Join in conversations with Elon faculty on a wide variety of topics, followed by a reception for all partcipants.
Elon is hosting a university-wide series of mini-seminars where students sign up to read a piece of scholarly writing and then attend a 45-minute critical reflection session led by a faculty member on Jan. 12 beginning at 5:30 p.m.
Each session will focus on a topic and short reading that the faculty member has chosen because it has been especially insightful or even transformative for students studying concepts around human differences. The aim is for faculty and students to examine and learn from critical academic discourse on diversity-related topics and then reflect together as a campus community on the importance of this intellectual work in transforming our campus and communities. You can register for one of the sessions here.
Social Construction of Race: Moving from “Not Real” to Reality
facilitated by Assistant Professor Jessica Carew in Alamance 203
In the United States context, we speak of race as though it is a biological reality without recognizing the ways in which the nation worked to construct it. This session will examine the “Frankenstein” nature of the development, permanence, and importance of race in the U.S.
People Diversity in U.S. Foreign Policy
facilitated by Associate Professor Rod Clare in Alamance 206
When speaking about diversity, Americans tend to look solely inwards. What does it mean when we look at how diversity plays a role in American foreign affairs? What do we mean by diversity and does it have different parameters for the nation as opposed to its relations to the outside world? Does it make a difference and if so, how? These questions and others are what will be explored in Professor Rod Clare’s reading and discussion on the topic of diverse diversity in American foreign relations.
The War on Compassion
facilitated by Associate Professor Samantha DiRosa in Alamance 204
This session is based on the Carol J. Adams article of the same name, which controversially compares confined animal feeding operations to human genocide and speciesism to racism as a lens to critically discuss objectification and normalized violence.
Living and Learning in the Contact Zone
facilitated by Professor Kenn Gaither in Alamance 205
The session will use Mary Louise Pratt’s concept of a ‘contact zone’ to explore differences within and among communities. The seminar will apply Pratt’s notion of contact zones to the places we live and learn, producing moments that range from “rage, incomprehension and pain” to “revelation, mutual understanding and new wisdom” (p. 39).
Unconscious and Semi-Conscoius Bias
facilitated by Assistant Professor Raj Ghoshal in Alamance 218
We all like to think of ourselves as fair-minded, but social science research shows that even well-intentioned people are susceptible to unconscious and semi-conscious biases around race, gender, age and more. This interactive session explores how these biases affect us and begins to engage the question of how we can address them. Please bring a laptop or iPad if possible, but not required.
Disability Rights: Can Higher Education Aim Higher?
facilitated by Associate Professor Julie Lellis in Alamance 215
This session will look at disability rights within the United States, and it will focuse on a case study looking at how UNC-Chapel Hill handled the passage of the Americans with Disabilites Act of 1990.
Bodies, Power and Gender
facilitated by Associate Professor Shannon Lundeen in Alamance 202
In this session, we will explore philosophical questions surrounding embodiment, gender difference and gender inequality. Our discussion will be rooted in Iris Marion Young’s essay “Throwing Like a Girl,” which analyzes the way in which body comportment (the way that bodies move) reflects and perpetuates gender inequality. We will ask how our understandings and experiences of space and movement illuminate systematic inequality — and whether they also have the potential to undermine inequality.
We Who Believe in Freedom: Race, Mothering, and Raising Black Sons
faciliated by Assistant Professor Cherrel Miller-Dyce in Alamance 301
“Until the killing of black men, black mothers’ sons, becomes as important to the rest of the country as the killing of a white mother’s sons, we who believe in freedom cannot rest.” – Ella Baker