exciting to see women of color doing amazing things in their community. I was perusing the internet as usual and came across an organization called, the Southern Rural Black Women's Initiative. This organization promotes the first human rights agenda in the United States aimed at eradicating historical race, class, cultural, religious and gender barriers experienced by southern rural black women.

Sounds cool huh?

According to SRBWI, Their Mission is to:

To nourish the internal capacity of women to take responsibility for their own lives, personally and externally;

To engage women in advocacy and policy initiatives that redirect local, state, and federal resources to help ensure women’s full participation and access to economic and social justice;

To engage women in an economic and community development agenda that includes workforce development;

To develop organizational capacity within the region to sustain this work; and

To build linkages with women’s groups committed to economic and social justice.

Every year the organization inducts new members in their Black Women's Hall of Fame. This year, they choose five Alabama women, along with numerous other women of color doing great things for their communities.

According to NBC 13, "Among the 5 Alabama women, they choose, Judson College artist-in-residence Billie Jean Young. Young founded and directed the Drama Project-Child Abuse Project, which uses improvisational drama to help women and children identify and respond to abuse, Carrie Johnson of Choctaw County, who spent more than six decades as an advocate for civil and human rights, Gwendolyn Patton, Earnestine Edwards-Williams and Arzula Johnson - are also civil rights advocates. Patton, who worked with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in her college years, established one of the first civil rights archives in the U.S. at Trenholm State Technical College.

So, to those women who have made a difference in the South for young women of color, thank you and Congrats on your accomplishments!

For more information about the Southern Rural Black Women's Initiative, please click here.