– During his career as a photojournalist from the 1940s to the 1970s, Gordon Parks illuminated issues of race relations, poverty, civil rights and urban life in America. An exhibition of his works, which he donated to Kansas State University, will be on display at the SU Art Museum’s Joe and Emily Lowe Galleries through Dec. 8. At the Sept. 6 event, , associate curator at Kansas State University’s Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, will discuss the legendary photographer and his wide-ranging artistic ideas.

– , professor at the University of California-Santa Barbara and prominent architect and architectural historian, will introduce participants to new methodologies in researching architectural and urban space through colonial and post-colonial lenses. The workshop will feature selected archival materials in the Special Collections Research Center and will also include a walking tour of the Erie Canal in downtown Syracuse.

Thursday, Sept. 12

– Chattopadhyay, whose research specializations include modern architecture and urbanism, and the cultural landscape of the British empire, will present a public lecture exploring how analyzing architecture, urban design and monuments can help people understand sovereignty and its relation to colonialism.

Friday, Sept. 20

– will commemorate Latine Heritage Month (Sept. 15 – Oct. 15) with the opening of its new exhibition, “Weird Barrio,” featuring the work of Syracuse-based Puerto Rican artist Manuel Matías. The installation will feature a collection of miniature three-dimensional dioramas that depict the Latino experience of Syracuse and Central New York.

Friday, Oct. 18

– An art exhibition at the SU Art Museum and film screening of will emphasize how women in the Mithila region near the India-Nepali border are shifting gender and other social norms through storytelling and art. The film screening will include a question-and-answer session with producer Coralynn Davis.

Sunday, Oct. 20

– Composer Kurt Erickson and award-winning poet and veteran Brian Turner will discuss the creative process behind their collaborative works, which blend Erickson’s compositions with Turner’s poetry. As part of Remembrance Week, the artists’ talk follows a of “Each Moment Radiant,” which commemorates the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. The concert will also include a rendition of “Here Bullet,” featuring a poem by Turner reflecting on his experiences as an American soldier in Iraq, and chamber music of Johannes Brahms.

Thursday, Oct. 24

– This year’s Kashi and Kameshwar C. Wali Lecture in the Sciences and Humanities will feature “bio-artist” Eduardo Kac, who gained prominence at the beginning of the 21st century with his transgenic work GFP Bunny (pictured). Kac used molecular biology and a gene found in jellyfish to create Alba, a bunny which turned fluorescent green when exposed to blue light. Kac will revisit key highlights in his career, with emphasis on his current space artworks.

Thursday, Nov. 7
– , assistant professor of writing, rhetoric and digital studies at the University of Kentucky, will discuss how incarcerated individuals build communities inside jails and the vital role they play in their emotional well-being, rehabilitation and reintegration.

– Erby will host a workshop detailing how incarcerated individuals turn to podcasting to sharpen their storytelling skills and build community.

Learn more about this year’s .

�ճ���� supports innovative faculty and graduate student researchers exploring a number of pressing social issues. Each spring, the center offers up to four highly competitive faculty fellowships—three from the College of Arts and Sciences (A&S), including one related directly to the annual theme, and another from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs.

, director of both the Humanities Center and Central New York Humanities Corridor, says, “Congratulations to this year’s faculty fellows. We are so pleased to support their projects, which take up important historical questions, explore the nuances of language and music, and analyze how social structures and norms impact everyday life.”

More information about the Spring 2023 faculty fellows can be found below. Readers can also learn more about their work by viewing short research presentations on the Humanities Center’s .

, associate professor of philosophy (A&S)

Project:

Anderson is this year’s Syracuse Symposium Faculty Fellow (the theme this year is “Repair”). His project, which takes inspiration from the late��, investigates discursive practices under conditions of oppression and engages the philosophy of language, history, political theory and sociology. Anderson draws from a growing number of philosophers who have begun to analyze racial language, including the debate on the meaning of racial slurs and generic statements surrounding people of color, while also exploring hate speech and racist language in broader social contexts.

His multidisciplinary book project aims to stimulate discussion and craft a more comprehensive approach to philosophical investigation of language. It builds on some of his previously published works—which include topics that range from racist humor, racial slurs as prohibitive word calling, addressing appropriations and bad words, and epistemic injustice and the philosophy of race. Anderson’s work offers a powerful analysis of the impact racial class-based language has on one’s interpretation of the social world.

