Author Archives: Katie Holt

Feminist (im)mobilities and Liquid Fractures: Migration and Mobility in North America and the Mediterranean

I write to share an announcement for an exciting lecture next Thursday, April 19 at 7:30.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are excited to host a multidisciplinary panel on “Feminist (im)mobilities and Liquid Fractures: Migration and Mobility in North America and the Mediterranean” on April 19th, 2018 in Lean Lecture Hall at 7:30pm.

Amy Lind will speak about Feminist (Im)mobilities, NAFTA, and the post-9/11 US-Mexico Border and Maurizio Albahari, will talk about migration via the Mediterranean route.

Speaker Bios

Amy Lind is Mary Ellen Heintz Professor and Head of the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Cincinnati. She is the author of Gendered Paradoxes: Women’s Movements, State Restructuring, and Global Development in Ecuador (Penn State University Press, 2005), and editor of four volumes, including Development, Sexual Rights and Global Governance (Routledge, 2010) and Feminist (Im)mobilities in Fortress(ing) North America: Rights, Citizenships and Identities in Transnational Perspective (Ashgate Publishing, 2013). Her new book, From Nation to Plurination: Resignifying State, Economy and Family in Ecuador (with Christine Keating), addresses the cultural, economic, and affective politics of Ecuador’s postneoliberal Citizen Revolution.

Maurizio Albahari is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Notre Dame, where he is also concurrent Associate Professor in the Keough School of Global Affairs. He is the author of Crimes of Peace: Mediterranean Migrations at the World’s Deadliest Border (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015). His articles and editorials on refugee mobility and related civic engagement in the Euro-Mediterranean context have appeared in interdisciplinary and news media venues including the Journal on Migration and Human Security, Social Research, Humanity, Anthropology Today, Anthropology News, Anthropological Quarterly, History News Network, openDemocracy, Perspektif Magazine, Fox News, and CNN.

Benefit Dinner for Central American Clean Water Campaign April 11

Students, please consider supporting this important effort to help clean water projects in Central America by attending Soup & Bread next Wednesday, April 11 from 5-7pm in Kittredge.   I share Nate Addington’s message below:

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Soup and Bread, in collaboration with the Greenhouse Student Sustainability Group, is teaming up again to reach our pledge for the Companion Community Developmental Alternatives’ (CoCoDA) clean water projects in Central America. Our first dinner this semester kicked off our campaign and was a huge success! But we still have a little work to do! Join us in reaching our goal of $5,750 towards the total cost of these projects ($110,000).

This past October, students, staff, and faculty from The College of Wooster attended The Sun and Water Conference hosted by CoCoDA in Suchitoto, El Salvador. The conference focused on CoCoDA’s initiatives to install solar powered water filtration systems in three villages located in El Salvador and Nicaragua. Our pledge will go towards directly benefiting these projects in these villages.

We invite you to join us in The Soup and Bread Central American Clean Water Campaign! We’ll have soup and grilled cheese! It’s only one meal swipe or $5! All are welcome to attend!

*View this video from The Sun and Water Conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G26CcoWNh6I&t=215s

The Guardian Publishes Activist Letter Calling for Justice for Marielle

As a follow-up to Thursday’s discussions of Marielle Franco’s assassination, I wanted to share this letter signed by international activists, artists, and writers calling for her death to be fully investigated and the perpetrators brought to justice.

Signers of the letter include Ava DuVernay (director of Selma & A Wrinkle in Time), Angela Davis, Janelle Monáe, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi (founders of Black Lives Matter), and Bertha Zúñiga Cáceres (Beta Cáceres’ daughter).

Lecture: White Bound Monday 2/12

Matthew Hughey to Deliver Stieglitz Memorial Lecture. Matthew Hughey, associate professor of sociology at the University of Connecticut, will present “White Bound: Nationalists, Antiracists, and the Shared Meaning of Race” on Monday, Feb. 12, at The College of Wooster’s Stieglitz Memorial Lecture. The talk, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Lean Lecture Room of Wishart Hall.

“White Bound” investigates whether whites are splintering into antagonistic groups, with differing worldviews, values, and ideological stances, and questions the very notion of a fracturing whiteness, and in so doing offers a unique view of white racial identity. Hughey spent over a year attending meetings, reading literature, and interviewing members of two white organizations—a white nationalist group and a white antiracist group.

Though he found immediate political differences, he observed surprising similarities related to how both groups make meaning of race and whiteness.

“White Bound” was a co-winner of the 2014 Eduardo Bonilla-Silva Outstanding Book Award. Hughey, who earned a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Virginia, is currently a member of the executive committee for the Eastern Sociological Society and is chair-elect of the Division of Racial and Ethnic Minorities for the Society for the Study of Social Problems. In 2018, he’ll serve as a visiting professor in the department of sociology at Trinity College in Dublin and a visiting fellow in the Institute of Advanced Study at Warwick University in Coventry, England.

