Billie Jean Young

Billie Jean Young

BILLIE JEAN YOUNG lives in Pennington, Alabama, her hometown. She was educated in Choctaw County schools and holds degrees from Selma University, Judson College, and Samford University’s Cumberland School of Law. A former Jackson State University Assistant Professor of Speech and Dramatic Art, she teaches at Mississippi State University Meridian campus. From the late 1960s into the early ’90s, she was a national and international leader in development opportunities for rural women, especially African Americans. She co-founded and directed the Southern Rural Women’s Network (SRWN) before writing and producing her best known work: Fannie Lou Hamer: This Little Light..., a one-woman play based on the life of the Mississippi Delta freedom fighter and human rights activist. In recognition of her work in preserving the history of African American women through the play and for her organizing work through the SRWN, Young was named a 1984 MacArthur Fellow by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.