Past Speakers

Dr. Tracie Canada presented on her book, Tackling the Everyday. Her ethnography is about the lived experiences of Black football collegiate players. She shows how the system of college football particularly harms the young Black men who are overrepresented on gridirons across the country. Dr. Tracie Canada is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Duke University.

Dr. Juliet Nebolon presented on her book, Settler Militarism. In this talk, Dr. Nebolon extrapolated the relationship between US militarism, settler colonialism, and Indigenous displacement during and after World War II. By looking at the ways that dislocation and displacement occur through US militarism, Dr. Nebolon illustrated the ways that science, military, race, and gender intersected in this settler colonial project. Dr. Juliet Nebolon is an Associate Professor of American Studies at Trinity College.

The Hayden Lecture was given by Dr. Jose Jorge Mendoza. During his talk, Dr. Mendoza brought together Philosophy, History, and Ethnic Studies to imagine the racialization and race-making with relation to Latinx communities. In particular, he examined the ways that migration ethics, Latinx identity, and racial justice intersect during this particular time of the increasing xenophobia and anti-Latinx racism during a time of also the emergence of Latinx communities with the current conservative political projects. Dr. Jose Jorge Mendoza is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Washington.

Cambodian Poet Sokunthary Svay joined us to give a talk based on her hybrid memoir Put it on the Record as well as her poetry collections. Poet Svay explored the multiple locations, histories, and languages of articulation that informs her work on Cambodian American history, memory, and agency. She is a doctoral candidate in English at the CUNY Graduate Center.

Dr. Constancio R. Arnaldo Jr presented a talk on his book, Filipino American Sporting Cultures. In his talk, he discussed the transnational and transhistorical practices of gender and race making that inform Filipinx American social formations. Dr. Arnaldo Jr. discussed the importance in looking at desires, pleasures, and sports to understand Filipinx and Asian American lives. He is an Associate Professor of Asian and Asian American Studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Katie Duarte is a PhD candidate in Sociology at Brown University. She examines the gendered narratives and Latinx and Black-identity making through curly hair and the natural hair movement amongst Dominicans in New York City and Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Duarte highlighted the ways that race, colonialism, and imperialism impact the everyday practices of caring for one’s hair.

The Hayden Lecture was given by Dr. Roderick Ferguson. In this talk, Dr. Ferguson showcased the longer histories of white supremacy, HBCUs, and art. By bringing in the radical Black tradition, Dr. Ferguson utilized the work of Black artists to highlight the relations between Black and Indigenous students at a HBCU and the many ways that white supremacy exists in relation to Black and Indigenous freedoms, education, and critique. Dr. Roderick Ferguson is the William Robertson Co-Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Yale University.

Dr. Candace Lukasik provided a lecture based on her book, Martyrs and Migrants. In this talk, Dr. Lukasik explored the histories of life and migration for Egyptian Copts. She examines how American religious imaginaries of global Christian persecution have remapped Copic collective memory of martyrdom. She argues that commingling of American conservative and Coptic theopoligical subjectivities and practices have shaped a new kind of Christian kinship operationalized by glorification and racialization. Dr. Candace Lukasik is an Assistant Professor at Mississippi State University.

Dr. Jeffrey Fuhrer presented on his book, The Myth that Made Us. He discussed the false naaratives about poverty and race and poor outcomes for many in the U.S. economy. In his talk, he discussed the need to dismantle false economic narratives and focus on equity. He is working with a large collaborative to update the findings of the Federal Reserve’s 2015 “Color of Wealth in Boston” study. 

Dr. Matthew Sakiestewa Gilbert presented on his newest book, Hopi Runners. He discussed the longer history of settler colonialism, American Indian education, the Hopi experience in boarding schools, and the role of sport in practicing Hopi ways of life. Dr. Gilbert is Professor of American Indian Studies at the University of Arizona and produced the documentary film—Beyond the Mesas—on the Hopi experience at off-reservation Indian boarding schools. 

Dr. Jennifer Delfino and Dr. Mike Mena provided a lecture about the relationship between race and language. Bringing in linguistic anthropology and raciolinguistics, they demonstrated the ways that race and racialization are structured into the educational project in the United States. Dr. Delfino is an Associate Professor at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and Dr. Mena is an Assistant Professor at Brooklyn College (CUNY).

