91ֱ�� College Receives Grant Supporting the 91ֱ�� Sanctuary Project</h1> <article> <h1>91ֱ�� College Receives Grant Supporting the 91ֱ�� Sanctuary Project</h1> <p>hhempste — Tue, 28 May 2019 15:27:40 +0000</p> <span>91ֱ�� College Receives Grant Supporting the 91ֱ�� Sanctuary Project</span> <span><span>hhempste</span></span> <span><time datetime="2019-05-28T11:27:40-04:00" title="Tuesday, May 28, 2019 - 11:27">Tue, 05/28/2019 - 11:27</time> </span> <div class="text-content field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>From 91ֱ��’s historic decision in 1835 to enroll students “irrespective of color,” to its roles as an Underground Railroad stop, a welcoming place for Japanese American students during World War II internments, and a refuge for Kent State University students after the May 4, 1970 National Guard shootings, the practice of providing sanctuary has been a central value of the college and town.</p> <p>91ֱ�� College has been awarded $10,000 from the <a href="https://www.cic.edu/Pages/default.aspx" target="_blank">Council of Independent Colleges</a> <a href="https://www.cic.edu/programs/public-humanities" target="_blank">Humanities Research for the Public Good</a> program to both expand and extend 91ֱ��’s existing work around the concept of sanctuary. To that end, the college and city’s commitment to providing shelter for and affirming the humanity of individuals at key points of U.S. history will be highlighted through undergraduate research, the creation of a traveling exhibit, and online educational resources.</p> <p>The impetus for this project was “inspired by a strong movement on campus to further assert 91ֱ�� College’s position as a sanctuary,” says Alexia Hudson-Ward, Azariah Smith Root Director of Libraries. “After a series of conversations with former Dean Tim Elgren and College Archivist Ken Grossi, the Libraries and Archives were charged with creating a sustaining educational program that would explore our institution’s role as sanctuary from our early beginnings through the modern era. Hence, the 91ֱ�� Sanctuary Project was born.”</p> <p>A variety of individuals will help bring this project to fruition, including Associate Professor of Africana Studies and Comparative American Studies <a href="/meredith-gadsby">Meredith Gadsby</a> and Professor of Comparative American Studies <a href="/gina-perez">Gina Pérez</a>, who will serve as researchers and faculty mentors to a student researcher. Grossi will be the collections expert and Hudson-Ward will be the project administrator.</p> <p>Gadsby says that it’s vital to undertake this research because it provides the opportunity to illuminate how alive this particular history is.</p> <p>“At 91ֱ��, we celebrate the history of the city and the college as a space that offered safe haven to African Americans escaping enslavement. In the present, there are students and faculty here who are first-generation and have diverse immigration experiences and stories.</p> <p>‘‘The college was also the leader in admitting students ‘without respect to race.’ 91ֱ�� has been superbly situated to actively participate in almost 300 years of sanctuary practices. Today, this issue touches Africans, Caribbeans, Latin Americans from Central and South America, and many others. It is important that we remember our history and act decisively in the present and future,’’ she says.</p> <p>Pérez hopes that the resulting research and exhibit will inspire others to investigate their community’s efforts related to activism so that they can work to change unjust practices. She also hopes it will serve as a reminder of the history of sanctuary movements.</p> <p>“Current sanctuary movements and struggles have long histories that affect a range of communities, including enslaved African Americans in the 19th century, interned Japanese and Japanese Americans during WWII, and even those protesting U.S. military power, including antiwar activists during the Vietnam War.”</p> <p>The <a href="http://www.oberlinheritagecenter.org/" target="_blank">91ֱ�� Heritage Center</a> will serve as the community partner for the project, providing support through research and interpretation of both 91ֱ��’s abolitionist history and the community’s acceptance of Japanese Americans during World War II.</p> <p>91ֱ�� Heritage Center Executive Director Liz Shultz says she hopes that those who engage with the resulting exhibit and programming can obtain some insight into how sanctuaries originate. </p> <p>“I hope they gain a better understanding of how sanctuaries were created,” says Shultz.<br> “It’s often not through one big easy decision but through individuals making recurring, small, difficult, and personal decisions.”</p> <p>Hudson-Ward believes that the project has the power to galvanize individuals into a different way of thinking. “I hope that people will be inspired by the concept of supporting community members in times of need, and they will see how this concept influenced the history of our nation.”