Price Institute Newsletter

Price The Clement A.

2014-2015 REVIEW

Institute

o n Et h n i c i t y , C u l t u r e , a n d t h e M o d e r n E x p e r i e n c e

In This Issue MTW

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Dance Symposium

Book Series

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Teacher Development

Created Equal

Newark 350th

We have been renamed the Clement A. Price Institute on Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience

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hen Professor Clement A. Price founded the Institute on Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience in 1997, he sought to make cutting-edge scholarship and artistic output accessible, relevant, and desirable to a diverse urban audience. Over the seventeen years he directed the Institute, he pursued

this mission via a plethora of public programming, convenings, and fellowship opportunities. Since Dr. Price’s untimely passing in November 2014, the extended Rutgers and Newark communities have joined in an effort to make sure his work continues. A fundraising effort unprecedented in speed and generosity has raised more than $5 million

to endow the Institute in Dr. Price’s name. At the conclusion of this year’s Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Series, Rutgers president Robert Barchi announced the renaming to the great enthusiasm of those in attendance. From now on, we at the Clement A. Price Institute continue our work in both Dr. Price’s spirit and his name.

Kea’s Ark

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Partners & Fellows

Upcoming Events

Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Series

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urating Black America, the 35th Annual Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Series (MTW), used the imminent grand opening of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) in Washington, DC, to invite a wide-ranging discussion of the ways we remember the black experience and present it to a diverse global audience.

This is especially germane as the newest resident of the National Mall readies to spotlight such issues for the world.

Keynote speaker, Lonnie Bunch, inaugural director of the NMAAHC, reflected on his experience launching the Museum.

The day’s other speakers explored black history and culture through their experiences leading several other premiere museums and historic sites. They were: Robert

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Stanton, former director of the National Park Service; Thelma Golden, director and chief curator of The Studio Museum in Harlem; George McDaniel, executive director of the Drayton Hall Historic Site in Charleston, South Carolina; and Drayton Hall docents Rebecca Campbell and Catherine Braxton.

People used to remember, now they forget, and if you’re a historian, your job is to help people remember, but remember not just what they want but what they need. -Lonnie Bunch

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The preservation of historic places is more than a protection of the building, artifacts, structures, and landscape. Preservation demonstrates the value of diversity and community and honors and links us with the heritage of our predecessors and most importantly represents our individual and collective legacy to our successors.

-Robert Stanton

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What separates history from fiction is the evidence. If we don’t have the evidence... we don’t have the history. We get that history by doing what? By asking questions.

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-George McDaniel

It is the Harlem of the past with which the museum was building itself, the ground on which the museum first created itself, but it really was a Harlem also of that present, a Harlem that needed a sense of hope, a sense of possibility, a sense that art and culture could be part of engaged community redevelopment that really made the museum happen.

-Thelma Golden

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Continuing the Legacy of Marion Thompson Wright

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urating Black America spoke to the theme of the transformation of American history through the work of those responsible for curating African American history. An audience of close to 800 people from Newark and surrounding communities listened to the speakers as they explored the challenges and opportunities inherent in curation and memory, and how best to represent the diversity of the human experience.

They considered how historical and artistic representation might help prefigure and drive political representation and vice versa.

This year’s MTW examined these processes at the national level, in museums of broad repute, the national parks, and on the National Mall.

MTW was cofounded in 1981 by Dr. Price and Giles R. Wright, who served many years as the inaugural director of the Afro-American History Program at the New Jersey Historical Commission (NJHC).

Mounted in observance of Black History Month in New Jersey, the MTW Series is one of the nation’s most remarkable and longest running scholarly conference series devoted to the historical literacy of a broad and diverse public. Over its nearly four decades, MTW has brought to

Newark some of the most significant scholars of and figures in black history. They have included Sterling Stuckey, James Farmer, Arnold

Rampersad, Nell Irvin Painter, Eric Foner, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Joycelyn Elders, Bob Moses, and Diane Nash.

