Pictured above (left to right) are Diahann Carroll, award-winning star of television’s “Julia” series (aired 1968-1971, IMDb photo); Queen Fatima Atahiya Chui, a Cleveland-based designer and entrepreneur, and Regennia N. Williams. (Photos courtesy of Queen Fatima Atahiya Chui and Regennia N. Williams)
Please join members of RASHAD and other friends of the arts and humanities on Thursday, November 20, 2025, from 5:30 to 7:30 PM for a special celebration titled Good Health, Hats, and Headwraps for the Holiday Season. This event, held in recognition of both National Headwrap Day and International Education Week, draws inspiration from the work of the Cleveland Council of Black Nurses, television’s “Julia Baker” (a character brought to life by the late Diahann Carroll), and the rich fashion traditions of Africa and the African Diaspora. Co-sponsored by the RASHAD Center, Inc., this program is also one of the complementary activities for the Western Reserve Historical Society’s “Race, Place, and Community-Based Healthcare” exhibition.
As part of this pre-Kwanzaa event, we will feature demonstrations by Queen Fatima Atahiya Chui, owner of Kings and Queens Cultural Village in Cleveland. Guests will enjoy light refreshments, engaging conversations, and informative presentations, including details about Cuyahoga County’s CROWN Act. Attendees are welcome to wear African-inspired attire, though it is not required, and all are encouraged to participate.
The program will take place in the African American History Gallery and the adjacent reception area of the Cleveland History Center, located at 10825 East Boulevard in Cleveland’s University Circle neighborhood. Admission to the event is included with general museum entry: $15 for adults, $13 for seniors, $10 for college students, and $8 for children ages 3–12. Admission for WRHS members is free of charge.
Please save the date, watch for additional details, and contact Dr. Regennia N. Williams at regennia@gmail.com with questions.
About Dr. Regennia N. Williams, Founder, President, and Executive Director
Dr. Regennia N. Williams is the Founder and Executive Director of The RASHAD Center, Inc., a Maryland-based non-profit educational corporation.
Williams holds a PhD in Social History and Policy from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. A native Clevelander and a four-time alumna of Cleveland State University, information on RASHAD's “Praying Grounds, African American Faith Communities: A Documentary and Oral History” project is now available online at www.ClevelandMemory.org/pray/, a site that is maintained by CSU's Library Special Collections, home of the Praying Grounds manuscript collections. Praying Grounds was the primary inspiration for the launching of the Initiative for the Study of Religion and Spirituality in the History of Africa and the Diaspora (RASHAD) at CSU, and links to RASHAD's scholarly journal and newsletter are also available on the Praying Grounds site. On April 28, 2020, the RASHAD Center, Inc. became a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
In 2010, Dr. Williams was a Visiting Fulbright Scholar at Nigeria’s Obafemi Awolowo University, where she taught history and directed a RASHAD-related oral history project that focused on the role of religion in recent Nigerian social history. Other research-related travels have taken her to Canada, China, France, South Africa, and Austria.
In 2013, she conceived and produced “Come Sunday @ 70: The Place of Duke Ellington’s Sacred Jazz in World History and Culture, c. 1943-2013,” a project that included scholarly presentations and performing arts activities. From September 1993 until May 2015, she was a faculty member in the Department of History at Cleveland State University. She served as a Fulbright Specialist at South Africa's University of the Free State in the summer of 2019, and completed a short-term faculty residency at Howard University in the fall of 2019. She is based in Cleveland, Ohio.
As a public scholar, her current research projects focus on African American history and culture, especially as it relates to music, religion, and spirituality. She is a member of the Oral History Association, the Western Reserve Historical Society, and the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
The RASHAD Center, Inc. 