</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-type field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__item">Campus News</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-date field--type-datetime field--label-hidden field__item"><time datetime="2019-05-28T12:00:00Z">Tue, 05/28/2019 - 12:00</time> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-author field--type-string field--label-hidden field__item">Hillary Hempstead</div> <div class="text-content field field--name-field-intro-text field--type-text-long field--label-hidden field__item"><p>A $10,000 grant awarded from the Council of Independent Colleges Humanities Research for the Public Good program will fund exploration of 91ֱ�� College and the city of 91ֱ��’s shared 185-year commitment to providing a safe place for humanity to live, learn, and work.</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2563">Grants</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2374">Archives & Special Collections</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2384">Libraries</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2496">91ֱ�� History</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2414">Faculty</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2551">Staff</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-programs field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?program=4821">Africana Studies</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?program=25311">Comparative American Studies</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-faculty field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/gina-perez" hreflang="und">Gina Pérez</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/meredith-gadsby" hreflang="und">Meredith Gadsby</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/ken-grossi" hreflang="und">Ken Grossi</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-departments field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/arts-and-sciences/departments/comparative-american-studies" hreflang="und">Comparative American Studies</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/arts-and-sciences/departments/africana-studies" hreflang="und">Africana Studies</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-pin-school-page field--type-boolean field--label-hidden field__item">Off</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-photo-gallery-top field--type-boolean field--label-hidden field__item">false</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-image-credit field--type-string field--label-hidden field__item">John Seyfried</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-media field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__item"> </div> </article> <article> <h1>91ֱ�� College Awarded $150,000 Grant to Strengthen Music Studies Major</h1> <p>Anonymous — Mon, 07 Nov 2016 18:18:55 +0000</p> <span>91ֱ�� College Awarded $150,000 Grant to Strengthen Music Studies Major</span> <span><span>Anonymous (not verified)</span></span> <span><time datetime="2016-11-07T13:18:55-05:00" title="Monday, November 7, 2016 - 13:18">Mon, 11/07/2016 - 13:18</time> </span> <div class="text-content field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded 91ֱ�� College a $150,000 presidential leadership grant, which will be used to strengthen and expand the study of music in the context of liberal arts, a priority identified by President Marvin Krislov.</p> <p>“I am thrilled that the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has provided me with this grant and the capacity to develop opportunities to incorporate musical study across the Arts and Sciences curriculum,” Krislov says. “It will it be a tremendous asset in helping the college reach a new level of inclusive academic, artistic, and musical excellence and in helping us in our continued goal of preparing college and conservatory students for successful lives, careers, and leadership.”</p> <p>Building connections across the curriculum through interdisciplinary study and ties between the College of Arts and Sciences and the Conservatory of Music is a key focus of the <a href="http://new.oberlin.edu/strategic-plan/">91ֱ�� College Strategic Plan 2016-2021</a>. With this grant, over the next four years 91ֱ�� College will:</p> <p>• enhance and expand the study of music in the context of the liberal arts through piloting of a full-time faculty line in Musical Studies designed to increase the number and diversity of course offerings;</p> <p>• offer faculty-development workshops and competitive curriculum-development grants to broaden faculty expertise to incorporate musical study across the Arts and Sciences curriculum; and</p> <p>• develop programming to deepen student and faculty engagement with music. </p> <p>“Premised on the culture of academic and artistic vibrancy that flows naturally from 91ֱ��’s college-conservatory combination, this grant empowers us not only to create new opportunities for students to enrich their learning through musical engagement,” says Dean of the Conservatory of Music Andrea Kalyn, “but also to make connections across disciplines through music, and to contextualize the many performances on campus with their core academic work and co-curricular interests. We are deeply grateful to the Mellon Foundation for supporting us in this endeavor.”