MTW Tribute To Dr. Clement A. Price The conference, which was presented in memory of Dr. Price, culminated in two special events at the Newark Museum. At the traditional MTW reception, Rutgers University president Robert Barchi announced that the Institute was being endowed in Dr. Price’s name. Following the reception, the Institute and the Rutgers UniversityNewark chancellor’s office mounted a special tribute to Dr. Price’s life and work in the Museum’s Billy Johnson auditorium. Invited speakers participated in a moderated discussion about his contributions to the fields of public history, African American history, and the public humanities. They included Pulitzer Prize-winning historians Taylor Branch and Annette Gordon-Reed; Spencer Crew of George Mason University; Johnnetta Cole, director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art; and Nell Irvin Painter, artist and professor emerita, Princeton University.

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Dance Symposium Series S

ince 2005, the Price Institute has mounted the Dance Symposium Series with the mission of bringing exceptional dance artists directly to an urban audience, including diverse groups of students, families, and lifelong learners. As the only regularly produced dance program at Rutgers University-Newark, the Series has, over the years, brought a variety of dance styles and traditions to campus and the larger Newark community. In addition to an evening performance, each entry in the Series includes a public engagement activity, such as a workshop or lecture/demo, with one of the Institute’s community partners. Last year, the Price Institute successfully applied for a $20,000 Art Works grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to support the Series. These prestigious grants promote the arts as a core element in enhancing the livability of communities. The Series also enjoyed the generous support of the Cultural Programming Fund at Rutgers University-Newark, the Essex County Division of Cultural and Historic Affairs, The Newark Arts Council, and the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation.

September 23-24, 2014, the fall Dance Cross Currents: On Symposium featured the renowned New A Symposium on Jersey ensemble Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company.

Traditional & W Contemporary Chinese Dance

orking with our community partner, the Boys & Girls Club of Newark, the Price Institute facilitated a class on the Chinese tradition of “Ribbon Dancing” for approximately thirty children as part of the Boys & Girls Club’s after-school program in the arts at the organization’s new studio. The next day, at the Bradley Hall Theater, Nai-Ni Chen presented a full concert choreographed by Ms. Chen, which explored both traditional Chinese dance and its influence on contemporary works. Many of the Boys & Girls Club of Newark students were in attendance. Both the workshop and concert were presented free of charge.

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Having the Nai-Ni Chen workshop at the Boys & Girls Club was WONDERFUL. The members had a BLAST and wanted more.

Several of the members have asked if we would be doing this again because they had so

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much FUN learning the Ribbon Dance.

- Cynthia Banks, Vice President of

Operations, Boys & Girls Clubs of Newark 4

Flyin’ With the Wind: A Symposium with the Lula Washington Dance Theater

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n February of 2015, the Institute’s Dance Symposium Series welcomed the West Coast’s premiere African-American dance troupe to Newark. The Lula Washington Dance Theatre (LWDT), a nationally revered company that uses dance to explore social and humanitarian issues, celebrated its 35th anniversary in 2015. Through a special collaboration between the Price Institute and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC), the performance was held at NJPAC’s Victoria Theater on February 26. The previous day, LWDT artists taught two classes, a ninety-minute master class for approximately forty students in the dance program at Newark’s Arts High School (above) and a community class for forty students from Columbia High School (left), as well as Rutgers students and staff, at the Paul Robeson Campus Center.

San Jose Taiko: Rhythm Journey The pounding of taiko drums reverberated throughout the Newark Museum on Monday, March 23, 2015, as San Jose Taiko presented a free daytime lecture/demonstration in the spectacular art of taiko drumming for the Newark community. Founded in 1973, San Jose Taiko is a world-class ensemble that, through its domestic and international touring, reaches more than 75,000 audience members each year.

In a special co-presentation by the Price Institute and the Newark Museum, members of the audience were introduced to the history and various performance techniques of the ancient art of Taiko drumming and were invited to try their hand at playing the drums. Students from two Newark Public schools – Roberto Clemente Elementary and John F. Kennedy School – joined an audience of eighty attendees for this mesmerizing performance and lecture.

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Faculty Book Series This year the Price Institute organized two entries in what we hope will become a regular feature of our calendar. The Faculty Book Series seeks to introduce scholarship produced at Rutgers University–Newark to a broader audience in formats that go beyond the traditional book talk. We work with faculty members to design a program tailor-made for their topic and interests.

But Where is the Lamb? Imagining the Story of Abraham and Isaac

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n September 17th, 2014, the Price Institute celebrated the publication of Professor James Goodman’s But Where Is the Lamb?

