Dr. Raja Malikah Rahim is an Assistant Professor of History and African American Studies in the Department of History at the University of Mississippi.
Research Interests
As a social and cultural historian, Dr. Rahim's research interests expand to include United States History, African American History, Sport History, and Oral History, as well as Public History and Digital Humanities.
Dr. Rahim’s research agenda and innovative scholarship focus on the perspective of often-marginalized people, communities, and institutions that served as catalysts of change with the hope of representing and acknowledging the diverse and global world of the past and present.
Her current research, and first book project, places Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and HBCU sports at the center of the long Black Freedom Movement by chronicling the history of the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (CIAA) through the broader lens of Black college basketball. She examines how African Americans built an autonomous institution in opposition to racism and white supremacy and created an organizing tradition around college basketball in the 20th century to articulate and enact what she calls the “politics of Black athletic emancipation.”
Biography
A native of Richmond, Virginia, Dr. Raja Malikah Rahim serves as an Assistant Professor of History and African American Studies at the University of Mississippi. She received her B.A. and M.A. degrees in history from North Carolina Central University, where her passions for history and sports blossomed. She received her PhD in history from the University of Florida, where she specialized in oral history through the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program. Prior to her arrival at UM in Fall 2024, Dr. Rahim served as a postdoctoral fellow for the James Weldon Johnson Institute for the Study of Race and Difference at Emory University, which followed her stint at Appalachian State University as an Assistant Professor of African American History.
Publications
Selected Publications:
“Black Student Activism and Sport: Ronald Coleman and the Black Campus Movement at the University of Florida, 1968-1972,” International Journal of Africana Studies, special edition on Africana Sports Studies and History (expected Spring/Summer 2025).
“‘I Am Not Worried About Ali’: Bill Russell, Jim Brown, and the Negro Industrial Economic Union.” In Picturing Black History: Photographs and Stories that Changed the World, 159-164. New York: Abrams Book, 2024.
"Speaking Out Loud About Sports: Introducing Oral History as Sport History," Journal of Sport History 50, no. 3 (Fall 2023): 409-411.
"’Our Life Out of the Dungeon’: Robert L. Vaughan and the Racial and Cultural Politics of Black College Basketball," Journal of Sport History 50, no. 3 (Fall 2023): 412-429.
Raja Malikah Rahim and Rita Liberti, “Roots of Resistance: The Origins of the Black Women in Sport Foundation and the Politics of Race and Gender,” Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal 31, (Summer 2023): 55-62.
Courses Taught
- HST 415 / AAS 326 African American History since 1965
- HST 418 / AAS 362 African American Women’s History
- HST 420 / AAS 440 African Americans in Sports
- HST 696 African American History Selected Topics
Education
Ph.D. History, University of Florida (2021)