Melissa Harris-Perry is Wellesley College's 2012 Commencement Speaker

Melissa Harris-Perry, professor, political scientist, author, Nation columnist, MSNBC host, and rising “nerdland” icon, is Wellesley College’s 134th Commencement Speaker. She will address the class of 2012 and their families at this year's exercises, which will be held on Friday, May 25, 2012 at 10:30 AM. Commencement exercises at Wellesley are open to the public.

Wellesley’s commencement speaker selection process is driven by its students. “Each year, Wellesley’s graduating seniors, who are ready and eager to make their mark, express their sense of the times, engagement with the world, and openness to inspiration in the selection of their Commencement speaker," said H. Kim Bottomly, President of Wellesley College.

"Wellesley’s 2012 Seniors are making an important statement by inviting Melissa Harris-Perry to address the class. It’s clear that they value the need to support and be supported by each other—smart, empowered women who are boldly, and thoughtfully, pioneering every platform,” President Bottomly added. “Melissa Harris-Perry is the kind of leader that Wellesley women admire, and we are honored and excited to welcome her to Wellesley.”

Keeping with tradition, the announcement of the 2012 speaker was made at the College’s Senior Soiree on March 29 by Senior Class President Kate Leonard.

Harris-Perry, a professor at Tulane University, is host of MSNBC's "Melissa Harris-Perry," which premiered in February and airs Saturday and Sunday mornings. She is the first African-American woman to solo-host a news and politics show on a major TV news outlet. Harris-Perry is also the only tenured professor in the United States to host a cable news show. She is widely praised for bringing the stimulating, intellectual discourse of the academic world to popular audiences.

Harris-Perry is also a columnist for The Nation magazine, where she writes a monthly column titled Sister Citizen, and an author. Her 2011 book, Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America (Yale), argues that persistent harmful stereotypes—invisible to many but painfully familiar to black women—profoundly shape black women's politics, contribute to policies that treat them unfairly, and make it difficult for black women to assert their rights in the political arena. She also provides commentary on U.S. elections, gender concerns, racial issues, and religious questions for The Rachel Maddow Show, The Colbert Report, PBS, CNN, The Huffington Post, and many others.

Read the full announcement on Wellesley College's Website.