Ernst Borinski

Ernst Borinski (November 26, 1901 – May 26, 1983) was a German-Jewish sociologist and intellectual, who contributed to undermining Jim Crow laws in Mississippi during the 1950s and 1960s.

Background

Borinski was born in the city of Kattowitz, in then-German Empire (now Katowice, Poland). His undergraduate studies were completed at the University of Berlin.

On March 21, 1938, he arrived in New York City aboard the Queen Mary. After serving four years in the U.S. Army during World War II, Borinski received a M.A. degree in Sociology from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. in Sociology in Law from the University of Pittsburgh.

Career

In 1947, he accepted a teaching position at Tougaloo College, a historically black college located in Tougaloo, Mississippi. In addition to heading the sociology department, Borinski also taught Russian and German.

During the 1950s and 1960s, Borinski regularly organized meetings between black and white groups in defiance of racial segregation. He spoke frequently at Millsaps College, a historically white institution in Jackson not far from Tougaloo College's campus. As a consequence of his activities, Borinski was the subject of investigation by the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission.

Borinski continued to teach at Tougaloo until he died on May 26, 1983 at the age of 81. He is buried at a small cemetery on campus.

Legacy

There is a building complex on Tougaloo’s campus named after him.

In January 2000, Tougaloo sponsored their first annual history conference in his honor. The Mississippi ACLU gives out an annual award in his name.

Borinski is one of the subjects profiled in the documentary, From Swastika to Jim Crow, which looks at Jewish refugee scholars who taught at historically black colleges in the mid-20th Century.