Each year, Edmonds Community College celebrates the life, work, and message of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. This year’s theme is “Shift Happens…Be the Shift,” and the keynote speaker at Edmonds CC this Thursday, Jan. 14 is Dr. Michael Eric Dyson.

Dyson will speak at 12:30 p.m. to the campus community in the Black Box Theatre on campus, 20310 68th Ave. W, Lynnwood. He will be back again at 7 p.m. to speak to the community.

Dyson, who is an American Book Award recipient and two-time NAACP Image Award winner, has been named one of the 150 most powerful African Americans by Ebony magazine. The Philadelphia Weekly noted that Dr. Dyson “is reshaping what it means to be a public intellectual by becoming the most visible black academic of his time.”

His first book, 1993’s Reflecting Black: African American Cultural Criticism, helped establish the field of black American cultural studies. Dyson’s first book on Martin Luther King, 2000’s I May Not Get There with You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr., made a significant contribution to King scholarship by recovering the radical legacy of the slain civil rights leader. His book, The New York Times best-selling April 4, 1968: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Death and How It Changed America, has been hailed by The Washington Post as “an excellent sociological primer on institutionalized racism in America.”

Dyson has appeared on nearly every major media outlet, including The Today Show, Nightline, O’Reilly Factor, The Tavis Smiley Show, and Real Time with Bill Maher — as well as such shows as Rap City, Def Poetry Jam, and The Colbert Report. He is also a contributing editor of Time magazine. In addition, he hosts an hour-long news and talk program on NPR, “The Michael Eric Dyson Show.”

Dyson is a Professor of Sociology at Georgetown University where, in 2011, he received widespread attention for his course “Sociology of Hip-Hop: Jay-Z.”

Reservations are strongly recommended. Reserve your free ticket at www.blackboxedcc.org.  Here are directions to the college.