The Stieglitz Memorial Lecture was founded by Dr. and Mrs. Lewis N. Stieglitz of Concord, N.H., as a tribute to their son, Martin, a Wooster student who was majoring in sociology when he lost his life in an off-campus house fire on Feb. 11, 1989. The Stieglitz Memorial Fund, the departments of Sociology and Anthropology, the Center for Diversity and Inclusion, as well as the departments of Political Science and Africana Studies are co-sponsoring the lecture.

Iemanjá

Today, February 2, some Brazilians celebrate the festival of Iemanjá (also spelled Yemanja), one of the most important Candomblé goddesses.  Candomblé, a Brazilian expression of several African faith traditions (especially Yoruba) combined with some elements of Catholicism, is a great example of the kinds of cultural resistance and exchange we started to talk about in class yesterday.  It is also a very visible link between West Africa and the larger African diaspora.

Iemanjá is a female water goddess, a protector of fishermen and pregnant women.  In Bahia, devotees honor her on the official Catholic festival day for Our Lady of Navigators (Feb 2).  Followers make offerings of flowers and other objects that they throw into the sea, or set adrift on small rafts.

It was hard to find a subtitled/English video of the Bahian celebration, but I’m sharing one here.  You’ll her the music, see the blue and white clothing of many devotees, and see a few people entering into religious trances.  (You can find a lot more of videos if you just want to see the celebration).

Panel: The Dream Act Today February 8th 4pm

I write to share an announcement from Dr. Jeff Lantis, Chair of Global and International studies.
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We are excited to announce an upcoming panel and talk-back event, titled “The Dream Act Today: The Immigration Policy Battle from the Front-lines” on Thursday, February 8th, in Lowry 119 at 4:00 pm.  This is a great opportunity to learn more about the history of the Dream Act (DACA) and ask questions about the future of immigration policy in today’s political climate. Guest speaker Angela Kelley is the Vice President of immigration policy at the Center for American Progress. We will also have a faculty moderated panel with student perspectives—and invite a broader discussions over refreshments.
This event is co-sponsored by the Global & International Studies Program, the Departments of Political Science and History, and the Beyond the Border student group.
We hope to see you there!
To learn more about Angela Kelley visit: https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/people/angela-m-kelley

WET: A DACAmented Journey

As I mentioned in class, I want to make sure that you all know about this upcoming performance by Alex Alpharaoh on January 31st at 7pm,
Below, I share the announcement from my colleague, Dr. Noriega.
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I am thrilled to announce that Alex Alpharaoh will be coming to the College to perform his one-man show about DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), which chronicles his journey as an undocumented immigrant in the turbulent politics of our nation. This critically acclaimed production comes to Wooster in the midst of a legislative and public battle over the future of DACA and the approximately 800,000 young immigrants whose futures were upended when the current administration ended Obama’s executive order. This event offers a unique opportunity to educate our community about the personal effects of divisive and racist politics and the role that the arts can play in advocating for a more inclusive and just society. For these reasons, I hope that you can join me in advertising:
WET: A DACAMENTED JOURNEY
written and performed by Alex Alpharaoh
January 31 at 7:00pm
Freedlander Theatre
This event is free and open to the public.
For more information on the show, please read the The Los Angeles Times review or visit the production’s website:
This performance is the first in a Transnational Performance Series being organized this semester at the College by Professors Jimmy Noriega (Theatre and Dance), Nicosia Shakes (Africana Studies), and Dheepa Sundaram (Religious Studies). More information on the series will follow soon. 

Thank you all,

Jimmy Noriega  

2018 Great Decisions Series: Resurgent Nationalism & Borderless Problems

I write to share a message from my colleague Dr. John Rudisill (Philosophy) with the schedule for the 2018 Great Decisions Lecture Series.  This campus-community collaboration brings together an impressive array of speakers.  All events are free and open to the public.

• The series begins on Thursday, February 1 with a lecture by Laura Galante, Founder of Galante Strategies and Senior Fellow, Atlantic Council. The title of her lecture is “Cybersecurity in the Age of Connectivity.” This lecture is scheduled for 7:30pm in Gault Recital Hall, Scheide Music Center..

• The second event is Tuesday, February 6 when Angela Maria Kelley, Senior Strategic Advisor on Immigration, Open Society Foundations, will speak on “Immigration Policy and Politics Under the Trump Administration: What’s Happened and What’s Happening Next?” This lecture is scheduled for 7:30pm in Gault Recital Hall, Scheide Music Center.

• On Tuesday, February 13 E.J. Dionne, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and Syndicated Columnist for the Washington Post will join us with his lecture: “One Nation After Trump.” This lecture is scheduled for 7:30pm in Gault Recital Hall, Scheide Music Center.

• The final event in our series takes place on February 27 & 28. On Tuesday, February 27, we will screen the powerful documentary film, “Chasing Coral” at 7:00pm in Gault Recital Hall. The following day, from 11:45 am to 1:15 pm we will host a lunch lecture featuring “Chasing Coral” Producer, Larissa Rhodes who will give the talk: “From Chasing Coral to Chasing Conversations.” This lunch event will take place in Kittredge Dining Hall. A ticket will be required for this lunch event only.