This is the rural area outside of Fisk University where Willie goes to support himself with a teaching job during the summer. Meeting less educated, poorer rural workers from a part of the country where more racial prejudice exists influences Du Bois future writings. It is also where he has his first sexual experience with a woman.
This remarkable University teaches a high level of liberal arts education, and because of this white philanthropists who might otherwise give it money regard it as a threat. Du Bois teaches at Atlanta for a number of years, and here he helps the college publish a series of deeply important long-term studies on the African American experience. The campus grounds are attractive and well groomed, but just outside the campus students find themselves in slums. The city.....