, associate professor of art and music histories (A&S)

Project:

Cateforis’ project explores how the popularization of alternative rock music—a genre which rose from the American underground of the 1980s into the mainstream of 1990s culture—raises an interesting question: “alternative to what?”

Many artists of this genre, fearing they were “selling out,” walked a fine line between positioning themselves both within the margins of the alternative genre and as part of the commercial mainstream. Cateforis explores this “doubleness” through multiple perspectives, including the double rhetorical strategy of irony and sarcasm that alternative rockers deployed to signify their allegiance to an underground ethos.

He also examines the sound of the music, specifically the soft/loud song form which combined soft verses with loud and raucous choruses that critics interpreted as an emotional outpouring of angst and anguish. As he shows, the sonic mood swings of the soft/loud in alternative rock mirrored a sharp rise in the diagnosis of depression and bipolar disorder, along with the over-distribution of prescription drugs, contributing to a “marketing of misery.”

In addition, Cateforis looks at alternative rock from the perspective of gender, examining how male alternative rock performers were often categorized as “losers and freaks,” as they rejected rock’s previous traditional masculine symbolism of fame and sexual potency. Cateforis’ book project demonstrates many intersections between alternative music and issues of gender, identity, race, aesthetics, visual culture, medicine and other areas central to the humanities.

, associate professor of women’s and gender studies (A&S)

Project:

Olwan, also a��Mellon Foundation grant recipient, will analyze the legal, political, social and economic conditions shaping marriage as well as divorce in the Middle East, with a particular focus on the country of Jordan. Olwan explores shifts and transformations that have occurred in marriage as a social institution over the past decade, as divorce rates across various Arab nations have reached as high as 20%.

Olwan’s project focuses on the complex laws, regulations, state institutions and practices that regulate people’s right to marry and divorce. Through research based in Jordan, she explores the consequences of these legal negotiations and social encounters on issues such as custody, alimony and women’s right to independence and remarriage.

Her work is invested in examining what these changes can tell us about shifting ideas about kinship, family making and family norms and values in Jordan and across the region. Olwan’s research contributes to the growing scholarship in the field of feminist Middle East studies that critically examines activism for women’s rights and the politics of agency, freedom and choice.

, associate professor of history (Maxwell)

Project:

Murphy’s project draws on detailed British colonial registries of enslaved people: notably, her approach does not use this information solely for demographic purposes but instead homes in on the life histories and genealogies that can be gleaned, via careful analysis, from these archival documents. With a focus on the British Crown colonies in the Caribbean, Murphy is combining history and digital humanities by compiling a publicly accessible database and associated book project designed to make the lives of enslaved people available and meaningful to students, researchers and members of descendent communities.

While most work of this period traditionally centers on abolition, Murphy connects with a variety of disciplines, including slavery studies, disability studies and English, to highlight the realities of slavery on the frontiers of the British Empire. The registries for the British colonies are particularly unique in that they detailed not only first and last names but ages and occupations of every enslaved person on an estate, as well as specific places of origin and any familial connections to others enslaved at the same location. These details inadvertently offer invaluable insight into the origins, experiences and familial relations of enslaved people who rarely had the opportunity to leave written records of their lives.

The fellowships, which provide faculty with the time and resources to delve into their projects and advance their research, are a part of the center’s diverse programming enhancing humanities research and engagement, including��, the��, visiting professorship opportunities and other forms of support.

This semester’s Syracuse Symposium events kick off with a two-day event featuring the (SJSA). Founded in 2017 by Sara Trail, SJSA is a platform where individuals utilize textile art for personal transformation and community cohesion and to begin the journey toward becoming an agent of social change. Trail, who learned to sew at the age of 4, is now a successful author, sewing teacher and pattern and fabric designer. On Jan. 27 at 6 p.m. she will visit the (CFAC) in Syracuse to present a program titled . The event will highlight the SJSA project, its history and impact, with a focus on how textile arts can contribute to repairing societal injustices.

On Jan. 28 at 10 a.m., registrants are invited to create their own social justice quilt block in a led by Social Justice Sewing Academy instructors. In addition, now through Feb. 17, visitors can view SJSA quilts on display at CFAC, located at 805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse. Trail’s visit is organized by , an associate professor in the School of Information Studies.