Imagining the Story of Abraham and Isaac by hosting an interfaith discussion of the book and the story whose long history it traces from ancient times through its central role in three major monotheistic religious traditions. Professor Goodman spoke on the genesis of the book and his experience grappling with the story of Abraham and Isaac before moderating a thoughtful, challenging, and often funny discussion among three local religious leaders: Imam W. Deen Shareef of the Newark Interfaith Coalition for Hope and Peace, Rabbi Clifford Kulwin of Congregation B’nai Abraham, and Dr. Gregg Mast, president of the New Brunswick Theological Seminary.

Sosúa: Make a Better World

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rofessor Robert Snyder’s Crossing Broadway: Washington Heights and the Promise of New York City tells the story of diverse residents of one iconic neighborhood who came together in a struggle to overcome their own urban crises. On April 15, 2015, the Price Institute helped Professor Snyder celebrate his book’s publication by hosting a screening of Sosúa: Make a Better World, which documents the efforts of Dominican and Jewish teenagers in Washington Heights to stage a musical exploration of the history of Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany in the Dominican Republic.

The screening was followed by a lively discussion among audience members, filmmakers Peter Miller and Renee Silverman, and one of the film’s stars, John Gutierrez.

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An Imam, a Minister, and a Rabbi gather at the Institute to talk about a Rutgers historian’s new book, But Where Is the Lamb? It sounds like the setup for a joke, but though there was plenty of laughter in Dana Library that night, it was a serious affair: a lively interfaith roundtable about the biblical and Koranic stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Ishmael, organized by the only person who could have brought us all together, Clem Price. It was an evening of

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open-minded, big-hearted, honest, and timely spiritual and intellectual exchange--not just among the four panelists but the entire room full of people.

- Professor James Goodman, Rutgers University-Newark 6

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We’ve shown our film around the world

and across the country, but I can’t remember a livelier or more engaged discussion than the one that happened at the Price Insti-

tute’s screening. The event was a perfect

blending of community and academy, bringing scholars and locals together, and using

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the arts as a catalyst for meaningful discussion. We were thrilled to be a part of it.

-Peter Miller, director, producer, and cinematographer

Teacher Professional Development

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ver the years, the Price Institute has partnered with various organizations to provide professional development opportunities for area teachers. As investments in humanities education dwindle, we have helped fill the resulting vacuum by hosting seminars and workshops that bring together university scholars and teachers and provide access to the leading edge of historical research and the new methods that drive it. One of our most steadfast of partners in this endeavor has been the New Jersey Council for the Humanities (NJCH). So when NJCH director Briann Greenfield and program officer Mary Grace Whealan approached us to pilot a new model of such professional development, we worked with them to design Making Local History Matter.

MAKING LOCAL HISToRY MATTER In July 2015, the Price Institute and the NJCH offered a three-day, non-residential course on the campus of Rutgers University-Newark that explored the challenges and opportunities of doing historical research in our own neighborhoods and towns. Twenty-six teachers from northern New Jersey, including several from the Newark Public Schools, met with faculty from across Rutgers and several other institutions to learn about project models that place students in the role of community historians. The workshop offered skills and resources to help students build their research skills, engage in their own education, and encourage pride-of-place. Topics included using history “scavenger hunts,” oral history interviews, and local historical sites as research tools, as well as the use of various digital resources – such as StoryCorps and Historypin – to share research findings with a broad audience. The workshop met in various RU-N classrooms, but a highlight of the program was a walking tour of downtown Newark – with key stops at Military Park, the Hahne’s building, and GlassRoots – conducted by Price Institute Program Coordinator Laura Troiano. Over the course of the workshops, participating teachers gained not only twenty-one professional development credits, but also a wealth of new ideas and resources to deploy in their classrooms.

