Human Bridges in the Study of Race, Religion, Art, and Politics

Monday, December 7 from 5:00pm to 6:00pm

(Registration closes at 3:00pm on Monday, December 7)

Speakers (pictured above from left to right)

• K. Healan Gaston, Lecturer on American Religious History and Ethics (HDS)
• Steven Harris, Ph.D. student in the Committee on the Study of Religion (GSAS)

Watch full video:

This talk will explore teaching about difference in a Harvard Divinity School course that looks at connections between the Harlem Renaissance and Mexican Modernism during the 1920s and 1930s. Using holiday-themed examples and compelling visual images, we will juxtapose the lives and works of two important figures in the course: Miguel Covarrubias, a Mexican-born caricaturist who spent most of his life in New York City illustrating for Harlem Renaissance texts and popular magazines, and Elizabeth Catlett, a U.S.-born Black sculptor and printmaker who spent her life in Mexico where she created some of the most powerful symbols and images of the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Covarrubias and Catlett captured our students’ imaginations in part because they serve as “human bridges” connecting the United States with Mexico as well the past with the present. Please join for a lively and wide-ranging meditation on the dynamic interplay of race, religion, art, and politics, and the cross-fertilization between history and ethics.

This event is a follow-on to HILT’s ninth annual conference, “Championing Equitable Instruction and Inclusive Classrooms.” Learn more about the 2020 HILT Conference on our website.