The Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change is pleased to announce that the Religious Communication Association (RCA) awarded Hooks Scholar in Residence, Andre E. Johnson its “Book of the Year Award” for No Future in This Country: The Prophetic Pessimism of Bishop Henry McNeal Turner. The Association gives the award to the book that “contributes to the communication discipline,” but more specifically, to the “study of religious communication.” Organizers will present the award to Dr. Johnson at their annual conference and awards banquet on Wednesday, November 17, 2021, in Seattle, Washington.

RCA is an academic society founded in 1973 for scholars, teachers, students, clergy, journalists, and others who share an interest in religious speech, rhetoric, media, and performance. The association is nonsectarian and provides a setting for professionals of various faiths, or no faith, to study problems of communication and religion. Through its annual conferences and quarterly Journal of Communication and Religion, the association fosters significant scholarship and respectful dialogue that reflects the diverse beliefs, subject matter concerns, methodologies, and professions of RCA members.

Dr. Andre E. Johnson is an Associate Professor of Rhetoric and Media Studies in the Department of Communication and Film at the University of Memphis and is the editor of the forthcoming, The Press, The Platform, and the Pulpit: The Speeches of Bishop Henry McNeal Turner. (University Press of Mississippi, 2022)