Legacies of American Slavery project: Centenary leads the way in national effort
The Council of Independent Colleges (CIC) has announced Centenary as one of seven Regional Collaboration Partners for Legacies of American Slavery: Reckoning with the Past, a multi-year initiative supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation with additional funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Dr. Karen Soul, provost and dean of the college, and Dr. Bethany Hansen, assistant professor of biology lead the Centenary team that also includes Dr. Chris Ciocchetti, associate professor of philosophy, and Dr. Michael Hicks, assistant professor of education. Centenary will work in partnership with colleagues at Huston-Tillotson University in Austin, Texas, on the topic of “Race, Health, and Medicine.”
Regional Collaboration Partners are charged with engaging other CIC member institutions and community-based organizations to develop and distribute programming related to their topics as well as involve students in research and learning activities. A few of the first-year activities planned by the Centenary-Hutson-Tillotson team include initiating a teaching circle for interested faculty at CIC institutions, a workshop to be held at the Whitney Plantation, course development, and preliminary research that will involve students in the development and analysis of community surveys.
To learn more about the Legacies of American Slavery project from the CIC, click here.
Three members of the Centenary team sat down with the magazine this spring to talk about the Legacies project in more depth. Dr. Karen Soul provides an overview of the program and Centenary’s specific goals.
Dr. Chris Ciocchetti introduces the concept of “legacies of slavery” and why these legacies are essential to unearth and interrogate.
Centenary and its partner, Huston-Tillotson University, are specifically examining the topic of “Race, Health, and Medicine” through the CIC grant. Dr. Bethany Hansen discusses how she and her students are already grappling with the many implications of this topic.
Ciocchetti helps illuminate some of the hidden legacies of slavery that persist at Centenary, and offers an example of how he has revised a long-standing course to specifically address some of the same complex issues about race and medicine that Hansen and her students have examined.
The Legacies of American Slavery grant project prioritizes collaboration and connections. Hansen explains how these connections started first on campus, when a colleague from another department discovered they were working on similar issues and approached her about applying for the CIC grant.
The Centenary team is looking forward to working with the nationwide network that has been created to support the Legacies of American Slavery project. Ciocchetti discusses his personal excitement about the chance to learn from his colleagues and advance his knowledge. The grant project is an opportunity for him to be a student as well as a teacher.
The Legacies project will also incorporate research opportunities for Centenary undergraduates. Hansen discusses her excitement about some of the early research plans and enthusiasm from students.