“The policies that created segregation have been so successful, that if you live in a white world, it’s kind of hard to see out of it. You just have to learn to see it.” -Merlin Rainwater Consider the following language. When was it written? Where was it written? No person…
Port Urbanism, Blackness, and the Shipping Crate in ‘Collapse: Works by Dewey Crumpler’ — a conversation with curator Sampada Aranke
“He would do these walks along the port, and see these shipping containers come in and out, and became particularly interested in the way that was shaping his relationships to the walk, to these meditative zones that are supposed to be about taking in nature and enjoying the stunning views…
St. Louis Map Room
How do maps reflect a place and its culture? How do maps inscribe meaning into place? What do maps conceal about a space and its culture? This week, my class engaged these questions at the St. Louis Map Room. The Map Room is a temporary exhibit located at Stevens Middle…
Walking the Divided City: on Euclid Avenue in St. Louis
As our bus turned right—east—onto Page Avenue, a major thoroughfare, we saw single-and multi-family homes alongside boarded up ones. Something (unexpected to some) adorned the latter: murals upon murals upon murals full of images of famous black St. Louisians. There was one of Jamala Rogers, activist, author, and columnist for…
Touring the Divided City
Our geography divided us into two teams. Blue marked those from Jeff-Vander-Lou; red designated those of us from Forest Park Southeast. And then, with a simple reorientation, those divisions vanished, at least temporarily. In their stead: new partnerships. Each pair included blue and red forged across neighborhood boundaries. My partner…
The black falsetto, or when artists live
Last month, I spoke at the first Americanist Dinner Forum of the 2016-2017 year. Peter Benson, Associate Professor of Anthropology and Director of Graduate Studies in the Program in American Culture Studies (AMCS), curated the engaging and moving event. The theme: “When Artists Die: On Prince et. al.” Pat Burke,…