Department of English

Challenging Racial Knowledge in the University

racial knowledge series poster

"Challenging Racial Knowledge in the University" is a yearlong speaker series sponsored by the Mandel Center for the Humanities. The series seeks to foster expansive cross-disciplinary conversations around race, with a particular focus on original and unique scholarly methodologies. The further aim is to generate new ideas that more effectively challenge white bias and other oppressive supremacist structures that impact our classrooms and our wider communities, and to open up new patterns theoretically, pedagogically, and creatively.

Annette Joseph-Gabriel

Atlantic Genealogies of Black Girlhood in the Nineteenth Century

Annette Joseph-Gabriel
John Spencer Bassett Associate Professor of Romance Studies, Associate Professor of Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies, Duke University

Tuesday, November 7, 1:00-2:15 pm

historical cartoon of man holding a pillow, getting ready to smother a woman whose hands are on her cheeks, and the words "Mr. Booth, as 'Othello,' smudges the face of the fair 'Desdemona' in kissing her.

The Residue of Inkface

Miles Parks Grier
Associate Professor of English, City University of New York

Friday, December 1, 2:00-3:20 pm

Chris Sue

Between the ‘American Century’ and the ‘Asian Century’: Toward a New Paradigm for Understanding Racial Inequality

Chris Suh
Assistant Professor of History, Emory University

Friday, March 22, 2:00-3:20 pm


historical photo of a dance get-together, with women wearing can-can skirts

Translating Dance

Rachana Vajjhala
Assistant Professor of Music, Musicology, and Ethnomusicology, Boston University

Friday, April 19, 2:00-3:20 pm