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Created Equal Film Series

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arly in 2014, the Price Institute partnered with the Newark Museum on a successful grant application to the National Endowment for the Humanities’ Bridging Cultures initiative. With additional funding from the New Jersey Historical Commission, the Institute and the Museum presented the Created Equal film series. Marking the anniversary of key moments in the long civil rights movement – especially the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Mississippi Freedom Summer – the series presented four acclaimed documentary films over the course of the year. Audiences gathered in the Museum’s Billy Johnson Auditorium to view and discuss Slavery by Another Name (February), The Loving Story (April), Freedom Riders (June, in conjunction with the Newark Black Film Festival), and all three episodes of The Abolitionists (October). Each screening was followed by an energetic public discussion led by renowned scholars and filmmakers including Junius Williams (RU-N), Sam Pollard (NYU, director and producer of Slavery by Another Name), Randall Kennedy (Harvard), Deborah Gray White (Rutgers University-New Brunswick), John Stauffer (Harvard), and James Oakes (CUNY). The series in Newark was one of over four hundred such series being held across the United States. As such, it was part of a larger national conversation about the changing meanings of freedom and equality in American history.

NEWARK CELEBRATION 350TH Upon Dr. Price’s passing, the planning for Newark’s 350th anniversary, which he led as chair of Newark Celebration 350, entered a period of reorganization. Working closely with several of the organization’s trustees – including vice-chair Victor Parsonnet; Irene Cooper-Basch, executive officer of the Victoria Foundation; and RU-N chancellor Nancy Cantor – the Price Institute requested funds from the Victoria Foundation to establish an interim director for the effort at 49 Bleeker Street. Dr. John Johnson came on board as a Price Institute Fellow and has since been named the permanent executive director of Newark Celebration 350. Over the next year and a half, Institute staff will provide administrative support for Dr. Johnson as he leads the effort to plan programming suitable for such a landmark year in Newark’s history. As part of that effort, the Price Institute will also be coordinating one key thread of that programming: a

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series of public discussions on Newark’s past, present, and future, each entry of which will be organized by various community members and/

or organizations and which will collectively constitute an unprecedented communal exploration of the city. A call for programs that would fit

the bill has begun circulating.

Please be in touch with your ideas, whether for programs you have planned already or prospective programs.

Kea Tawana’s Ark

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he Price Institute and our partners at Gallery Aferro have mounted an innovative public research project to commemorate the life and times of Kea Tawana’s Ark, a three-story boat-like structure built on a vacant lot in Newark’s Central Ward in the mid-1980s. At the time, the Ark became a flashpoint for debates about public art and urban development.

Today, as Newark’s long-touted revitalization speeds up and the role of the arts in that process is debated, Kea’s Ark takes on renewed relevance. Without the deeper consideration afforded by the humanities, the story is a bizarre legend from a battered place. With it, the story is a means to provoke thoughtful dialogue among disparate groups of citizens about the arts and urban development, especially as Newark approaches its 350th anniversary.

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ne woman built that!

It still inspires me when I think about it.

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he project proceeds in two

ages who knew Kea and the Ark.

timedia exhibition designed and

and artist-led visualization work-

phases. In phase one, we are

The Institute and the Gallery each

hosted by Gallery Aferro. In the

shops. The project’s guiding notion

gathering the material necessary to

bring significant complementary

project’s second phase, the story

is that there cannot and will nev-

tell the story of the Ark and design

strengths to the project, allowing

of Kea’s Ark will be opened to the

er be a definitive “official” version

the media for doing so. This will

us to enrich the strategies of schol-

public, and the public invited to re-

of the Ark’s story. Instead, we seek

be a collaborative process involving

ars and researchers by calling upon

spond to it. The exhibition is timed

to encourage historical and civic

humanities scholars, artists, and

the knowledge and skills of a multi-

to coincide with Newark’s 350th

literacy and empathy by honoring

the community at-large. Using a

generational cohort of Newarkers.

anniversary celebration and will

the ways in which one individual’s

broadly disseminated call for voic-

We will create a “people’s history”

open and close with public events.

gesture has inspired and informed

es and multiple scholar-led public

of the Ark by melding exhaustively

It will also serve as the basis for

multiple lives and by encouraging

workshops and presentations, we

researched and organized informa-

multiple public gatherings, during

citizens to consider the role of art

will collect extensive testimonies

tion with oral history and visual

which attendees will be invited to

and culture in civic life.

from artists, activists, church and

arts strategies. The result will be

explore the Ark’s story and the is-

To share your story of the Ark,

government

builders,

a powerful document of commu-

sues it raises via several methods,

please send an email to keas.ark@

and Newark residents of varying

nity-led meaning making: a mul-

including community conversation

gmail.com.

officials,

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Thank You to Our Community Partners As a campus-based, community-oriented center for the public arts and humanities, the Price Institute thrives on its partnerships with various community organizations in Newark and beyond. We gratefully acknowledge the generosity, wisdom, work, and friendship of all those who have helped us dream up, plan, and realize our programs.

