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College hosting two-day symposium on race, space and memory

March 31, 2008

Connecticut College's Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity is hosting two days of lectures, discussions and performances exploring the intersections of race, space and memory on April 18 and 19. All events are free and open to the public.

The symposium will provide "exciting opportunities to explore issues and questions of race through the framing effects of space, place, memory and history," David Kyuman Kim, director of the center and professor of religious studies at Connecticut College, said.

Following in the tradition of the Center's 2006 symposium on Cornel West's "Democracy Matters," the 2008 symposium will continue the Center's commitment to providing public programs that broaden and explore the complexities of race and ethnicity in America and abroad.

At the symposium, scholars and performers from colleges and universities including the University of California Los Angeles, the University of Southern California and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology will gather with Connecticut College faculty, staff, students and alumni, as well as members of the New London community, to discuss topics such as democracy and diversity in the American city, the impact of race on the arts and the challenge of memorializing the war on terror.

The event's keynote speakers include James E. Young, professor of English and Judaic studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and eminent scholar of the Holocaust and the politics of memory; and MacArthur winner and Fletcher Fellow Anna Deavere Smith, an Obie Award-winning actress, performing artist and founder of the Institute on Arts and Civic Dialogue. Young will give a talk titled, "The Arts of Counter-Memory: From Berlin to New York," April 18 at 1 p.m. in the Ernst Common Room, Blaustein Humanities Center. Smith will speak April 19 at 4:30 p.m. in Evans Recital Hall, Cummings Arts Center.

Other highlights include a dance performance, "Monk's Mood: A Performance and Meditation on the Life and Music of Thelonius Monk," by Thomas F. DeFrantz, professor of theater arts at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, April 19 at 2 p.m. Additionally, David Dorman Dance will be performing "Diavowal," a dance theater project inspired by the life and legacy of abolitionist John Brown, April 18 at 8 p.m.

For the complete schedule of events and to register online, visit www.conncoll.edu/academics/centers/ccsre/events.html.

For media inquiries contact: Amy Martin (860) 439-2526; a.martin@conncoll.edu