Research

William T. Williams: Variations on Themes features 31 original lithographs, works on paper, and sculptures at the David C. Driskell Center for the Study of the Visual Arts and Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora at the University of Maryland. Variations on Themes will be on view from March 31 through May 28, 2010. The public opening reception will be held on Wednesday, March 31, 2010 from 5 to 7 PM at the Driskell Center’s gallery, 1207 Cole Student Activities Building. 

Williams, who emerged in New York City during the 1960s and 1970s, is one of the most important artists working in abstraction today. He often incorporates childhood memories and life experiences into his artwork through colors, shapes and patterns. Curated by Dr. Lowery Stokes Sims, Curator of the Museum of Arts and Design in New York City, NY, Variations on Themes highlights four decades of William T. Williams’ work as a printmaker. The exhibition focuses on four basic compositional and thematic approaches, often highlighting Williams’ iconic imagery of the diamond/trapezoid; conical vessel shapes, orbs, serpentine elements and biomorphic presences; and patterns and textural effects within the individual segments. The exhibition illustrates Williams’ artistic journey, which has been as spontaneous as it has been methodical; as formal as it was free-wielding; as rich as it has been sparse.

Essays by Curlee Raven Holton, Julie L. McGee, David R. Brigham, and Diane Windham Shaw. 

Since its founding in 1996, the Experimental Printmaking Institute (EPI) at Lafayette College has passionately advocated for printmaking as an indispensable component of cultural and creative engagement. Combining traditional printmaking techniques with experimental approaches, EPI is committed to advancing this dynamic art form and expanding our visual language. At the heart of this groundbreaking program are artist residencies that, to date, have yielded more than 350 editions by artists such as Faith Ringgold, Richard Anuszkiewicz, David C. Driskell, Grace Hartigan, and Sam Gilliam. A two decade history of EPI, You Can Fly and Make Prints Too also celebrates EPI’s creative impact and the vision of its founding director, master printmaker and David M. ’70 and Linda Roth Professor of Art, Curlee Raven Holton, who will be retiring in 2017.

African American Art Since 1950: Perspectives from the David C. Driskell Center, an exhibition in which works by renowned artists such as Romare Bearden, Elizabeth Catlett, and Sam Gilliam are coupled with exciting new visionaries, including Chakaia Booker, Lorna Simpson, and Kara Walker, collectively reflects the growing prominence—and complexity—of the field of African American Art over the last 60 years. The exhibition is organized by the David C. Driskell Center for the Study of the Visual Arts and Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora at the University of Maryland and opens on Thursday, September 20, 2012 with a public reception from 5-7PM. The exhibition will run until December 14, 2012. The Gallery will be open three additional Saturdays, October 6, November 10, December 1, 2012 from 11AM - 4PM. The gallery will be closed for the Thanksgiving holiday, November 22-25, 2012.

Over thirty-five years ago, when prominent artist, collector, and scholar David C. Driskell developed the 1976 exhibition Two Centuries of Black American Art: 1750-1950, organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, he introduced the tremendous depth and breadth of African American art and creativity to an international audience. African American Art Since 1950: Perspectives from the David C. Driskell Center, curated by Dr. Robert E. Steele and Dorit Yaron, the David C. Driskell Center’s Former Executive Director and Acting Director, respectively, and Independent Scholar Dr. Adrienne L. Childs, honors the legacy of this landmark exhibition and brings to the nation the next pivotal chapter of African American art.

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Publications are available at a 20% discount for orders of 10 or more of the same title. Payment must be sent to The David C. Driskell Center before the order will be shipped. ALL SALES ARE FINAL. Visit the Driskell Center store for more details.

From the New York Times bestselling author of the National Book Award-winning title The Poet X comes a dazzling novel in prose about a girl with talent, pride and a drive to feed the soul that keeps her fire burning bright. Ever since she got pregnant freshman year, Emoni Santiago’s life has been about making the tough decisions – doing what has to be done for her daughter and her abuela. The one place she can let all that go is in the kitchen, where she adds a little something magical to everything she cooks, turning her food into straight-up goodness.

Even though she dreams of working as a chef after she graduates, Emoni knows that it’s not worth her time to pursue the impossible. Yet despite the rules she thinks she has to play by, once Emoni starts cooking, her only choice is to let her talent break free.