PRI C E

I n st i t u t e

John Johnson, Jr.

F e l l o ws

Kathleen Galop

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K

political and cultural history of 20th century United States, African Amer-

proud of the City of Newark. Kathleen’s focus is on the City’s Archives, the

ican history, history of immigration, and Urban Studies. For over a decade

preservation of its contents, and the encouragement of city residents to learn

he has worked with pre-college and undergraduate educational programs

more about Newark’s history. Kathleen is committed to creating a “State of

as an instructor and administrator. As part of his Fellowship, John serves as

the Art Archival Facility” for Newark. She has developed a scholar intern

the executive director of Newark Celebration 350, an organization tasked

program to organize the City’s Photography Collection and has undertaken

with commemorating in 2016 the 350th anniversary of Newark’s founding,

a project with Rutgers University–Newark’s Department of Arts, Culture

a rare and momentous time in the city’s history. Through a series of over

and Media, which will enable the Newark Archives staff to digitally repro-

100 curated events the commemoration will change the narrative of Newark

duce the photographs. Kathleen is in the process of developing projects to

by engaging people who live, work in, and play in Newark to participate

form a disaster plan for the Newark Archives, as well as a series of historic

in Newark’s rebirth and revitalization. Additionally the celebration will po-

and cultural tours based upon the contents of the Archives during Newark’s

sition Newark as an exemplar of civically engaged community and urban

350th Celebration Year. Additionally, she assisted in providing her expertise

development.

to records management at the Newark Archives as the administration of the

ohn received his PhD from Rutgers University-Newark in American Studies in 2014. His research and teaching interests are centered on the

athleen, an attorney by profession and expert in historic preservation and archival collections, is a native Newarker and exceptionally

Newark City Clerk’s Office has recently changed.

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What’s Up Next? Fall 2015 H’sao: Vocal and Instrumental Music from Chad On Thursday, October 8th, 2015, at 7 p.m., in the Bradley Hall Theater at Rutgers University–Newark.

This Montreal-based band will share its unique blend of modern and traditional African sound. Enjoy the free concert followed by a Q&A on Chadian music, dance and culture.

Dracula by the Atlantic City Ballet On Wednesday, October 28th, 2015, at 7:30 p.m., in the Jim Wise Theater at NJIT, there will be a Halloween special of highlights from this critically acclaimed ballet.

Free Admission.

A Symposium on Dance & Disability with the AXIS Dance Company

On Tuesday, November 17th, 2015, at 7:30 p.m., at NJPAC, one of the world’s leading and most innovative ensembles of dancers with and without disabilities will be performing.

Free Community Classes will be scheduled.

Birth of a Nation Film Screening and Discussion On Thursday, December 10th, 2015, we will host a screening of this film at the Newark Museum’s Billy Johnson auditorium, followed by a discussion with Professor Miriam Petty of Northwestern University. Free Admission.

Spring 2016 The 36th Annual Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Save the date for next year’s Marion Thompson Wright Lecture. It will take place on Saturday, February 20th, 2016. The theme will be criminal justice in the African American experience. The keynote speaker will be Professor Ruth Wilson Gilmore, cofounder of Critical Resistance and author of Golden Gulag.

Ukrainian Dance & Culture On March 31st, 2016, we will host the Voloshky Ukrainian Dance Ensemble in a daytime lecture/ demo at the Newark Museum and an evening performance at NJIT’s Jim Wise Theater.

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Price Institute Staff Mark Krasovic Interim Director (973) 353-1051 krasovic@rutgers.edu

Marisa Pierson Senior Program Coordinator (973) 353-3896 mpierson@rutgers.edu

Laura Tr oiano Program Coordinator (973) 353-3905 ltroiano@rutgers.edu

Aftan Baldwin Administrative Assistant (973) 353-3891 aftan.baldwin@rutgers.edu

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