A Fantastic Opportunity for Educators in Miami

The Small Axe Project presents

THE VISUAL LIFE OF SOCIAL AFFLICTION EXHIBITION EDUCATORS’ WORKSHOP

The Little Haiti Cultural Center Gallery

212 NE 59th Terrace, Miami, FL 33137

Saturday, January 25, 2020

PART 1: 10-1pm  |       PART II: LUNCH, 1-2    |       PART III: 2-4pm

The Small Axe Project believes that the visual arts constitute one of the most vital and expressive medias through which to explore social life in general and the life of social affliction in particular. Social Affliction refers to various forms of violence, crises, social, economic and environmental degradation ordinary people, particularly Caribbean people, face on a daily basis in order to survive. How might art generate conversations around economic blight and displacement but also cultural renewal? This workshop is designed to help educators explore ways to utilize arts to broach and discuss various types of social afflictions with their students in diverse disciplines.

The workshop will comprise of:

•       A curatorial tour of the exhibition

•       A careful engagement of the teaching pack and lessons plans containing hands on activities for students applicable to various disciplines and discussion questions for teachers to facilitate more meaningful conversations with their students on the theme. Educators will work through hands-on activities presented in the pack during the workshop.

•       Lunch and refreshments will be provided

•       Teachers will receive complete copies of the teaching pack and the exhibition catalogue free of charge.

Facilitators: The workshop will be led by Daniela Fifi and Hannah Heller.

Readings: In order to prepare for the session, the facilitators have asked participants to make an effort to read the articles listed below. PDFs will be emailed to registered participants.

1.     Fifi, D. A., & Heller, H. D. (2019). Exploring Manifestations of White Supremacy Culture in Art Museum Education and Interpretation. Journal of Cultural Research in Art Education, 36(1), 100-121.

2.     Hendrick, K. and Crum, M. (2014). Multicultural Critical Reflective Practice and Contemporary Art. In J. Accuff-Boyd and L. Evans (Eds.) Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press, p. 271-298

3.     Laurel Schimdt, Inquiry-Based Teaching Article - from “Great Teachers Don’t Take No For An Answer”.

Parking: Free parking is available at the LHCC.

Limited seating: Pre-registration is required through the Miami Dade Public Schools or via Eventbrite using the following link:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/educators-workshop-the-visual-life-of-social-affliction-exhibition-tickets-89507343875

Questions?: Contact Professor Erica Moiah James @ emj58@miami.edu

This workshop is completely free of charge thanks to the generous support of The Green Family Foundation.

Round-up: 37th Annual West Indian Literature Conference

"Miami Extensions: 305 Creativity, Alive and Thriving"

(L-R )Jason Fitzroy Jeffrers, Filmmaker, Co Founder of Third Horizon Caribbean Film Festival; Maria Ketsia Theodore-Pharel, Author of Rope; Caridad Moro-Gronlier, Author  of Visionware; Dr. Patricia J. Saunders, University of Miami.

There are conferences, and then, there are Conferences. The 37th Annual West Indian Literature Conference was one of the best Conferences that I’ve ever attended. The program offerings were diverse, fascinating, and riveting with a remarkable blend  of lectures for critics and creative writers.

"Publishing Workshop for Creative Writers"

Johnny Temple, Publisher, Akashic Books, Brooklyn, New York

I got to meet many of the writers and critics whose work I’ve always admired, but with whom I’ve never broken bread. 

 

  (L-R) Oonya Kempadoo, Author of Tide Running, Ifeona Fulani, Author Seasons of Dust, Nelly Rosario, Author of Song of the Water Saints.

 “Caribbean Women’s Textile/Textual Practices as Archives of Memory and Mourning”
Rachel L. Mordecai, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

"Frame Work: Imaging and the Afterlife of Things"
Kevin  Adonis Browne, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Author of High Mas,
The Caribbean Memory Project

 “An Aesthetics of Federation and a Federation of Aesthetics: West Indian Literature and the Project of Regional Unity”

Alison Donnell, University of East Anglia, United Kingdom

The Caribbean Literary Heritage

“Manscapes: Grooming New Jamaican Iconography”
Isis Semaj-Hall, University of the West Indies, Mona

“After the Collaboration: The Kamau Brathwaite Bibliography"
Kelly Baker Josephs, The City University of New York

 

And then, on Friday night, there was the public performance of Zong! by M. NourbeSe Phillips for the Africans lost in the Maafa. Imagine a host of Caribbean writers, all dressed in white, descending on Historic Virginia Key Beach—the Black Beach-- to offer benedictions for the ancestors and you will have some idea of the moment.

M. NourbeSe Phillips, Author of Zong!

One of the highlights of the Conference was the lecture by Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert (Vassar College), “The Debris of Caribbean History: Literature. Art, and Archipelagic Plastic,” in which she masterfully wove the ecologic degradation of the Caribbean to the legacy of imperialism and showed how plastic is being used by artists and writers, including Derek Walcott and Kamau Brathwaite as metaphors of colonial trauma.

 “The Debris of Caribbean History: Literature. Art, and Archipelagic Plastic,”

Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert (Vassar College)
Repeating Islands 

Give thanks to Pat Saunders & her team for hosting the 37th Annual West Indian Literature Conference, which brought together academics and writers to discuss issues that are essential to our understanding of Caribbean literature and a framework for moving ahead into the brave new digital world of text production, critiques, and archival.

Patricia J. Saunders, Associate Professor, Department of English

On a personal note, I would like to thank Pat for inviting me to launch Garvey's Ghost at the conference and giving me the space to introduce my work to professional critics, professors, and graduate students. It is a memory I will always cherish. 

Bless up, Pat. You have done a mighty, mighty work