Other Symposium Highlights

Reparations NOW! The Department of (AAS) will host a pair of film screenings in the Hall of Languages’ Kilian Room.

A screening of the documentary “” (2008) will take place on Tuesday, Feb. 7 at 5 p.m. This film details the efforts of descendants of Black residents who were “banished” from their towns as they seek reparations for the harm directed at their ancestors. , visiting assistant teaching professor of African American Studies, will moderate a discussion about the film.

“” (2014) will be screened on Thursday, Feb. 9 at 5 p.m. This film contrasts the £20 million Britain paid to compensate Caribbean slaveholders in the 19th century with contemporary demands for redress from descendants of Jamaican slaves. , associate professor of African American Studies, will moderate a conversation about this film.

Reproductive Justice–Part of , a yearlong exploration of the environmental humanities and arts organized by A&S’s and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry’s Writing, Rhetoric and Communications Program, of the Sankofa Reproductive Health and Healing Center will take part in two Syracuse Symposium events.

will trace out the relationship between environmental racism and reproductive justice and explain how the health of mothers is a key barometer of community health. Situated in the local Syracuse context, Kemp’s talk will center on mothers’ lived experiences. This event will be held Thursday, Feb. 16 at 6 p.m. in the Community Engagement Room, Nancy Cantor Warehouse.

Kemp will also lead a , which offers members of the Syracuse community an opportunity to address intergenerational trauma in service of gaining greater reproductive justice for all. This event is Saturday, Feb. 18 at 1 p.m. at the Salt Space, 103 Wyoming St., Syracuse.

Community-Engaged Repair–The , with support from the Engaged Humanities Network and Unlearning the Urban, will host Sara Safransky, assistant professor of human and organizational development at Vanderbilt University. Motivated by a concern for social and ecological justice, Safransky’s research centers around urban displacement and land justice.

Safransky’s first event, , is a workshop open to faculty, staff and students highlighting her community-engaged work in Detroit as a jumping off point for a broad conversation about how, why, and for whom research might take place. This event is Friday, Feb. 24 at 12:30 p.m. in Eggers Hall (room 155).

Her second event, , is a public lecture about the legacies of industrial decline in Detroit and the possibilities for creating a more just city. This event is Friday, Feb. 24 at 3 p.m. in MacNaughton Hall (room 200).

– Four composers whose music centers on the ideas of justice and identity will present a concert on March 26, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. at the Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium, Newhouse III. Hosted by the and the , the performance of “repair” works will feature Flannery Cunningham, Stacy Garrop, Anthony R. Green and James Gordon Williams. The concert is free to all SU students, faculty and staff with valid ID.

– The 40th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Public Memorial Lecture will feature a virtual talk by , professor emerita at Princeton University. Hosted by the Department of African American Studies, the program will explore issues of racial and gender identity and how they have figured into North American and Western history more broadly. Painter’s work urges us to look at history beyond the lines of difference and stereotype. The event on March 28 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. will feature a question-and-answer session and will be moderated by , associate professor of African American Studies.

–CODE^SHIFT (Collaboratory for Data Equity, Social Healing, Inclusive Futures and Transformation) at the Newhouse School presents a showcase of media, art and storytelling created within immigrant and refugee communities in Syracuse and Richmond, Virginia. The event will feature work by the current cohort of Narratio Fellows, created in collaboration with artist Rina Banerjee, the . The showcase is March 30 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Museum Studies Gallery at the Nancy Cantor Warehouse.

Climate Justice–George Lakey, a renowned champion of creating positive social change through nonviolent direct-action tactics, will take part in two events exploring climate justice as part of .

At the first event, , Lakey will share stories of how the successfully mobilizes cross-sections of society to address structural challenges in the United States, and how people can create inclusive nonviolent campaigns. This event is April 13 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. in Bird Library (room 114).

Lakey’s second event, Climate Justice Nonviolent Action Campaign Training, will feature a discussion with Sarah Nahar, a Ph.D. candidate in religion, on how to craft nonviolent social change campaigns to be inclusive, powerful and successful. This event is April 14, from 9 a.m. to noon at the Community Folk Art Center.

Read more about .