Margaret Prescod is an activist, author, journalist and radio host. She was a founder of The Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders and of Black Women for Wages for Housework. Prescod is on the executive board of the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice & Health, at

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

Early life and education

Prescod was born in

Barbados Barbados, officially the Republic of Barbados, is an island country in the Atlantic Ocean. It is part of the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies and the easternmost island of the Caribbean region. It lies on the boundary of the South American ...

and emigrated to the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

in 1962 as a teenager. Within her first two weeks of moving to the United States she was on a picket line, protesting against a medical centre in

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

that would not employ Black people. Prescod attended

Long Island University Long Island University (LIU) is a private university in Brooklyn and Brookville, New York, United States. The university enrolls over 16,000 students and offers over 500 academic programs at its main campuses, LIU Brooklyn and LIU Post on Long I ...

for her undergraduate studies. She started a course at the

Teachers College, Columbia University Teachers College, Columbia University (TC) is the graduate school of education affiliated with Columbia University, a private research university in New York City. Founded in 1887, Teachers College has been a part of Columbia University since ...

, but left to work in remedial teaching for adults. Prescod became increasingly active in the civil rights movement.

Career

In the early 1970s Prescod started to focus her activism on initiatives that looked to improve the welfare of mothers. At the time she was working as a school teacher in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. She became involved with the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

, and was part of the series of conferences that were part of the Decade for Women. She launched the International Black Women for Wages for Housework programme with Wilmette Brown in 1975. In 1980, she wrote ''Black Women: Bringing it All Back Home'', the first book that explored the relationship between women, immigration and race. In 1985, she moved to

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, where she became involved with the Utility Workers Union of America. Prescod was involved with the

Wages for Housework A wage is payment made by an employer to an employee for work done in a specific period of time. Some examples of wage payments include compensatory payments such as ''minimum wage'', ''prevailing wage'', and ''yearly bonuses,'' and remunera ...

campaign, and delivered evidence at both the Democratic and Republican Party annual conventions. In particular, Prescod looked to involve women's unwaged work in consideration of economic analyses. In 1986, Prescod founded the Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders, which was established in response to the murder of eleven women in

South Los Angeles South Los Angeles, also known as South Central Los Angeles or simply South Central, is a region in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, lying mostly within the city limits of Los Angeles, south of Downtown Los Angeles, downtown. It is de ...

. She was concerned with ensuring that the coalition looked to encourage the police and policy makers to investigate the murders and not to malign the victims. The organisation wound down in the mid 1990s, but was restarted in 2008 when the serial killer returned. In 2014 her efforts were turned into a film by

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

, ''Tales of the Grim Sleeper'', which was nominated for an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence ...

. She is presently the host and executive producer of the Sojourner Truth radio show which is broadcast by

KPFK KPFK (90.7 FM) is a listener-sponsored radio station based in North Hollywood, California, which serves Southern California. It was the second of five stations in the non-commercial, listener-sponsored Pacifica Radio network. KPFK 90.7 FM be ...

and syndicated by radio stations

WPFW WPFW (89.3 FM) is a public radio and jazz music community radio station, serving the Washington metropolitan area. It is owned by the Pacifica Foundation, wit studios located on K Street, NW, Washington, D.C. The station's slogan is "Jazz and J ...

(Washington DC) and

WBAI WBAI (99.5 FM) is a non-commercial, listener-supported radio station licensed to New York, New York. Its programming is a mixture of political news, talk and opinion from a left-leaning, liberal or progressive viewpoint, and eclectic musi ...

in New York City, named after the abolitionist and women's rights activist

Sojourner Truth Sojourner Truth (; born Isabella Bomefree; November 26, 1883) was an American Abolitionism in the United States, abolitionist and activist for African-American civil rights, women's rights, and Temperance movement, alcohol temperance. Truth was ...

Personal life

Her daughter, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, is a cosmologist, science writer and equality activist.

Selected publications

References

External links

* http://sotrueradio.org
"The Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Murders"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Prescod, Margaret Living people Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century African-American people African-American activists American civil rights activists Barbadian women activists Long Island University alumni Women civil rights activists Women non-fiction writers