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W. Gabriel Selassie I (pronounced: dubelu gebrel  silassē eye) (born Dec 1961) is a prominent Rastafarian lecturer, social activist, psyconaut, academic and theologian. He is currently Department Chair and Ralph Bunche Distinguished professor of African American & U.S. history at the Los Angeles City College's Department of Social Sciences where he teaches courses on world religions, African American, African Diaspora history and culture. He also heads the Institute for the Study and Preservation of Local Cultures (ISPLC) located in Los Angeles, USA. Selassie I is also an adjunct professor of history at the Claremont Graduate University where he teaches a graduate seminar on the American Civil and Human Rights. His research, teachings and activism focus on the historic interpretations of mythology in cultural systems, particularly African Diasporic communities; global spread of rastafarianism, human & civil rights, campaigns for literacy and education and to end government prohibition of certain classes of ethnogens. Selassie I is a follower of Rastafarian Covenant.

Early Life

Selassie I is thought to come from a family of civil and human rights activist. He is believed to be related to Elizabeth Eckford a member of the Little Rock Nine. In the early 1960's his mother and father were part of an inaugural group of educators that relocated to the Southwestern region of the Navajo Nation (USA) to address academic illiteracy amongst the Navajo population in the region. His early years spent on the Reservation are thought to have had a major impact on his life. Selassie I's maternal god mother was a Dene' "Singer." He was cared for and raised by the Dene' and he has often credited his introduction to Navajo spirituality as the central moment of his early life.

Education

Selassie I earned a bachelors degree in architecture and civil engineering from Prairie View A & M University of Texas (1980). At Prairie View he met and studied under Simon Wiltz, AIA. and Dr. Norman Powell of Texas Southern University who introduced him to sacred geometry. He later went on to earn a four masters degrees, and a doctorate in history. He is the first African American to earn a doctorate in history at the Claremont Graduate University. Selassie I read African politics at St. Antony's College, University of Oxford.

Selassie I is a dual citizen of the Republic of Italy and is recognized in the Republic as an Afro-Italian.

Military Service

Selassie I completed served in the U.S. Army as an enlisted solider and was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Army Reserves serving as a criminal investigator supervisor (CID). Much of his work here was done in narcotics and is classified.