</p> <p><strong>About the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation</strong></p> <p>Founded in 1969, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation endeavors to strengthen, promote, and, where necessary, defend the contributions of the humanities and the arts to human flourishing and to the well-being of diverse and democratic societies by supporting exemplary institutions of higher education and culture as they renew and provide access to an invaluable heritage of ambitious, path-breaking work. Additional information is available at mellon.org.</p></div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-type field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__item">Campus News</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-date field--type-datetime field--label-hidden field__item"><time datetime="2016-09-02T12:00:00Z">Fri, 09/02/2016 - 12:00</time> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-author field--type-string field--label-hidden field__item">Communications Staff</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2563">Grants</a></div> </div> </article> <article> <h1>English Professors Receive GLCA Grant</h1> <p>Anonymous — Mon, 07 Nov 2016 18:19:41 +0000</p> <span>English Professors Receive GLCA Grant</span> <span><span>Anonymous (not verified)</span></span> <span><time datetime="2016-11-07T13:19:41-05:00" title="Monday, November 7, 2016 - 13:19">Mon, 11/07/2016 - 13:19</time> </span> <div class="text-content field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>Three English professors have received a $47,520 grant from the Great Lakes Colleges Association (GLCA) for “Expanding Collaboration Initiative on World Literature: Phase Two,” a joint project with three Kenyon College faculty. The project is being funded through the GLCA’s <a href="http://glca.org/glcaprograms/glca-expanding-collaboration-initiative" target="_blank">Expanding Collaboration Initiative</a>, a professional development program made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation that supports collaborative curricular initiatives involving faculty and key professional staff who share common academic interests.</p> <p>The 91ֱ�� faculty receiving the grant are Anuradha Dingwaney Needham, Donald R. Longman Professor of English; Danielle Skeehan, assistant professor of English; and Harrod Suarez, assistant professor of English and comparative American studies. The Kenyon College faculty are Travis Landry, associate professor of Spanish; Jesse Matz, William P. Rice professor of English and literature, and Pashmina Murthy, assistant professor of English.</p> <p>The purpose of the project is to elaborate a more nuanced and deeper understanding of what it means to study world literature today in the context of a liberal arts college setting and to make scholarship more inclusive of underrepresented, predominantly non-European traditions.</p> <p>“What currently counts as world literature tends to privilege European texts. Our emphasis is not so much on rejecting European texts as on foregrounding non-European ones,” Needham says. “As a result our discussions have emphasized a different body of theory that doesn’t necessarily turn up under world literature. We want to make the argument that it belongs there.”</p> <p>The professors received a $13,016 grant, also from the GLCA Expanding Collaboration Initiative, for the first phase of the project. In phase one, the professors launched a hybrid course in which Kenyon students enrolled in Reading World Literature (taught by Landry and Matz) and 91ֱ�� students enrolled in Globalization and Diaspora (taught by Suarez) in spring 2015 collaborated by <a href="https://kenyonoberlinworld.wordpress.com/">contributing to a blog</a> and participating in discussions that engaged them in thinking about elements of world literature.</p> <p>The professors will use the grant awarded for phase two to create two additional offerings of collaborative hybrid courses in spring 2016 and 2017 with additional features to integrate collaboration more fully. They will also write a scholarly article (tentatively titled “Performing Provincialism in a Cosmopolitan World”) and convene a Consortial Meeting on World Literatures that will include participants from GLCA institutions and outside scholars and writers working in world literature today. Needham says the group hopes attendees will feel inspired to write essays post-meeting, which they will collect and publish in an edited collection.</p> <p>In an email to Needham, Director of Program Development at GLCA Gregory Wegner had this to say about the project: “This is a project that shows considerable promise in its continuing steps to create a GLCA consortial community to think together about the implications of world literature, to infuse one another’s thinking as scholars and teachers, and to take advantage of opportunities to collaborate in the teaching of world literature classes on GLCA college campuses.”