---
title: A More Perfect Telling of the American Story
date: 2024-02-28T05:30:00-05:00
author: University of Maryland
canonical_url: "https://today.umd.edu/a-more-perfect-telling-of-the-american-story"
section: Articles
---
# A More Perfect Telling of the American Story

*February 28, 2024* — by [Jessica Weiss ’05](/author/jessica-weiss-05)


> ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan Co-authors New Book That Proposes Novel Approach to Confronting Racism in America

*Shonekan book option3 1920x1080 — In a book that will be published this week, ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan teams up with a former colleague from a very different background to explore how race has shaped life in the United States.*

One week after Stephanie Shonekan arrived in Bloomington, Indiana, from Nigeria for graduate school, her husband, Tomiwa, was out for a walk when a white man stuck his head out of a truck window and yelled a racial slur.

Shonekan had thought she understood racism in America, having studied the works of African American authors like Langston Hughes and Toni Morrison and the music of Louis Armstrong and Miles Davis.

“But there was nothing that could have prepared me for that moment,” said Shonekan, now the dean of the University of Maryland’s College of Arts and Humanities and a professor of ethnomusicology.


*Stephanie Shonekan headshot*



**Sidebar note:**

This is one of a series of Maryland Today features during Black History Month celebrating Terp faculty, staff, students and alums.





**Topics:** [Research](https://today.umd.edu/tags/research)


**Tags:** [Books](https://today.umd.edu/topic/books), [Black History Month](https://today.umd.edu/topic/black-history-month), [Research](https://today.umd.edu/topic/research), [Multicultural Community](https://today.umd.edu/topic/multicultural-community)


**Units:** [College of Arts and Humanities](https://today.umd.edu/topic/college-arts-and-humanities)