Jackson, Jacquelyne Johnson | Minorities and Aging

First edition, first printing of what at the time was considered the “most complete work on minority aging” (”Women in Duke Health” online exhibition, Duke University Medical Center Archives). Presentation copy inscribed by the author on the inside of the upper wrapper, “To Leslie, So that you will learn more and more each day about the graceful aging you do! Jackie”.

Author Jacquelyne Johnson Jackson (1932-2004) was inspired to study aging as an undergraduate when elderly friends of her family were forced to sell their home and enter public housing to afford medical care. She earned her master’s degree in sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and completed her PhD at Ohio State, then joined the faculties of a number of universities including Duke, Howard, and Jackson State. She held leadership positions in numerous organisations, serving as president of the National Council on Black Aging, president of the Association of Behavorial and Social Scientists, Chair of the Caucus of Black Sociologists, and as a fellow of the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

“Dr. Jackson was a national expert in aging and a pioneer in the study of aging in Black Americans. Her first important work was her doctoral dissertation, published in 1962 as These Rights They Seek (Washington: Public Affairs Press). Her emphasis was on the unique needs of the older black population and the importance of government involvement in meeting those needs. Her subsequent work, Minorities and Aging (Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth Co., 1980), echoed this theme though the content was expanded to include other minority groups... Her first priority in the late 1960s was to point to the lack of empirical data on the black elderly that could be used to direct research and policy... To help fill this gap, she began research on older black women, finding that in the aggregate, black women faced an exacerbation of problems seen earlier in life as a result of racism, economics, and isolation. An activist in the Civil Rights movement, Dr. Jackson has addressed race-based affirmative action, the bell curve, and the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas controversy of 1991 as scholarly works” (Duke).