Lectures and Events

In this Concert entitled Wajd—the ecstatic, blissful state induced by poetry and music—the Tarab Ensemble will perform selections of the Arabic Sufi repertoire.

Chelle Barbour’s multidisciplinary art practice reimagines the body of the Black female through the lens of Afro-Surrealism. Barbour’s morning talk will be followed by an evening reception.

Dr. James R. Jones, Director of the Center on Politics and Race in America at Rutgers University–Newark, will discuss how white supremacy diffuses from Congress through law, politics, and everyday social life.

A Matthew Vassar Lecture, panel discussion, and workshops by syndicated Black cartoonist and children’s book illustrator Jerry Craft, who will discuss his graphic novel New Kid—and how the text has been weaponized and banned from some libraries and classrooms across the country.

A lecture by Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz, Associate Professor of English Education at Teachers College, Columbia University.

In search of a more inclusive history, public historian and community activist Sam Collins III will share how he has worked to “fill in the gaps” in our shared story. His scholarship spans U.S. and Mexican history as well as the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The talk is co-sponsored by the Poughkeepsie community organization Celebrating the African Spirit, whose co-chair Carmen McGill will introduce the speaker.

Dr. Square is Assistant Professor at Parsons School of Design and a fellow in the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He will speak about his present research, which explores connections between histories of enslavement and the fashion system.

A lecture by Dr. Eddie Glaude Jr., author and James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor and Chair of the Department of African American Studies at Princeton University.

A Matthew Vassar Lecture by syndicated Black cartoonist and children’s book illustrator Jerry Craft, who will discuss his graphic novel New Kid—and how the text has recently been weaponized as a political pawn, banned from some libraries and classrooms across the country.

The author and New School professor will discuss her ground-breaking new book, Reckoning, which analyzes the emergence of the Movement for Black Lives, its organizational structure and culture, and its strategies and tactics.