Dr. Jon Hale provided a talk on the role of the “freedom schools” during the Civil Rights Movement. He gave a talk based on his book, The Freedom Schools. In his talk he illuminated the radical and important syllabus of these schools and the incredible leadership and engagement of young Black students. He is a Professor of Education at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

The Hayden Lecture was given by Dr. Kim TallBear. She is the author of Native American DNA and her important talk discussed the various ways that Indigenous self-definitions stand in relation to Western scientific hegemony. Dr. TallBear illustrated the ways that Indigenous communities create relations to the world governed by expansive epistemologies not limited to Western science. Dr. Kim TallBear is a Professor at the University of Minnesota.

Dr. Nadia Kim presented her award-wining book Refusing Death. Dr. Kim addressed the many ways that Asian American women and Latinas are organizing against environmental racism, pollution, and fighting for environmental justice. Dr. Nadia Kim is a Professor of Sociology at Texas A&M University and a multi-book-award winging Sociologist and Ethnic Studies faculty.

Lauren Stowell and Jenna Contreras are award-winning film-makers and producers. They featured their documentary “144” at Stonehill College. 144 captures the powerful and intimate moments when the 144 athletes of the Women’s National Basketball Association chose to organize to shut down the 2020 season in support of Black Lives Matter. The film details the difficult and important work of women in fighting anti-Black racism.

Dr. Dana-Ain Davis presented on her most-recent award-winning book Reproductive Justice: Racism, Pregnancy, and Premature Birth. Dr. Davis addressed the health disparities in Black communities with a focus on the high rates of premature birth and infant mortality. Dr. Davis is a Professor of Anthropology and Gender Studies at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. 

Dr. Asale Angel-Ajani presented her debut novel A Country You Can Leave. She is a scholar of the global drug trade, women of color’s experiences of incarceration, and justice. Dr. Asale Angel-Ajani is an Associate Professor of Anthropology, Gender Studies, and International Studies at the City College of New York.

Hayden Lecture by Dr. David Roediger. Dr. Roediger discussed the longer histories of whiteness that govern US history while highlighting the critical need for scholarship on race and equity. This talk was part of his book, An Ordinary White. He is the endowed professor of American Studies at the University of Kansas.

Dorceta Taylor presented on "Untold Stories of American Conservation: Privilege and Social Inequality." A professor at the Yale School of Environment and prominent environmental justice scholar, Taylor has received awards from the National Audubon Society, National Science Foundation, and Smithsonian Institution.

Pamela Karimi presented on "Art and Spatial Politics." She is an architect and an architectural historian. Her primary field of specialization is art, architecture and visual culture of the modern Middle East.

Nadia Brown presented on "The The Politics of Black Women's Appearance." Dr. Brown is a professor of Government, chair of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program and affiliate in the African American Studies program at Georgetown University. This lecture explored how the politics of appearance shape Black women’s political ambitions, opportunities and access to political office in the United States. 

Janet Mancini Billson presented on "The Global Refugee Crisis: Can a Broken System be Fixed?" Dr. Billson is a Killam Visiting Professor at Bridgewater State University and Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Rhode Island College. She is also the author of several books on identity, marginality, refugee resettlement and integration, and social change.

Khary Polk presented on "For Race or Country? Double Consciousness and the Life of Col. Charles Young." Dr. Polk is an associate professor of Black Studies and Sexuality, Women's and Gender Studies at Amherst College. This lecture explored the theme of double consciousness in the life and work of Charles Young, the third African American officer to graduate from West Point, and the first to reach the rank of colonel.

The 2021 Chet Raymo Literary Series welcomed author Ross Gay. He is the author of four books of poetry: Against Which; Bringing the Shovel Down; Be Holding; and Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. His new poem, Be Holding, was released from the University of Pittsburgh Press in September of 2020.

Karam Dana presented on "Between Orientalism and Racialization: The Ongoing Exclusion of Arabs and Muslims in the US." Dr. Dana is the Alyson McGregor Distinguished Professor of Excellence and Transformative Research and Associate Professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at the University of Washington Bothell. He is also the founding Director of the “American Muslim Research Institute.”