</p> <p>The success of phase two will be evaluated through a variety of means, including written feedback and informal discussions. Needham says she does not anticipate the project will require additional phases at this time.</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-type field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__item">Campus News</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-date field--type-datetime field--label-hidden field__item"><time datetime="2015-10-09T12:00:00Z">Fri, 10/09/2015 - 12:00</time> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-author field--type-string field--label-hidden field__item">Lisa Gulasy</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2563">Grants</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-programs field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?program=25346">English</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-faculty field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/harrod-suarez" hreflang="und">Harrod Suarez</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/danielle-skeehan" hreflang="und">Danielle Skeehan</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-departments field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/arts-and-sciences/departments/english" hreflang="und">English</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-pin-school-page field--type-boolean field--label-hidden field__item">Off</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-photo-gallery-top field--type-boolean field--label-hidden field__item">false</div> </article> <article> <h1>Grant to Help Engage Latinx Communities</h1> <p>Anonymous — Mon, 07 Nov 2016 18:19:57 +0000</p> <span>Grant to Help Engage Latinx Communities</span> <span><span>Anonymous (not verified)</span></span> <span><time datetime="2016-11-07T13:19:57-05:00" title="Monday, November 7, 2016 - 13:19">Mon, 11/07/2016 - 13:19</time> </span> <div class="text-content field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p>91ֱ�� College has received a programming grant to participate in Latino Americans: 500 Years of History, a nationwide public programming initiative produced by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the American Library Association (ALA).</p> <p>Latino Americans: 500 Years of History supports the exploration of the history and experiences of the population, who, with more than 50 million people, have become the country’s largest minority group. Latino Americans: 500 Years of History is part of a larger NEH initiative, <a href="https://www.neh.gov/news/press-release/2015-01-15/common-good" target="_blank">The Common Good: Humanities in the Public Square</a>, and features the six-part NEH-supported documentary series “Latino Americans,” created for PBS in 2013 by WETA.</p> <p>91ֱ�� is one of 203 grant recipients representing 42 states and the District of Columbia. In addition to a cash grant of $3,000 to hold programs about Latinx history and culture, the college will also receive:</p> <ul> <li>A “Latino Americans” DVD set with public performance rights</li> <li>Access to additional programming and humanities resources developed by national project scholars, librarian advisors, and outreach experts</li> <li>Promotional materials to support local outreach</li> </ul> <p>Associate Dean of Campus Life Adrian Bautista will serve as the grant project director. According to Bautista, an overarching goal of the 91ֱ�� project will be to enhance engagement between the campus and Lorain County Latinx communities. Pronounced “Latin-ex,” the gender-neutral term is becoming more widely accepted at 91ֱ�� and beyond.</p> <p>The grant, he says, will support several on- and off-campus activities, including a scholar-led viewing and discussion of an episode in the “Latino Americans” documentary series, as well as a film screening and writer’s workshop in collaboration with the Multicultural Resource Center.</p> <p>More information about Latino Americans: 500 Years of History can be found <a href="https://apply.ala.org/latinoamericans">on this website</a>.</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-type field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__item">Campus News</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-date field--type-datetime field--label-hidden field__item"><time datetime="2015-06-30T12:00:00Z">Tue, 06/30/2015 - 12:00</time> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-author field--type-string field--label-hidden field__item">Lisa Gulasy</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-tags field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden field__items"> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2404">Cultural Celebrations</a></div> <div class="field__item"><a href="/news?tag=2563">Grants</a></div> </div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-pin-school-page field--type-boolean field--label-hidden field__item">Off</div> <div class="field field--name-field-news-photo-gallery-top field--type-boolean field--label-hidden field__item">false</div> </article> </main></body></html>