Magazines as bodies – human bodies. Alive. Breathing, moving. Preaching. In this lecture, we will look at Black independent magazines as spiritual bodies. In fact, magazines like CRWN, Womanly, and HANNAH become spiritual leaders whose teachings are ubiquitous in their pages, though not necessarily obvious.
In their missions to represent authentic Black women, these magazines depict as well as build a Black female community. This focus on strengthening the larger Black community sets the indies apart from mainstream publications, which tend to focus on individuals’ achievements and exceptionalism.
Based on Christian and African-based spiritualities, African Americans have forged a unique spirituality in which knowledge of the interwovenness of all things and beings, dead or alive, is crucial. Thus, we will see how selected Black independent magazines spiritually guide the Black individual into community, inspired by the belief that the self is most authentic, free and self-actualized when in relation.

You can download the poster for the event here.

This lecture offers insight into the U.S. occupation of Haiti (1915-1934) and the complex ways in which African American women engaged with Haitian history during the occupation. It explores how Anna Julia Cooper’s and Harriet Gibbs Marshall’s historical writing challenged the dominant discourse about Haiti, which undergirded the occupation. Reading their work in the context of U.S. imperialism abroad and racial segregation and violence at home, it examines how Cooper and Marshall negotiated their own ideas about and relationships to empire, racial uplift, and diasporic solidarity.

This event features Irene Gammel and Carlos Lozada discussing the role of life writing in political memoir and beyond. They delve into how these narratives address politicians’ lives under public scrutiny, particularly in the context of the Trump era, which has inspired a wave of books exploring personal and political identities and the shifts caused by the Trump era. Lozada focuses on the political aspects, while Gammel advocates for a feminist reevaluation of life writing, highlighting how personal narratives can embody political values such as care and empathy. They explore how personal stories, like those of #MeToo, can fuel resistance movements and how life writing narratives of public persons can reveal unexpected insights beyond their public personas.