The colonial project is stitched in and through the language and literatures of the pre- and early modern periods; the politics and economics that ultimately produced settler colonialism, chattel slavery, the forced migration of peoples, and the development of the British empire animate these early English texts.

Read "BlacKKKShakespearean: A Call to Action for Medieval and Early Modern Studies"

2017 (Spring) semester-long Research and Scholarship Award, the Graduate School, University of Maryland.

By Catherine Knight Steele, assistant professor of communication, and Jessica H. Lu, AADHum postdoctoral associate.

Abstract:

Existing research has affirmed that Black people historically mastered oral communication strategies to resist subjugation and oppression by dominant groups, and have emerged as leaders in technological innovation. This article takes seriously Black users’ social media engagement and focuses particularly on Black joy online. We analyze a rich collection of discourse spanning both Twitter and Vine through which Black users utilize the affordances of both platforms to challenge dominant narratives that demean and dehumanize Black people. We argue that Black users seize upon the interplay of the applications to not only express and foster joy, but to extend historic legacies of Black oral culture and further cultivate contemporary strategies that leverage – but also transcend – the affordances of each platform.

Robyn Muncy, professor of history, guest curated an exhibit at the National Archives marking the 100th anniversary of women in the U.S. attaining the right to vote.

Robyn Muncy, professor of history, is a guest curator of "Rightfully Hers: American Women and the Vote," an exhibit to commemorate the centenary of the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment at the National Archives in Washington, DC. The exhibit opened in March and will run through September 2020. 

The exhibition is part of a nationwide initiative exploring the generations-long fight for universal woman suffrage. Despite decades of marches, petitions, and public debate to enshrine a woman’s right to vote in the Constitution, the 19th Amendment – while an enormous milestone – did not grant voting rights for all. The challenges of its passage reverberate to the ongoing fight for gender equity today. 

What is now considered a key component of citizenship - the right to vote - is often taken for granted, and is not afforded to all through the Constitution. Through this initiative, the National Archives will not only highlight the hard-won victories that stemmed from the Women’s Suffrage movement, but also remind modern-day citizens of their responsibilities associated with the right to vote.

Read more about the exhibition on the National Archives website.

Project Director: Mary Corbin Sies, Associate Professor of American Studies 

Project Title: Change and Resilience in Lakeland: African Americans in College Park, Md., 1950–1980

Project Description: A daylong digitization event, by-appointment collecting visits to neighbors’ homes, and a public interpretation event to document and explore the history of Lakeland, an African-American community in Prince George’s County, Maryland. 

Juan Carlos Quintero-Herencia, professor Spanish and Portuguese in the School of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, received a grant from the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) to host an symposium at the University of Maryland in Spring 2019 on Spanish Caribbean literature and culture.

This proposal describes the design and organization of an experimental symposium focused on the critical reconsideration of periods, situations and texts that have been polemics in the modern and contemporaneous Spanish Caribbean. It is, in addition, an intriguing proposal for its promise to combine esthetics and policy, literary critique and analysis of the current political, economic and environmental uncertainties that confront the societies of the Caribbean.

In Latin America, the Caribbean occupies a secondary or inferior position, and is often overlooked.  This project makes a significant effort to increase the academic visibility of this region, therefore it obtained a high score in the evaluation of the potential of its impact criteria.

The organizers and participants in the symposium, who come from different countries in the Hispanic Caribbean and other countries, show an excellent transnational and hemispheric commitment that includes the United States, Canada, Europe and Latin America, and seek to be involved in the proposed discussion and to supply texts to established and emerging academics, from a great variety of institutions. In summary, it is an original project, it is very well developed and is clear in its proposals, objectives and use of the budget.

 Selection Committee:

The project selection committee in this cycle was presided over by Mara Viveros-Vigoya, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Vice President of LASA and President-elect, and included the participation of María Victoria Murillo de Columbia University; Emiliana Cruz, from Ciesas, México DF, Vivian Andrea Martínez-Díaz, Universidad de los Andes and Jaime A. Alves of CSI/CUNY and Universidad ICESI/Colombia, former winner of the FORD-LASA grant in 2015.