Spring 2017 GRID Seminar
Radical Unlearning:
Feminist Reflections on Transgression, Humility, and Chaos
Directed by Professors Ivy Schweitzer and Pati Hernandez. In "Radical Unlearning" we will address how, in the words of bell hooks, "our ways of knowing are forged in history and relations of power," and how this recognition shapes social experiences, our academic approaches, and our performance of community.
Public Lecture Series
Speaker Schedule
Michelle Dorrance and Toshi Reagon in Conversation April 5, 2017
Co-sponsored by the Hopkins Center for the Arts
* 4:30 -5:30 pm * Faulkner Recital Hall * Free
"Performance as Activism"
Michelle Dorrance and Toshi Reagon reflect on their roles as cultural tradition bearers. Co-sponsored by the Hopkins Center for the Arts and the Gender Research Institute at Dartmouth. Info 603.646.2010
Presented in conjunction with The Blues Project, Dorrance Dance with Toshi Reagon and BIGLovely. Performances Friday & Saturday, April 7 & 8, 8 PM, The Moore Theater.
Tickets & info: https://hop.dartmouth.edu/Online/dorrancedance
A conversation between two vibrant artists who will be performing at Dartmouth this Spring: MacArthur "genius" tap dancer/choreographer Michelle Dorrance, director of Dorrance Dance, and Toshi Reagon, singer, songwriter and leader of the band BIGLovely . Interviewed by Francine A'Ness, a scholar of performance, they will reflect on their roles as cultural tradition bearers.
Pedagogy Panel Wednesday April 12, 2017
Co-Sponsored by the Leslie Center for the Humanities
* 4:30 - 6:00 pm, Haldeman 41 * Free
"Feminist Pedagogies: Listening, Hesitation, and Lived Possibilities"
with Professor Krista Ratcliffe (English, Purdue), Professor Alia Al-Saji (Philosophy, McGill) , Professor Smaranda Aldea (Philosophy, Dartmouth)
How can we listen, react and live consciously? In ways consistent with feminist theory and practice? In ways that intervene in and unsettle our usual, often hierarchical, sometimes oppressive behaviors? Two philosophers and a scholar of rhetoric and composition discuss their various but related approaches to difference, embodiment and otherness, drawing on a wide variety of philosophical, feminist, critical, and critical race theories and practices
Dr. Gabor Maté Thursday April 27, 2017
Co-Sponsored by the Rockefeller Center
* 12:30 - 2:00 pm, Haldeman 41 * Free: Open to the public on a first come first serve bases.
"The Hungry Ghost: A Biopsychosocial Perspective on Addiction, from Heroin to Workaholism"
Clinician and author of In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts
Addiction is epidemic in our society, but we react by regarding it as a crime rather than a disease, even less so as a disease of dislocation and spiritual emptiness. Gabor Maté, a Hungarian-born physician who treats addicts in the Vancouver area, advocates a radical and compassionate approach to addiction and treatment. Boldly challenging the efficacy of the War on Drugs, he proposes more holistic alternatives that address larger societal problems and "high status" addictions, such as wealth, power, sex.
Rhodessa Jones Thursday May 4, 2017 *******Date Change******
Sponsored by Montgomery Fellows Program.
* 4:30 - 6:30 pm, Dartmouth Hall 105 * Free ******Place Change********
"Gathering Stories at the Edge of the World"
Co-Artistic Director of the San Francisco based performance company Cultural Odyssey
How can performance address the wounds of incarceration and social dysfunction? Rhodessa Jones, actress, teacher, and director, has spent her life putting performance to the service of personal and social transformation. She is co-Artistic Director of the acclaimed San Francisco performance company Cultural Odyssey, and Founder and Director of the award-winning performance workshop, the Medea Project: Theater for Incarcerated Women/HIV Circle. She shares a lifetime of experience and wisdom in the stories she gleans from her work in the forgotten spaces of society.
Public Event: Attend TSSC performance at the Sullivan County House of Corrections, Unity, NH, Thursday May 18 or Friday May 19 at 7pm.
What happens when we put ourselves on the line? When we make ourselves vulnerable and open to listening and working with others as equals? This performance, by the students in Eng53/WGSS 66/MALS 364 Telling Stories for Social Change and the male inmates at Sullivan County House of Corrections, gives voice to the challenges and struggles we all face living in a world of adversity, but particularly to the issues faced by men in the rural Upper Valley. It will move and challenge you to think about and work on how we can do it better.
Alumni / Activists Panel: And Now What?
Screening of "It's Criminal: A tale of Incarceration and the Ivy League" Wednesday May 24, 2017
* 4:00 - 6:00 pm, Haldeman 41 * Free *****Time Change****
with film director Signe Taylor, Nell Pierce'13, Christina Stoltz '06,'07, Charlotte Gunderson and Kim McDonald.
Seven years in the making, IT'S CRIMINAL shares the poignant journeys of incarcerated women and Dartmouth College students working together to write and perform an original play about the lives of the imprisoned women. The film captures the humanity of both the students, in all their privilege, and the prisoners, who are heartbreakingly articulate about the lack of economic and legal justice in the USA. The panel includes the filmmaker, four alumni of the program: two students who are now doing their own social justice work, and two formerly incarcerated women who are working with the Telling My Story project.
"Experiences with Radical UNlearning: GRID Institute Final Performance" Thursday May 25, 2017
* 7:00 - 8:30 pm, Alumni Hall * Free
This performance is the coming together of students, faculty and staff Fellows in the Spring 2017 GRID Institute: Radical UNlearning: Feminist Reflections on Trangression, Humility and Chaos, using the "Telling My Story" platform to identify and transcend the invisible barriers that are so present in academia and in our lives. There will be skits, a talking wall, a manifesto, and final testimonials by all the Fellows.
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Feminist theories have allowed us to analyze and critique the workings of social power, to see that our institutions, communities, and intimate relations are full of unseen, unspoken, and unheard dynamics. These hidden social behaviors contribute to building and maintaining visible and invisible walls. Behind these walls, a growing population has found a way to social visibility through addiction, violence, and crime. There is, for example, a spiraling opioid epidemic in New Hampshire and Vermont, but the Dartmouth community rarely engages with these issues or communities, except abstractly. We see our campus as immune and insulated from these dangerous trends.
Dartmouth more so than most, because of our location in rural New England, a relatively non-diverse area far from large population centers. In reality, our community is quite diverse, but we gloss over our differences rather than acknowledging them as a means "to enrich our visions and our joint struggles," as Audre Lorde counseled back in 1984. Despite several decades of work on feminist and critical pedagogy, we have not fully integrated these insights and practices into our teaching and classrooms.
This GRID seminar asks: what are the pressing and invisible inequities facing the Dartmouth community and the communities around us, and how can we shape our teaching and learning to prepare our students to address them? How can we embrace the whole of students' intellect and experience, actively transform knowledge rather than simply consume it, and unlock the genuinely transformative potential of teaching? What kinds of new research methods and questions does this kind of learning and teaching facilitate?