December 18, 2015

Winter 2015 Newsletter

As the semester comes to a close, we wish to thank you all for your continued support of the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice. Have a happy holiday season!

From all of us at CSSJ,
Tony, Roque, Shana, and Ruth

Fall 2015 Happenings

The Civil Rights Movement Initiative

There is a substantial correlation between what happened back then and what is currently happening now, and kids my age aren't as socially conscious as they should be. There are so many things happening within the civil rights movement for equality (or lack thereof) that we're just not learning in school. 

-Rachelle Ojo

This fall semester the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice developed a unique program for Hope High School seniors called the Civil Rights Movement Initiative (CRMI). This initiative aims to get high school students to think of the Civil Rights not as something that happened in the past, but to use it as a bridge to understand the present. Once a week for six weeks, students explored different aspects of the Civil Rights, guided by a curriculum designed by the Center’s second year Graduate Fellow, Maiyah Gamble-Rivers. Themes addressed included Jim Crow and Education, Protests and Racial Tension, Physical Space and Political Place, Music and Freedom Songs, and Memory and the Civil Rights Movement. The curriculum provided students with the tools to conduct research of their own on the topics and present their findings to their peers.

Thanks to the support of the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice, the Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion, and the Bernstein Scholarship of the Brown-Tougaloo Partnership, these students and Maiyah will have the opportunity to attend a Civil Rights Trip along with 30 other students from Baltimore area high schools in January 2016. Students will visit historic sites and museums in Greensboro, Atlanta, Montgomery, Selma, Birmingham, Meridian, Jackson, Money, Sunflower, Little Rock, and Memphis.  

For more information on the Civil Rights Movement Initiative or on CSSJ’s youth programming, please email Maiyah at: cssj_youthprograms@brown.edu.

Coming in 2016

January 2016
January 22 & 23, 2016
Listen for a Change: Sacred Conversations for Racial Justice
Petteruti Lounge, 75 Waterman Street, 2nd Floor

February 2016
February 5, 2016
Lunch talk with Dr. Emily Button
E Pluribus Unum? An Archaeology of Race and Community in Sag Harbor, NY 

February 24, 2016
Prof. Manisha Sinha: Book Launch
The Slave's Cause: A History of Abolition

February 2016
Black History Month Film Screening
In Partnership with the Providence Community Library and Center for Reconciliation

March 2016
March 4, 2016
Emerging Scholars Series: Prof. Shauna Sweeney 

March 7, 2016
Lunch talk with Prof. Christine Walker

March 16, 2016
Emerging Scholars Series: Prof. Jamie Parra 

March 2016
Annual Debra L. Lee Lecture

April 2016
April 6, 2016
Lunch talk with Prof. Nora Wittmann

April 13, 2016
Panel: Black Atlantic Crosscurrents

April 14, 2016
Talk with Prof. Barnor Hesse
Racism's Alterity 

April 15, 2016
Lunch talk with Prof. Charlotte Carrington-Farmer
Slave Horse: From Rhode Island to the Wider Atlantic World 

May 2016
May 4, 2016
Lunch talk with Prof. Raffaele Laudani 
Political Theory of Black Abolitionism

In the news

Rhode Island Church Taking Unusual Step to Illuminate Its Slavery Role

Opportunities

Center for the Study of Slavery & Justice
Faculty Associate Grants Spring 2016

CSSJ Faculty Associate Grants are designed to support the synergistic development of intellectual community and research on campus. We invite Brown University faculty and researchers to submit proposals that focus on broad issues to do with slavery, justice, freedom, and contemporary forms of human bondage.

Maximum Award: $2,000

Applicants should include a 500 word proposal, brief budget, and a CV of the individuals involved. Proposals will be evaluated by CSSJ and should be sent to Associate Director, Roquinaldo Ferreira [roquinaldo_ferreira@brown.edu].

The deadline to submit proposals has been extended to January 8th, 2016.