# Melina Abdullah

melina abdullah (born Melina Rachel Reimann on September 18, 1972) is an American academic and civic leader. She is chair of the department of Pan-African Studies at California State University, Los Angeles, and a co-founder of the Los Angeles chapter of Black Lives Matter. == Early life and education == Melina Rachel Reimann was born on September 18, 1972 at East Oakland, Oakland, California, U.S. Her father, John Reimann, was "a union organizer and self-proclaimed Trotskyist." Her paternal grandfather was Günter Reimann (born Hans Steinicke), a German-Jewish Marxist economist and member of the Communist Party of Germany who opposed Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich.She graduated from Howard University, where she earned a bachelor's of arts (B.A.) degree in African American Studies.