As part of its 2019-2020 “Justice” theme, The Humanities Center of Texas Tech is calling for faculty and graduate student participants for a pedagogy workshop with Dr. Koritha Mitchell of Ohio State University. The workshop, “Responsible Teaching in a Violent Culture,” will take place from 4:00-6:30pm on Friday, October 11. Seats are limited, and this is a catered event.
Dr. Mitchell is an award-winning author, cultural critic, and professional development expert. Her study Living with Lynching: African American Lynching Plays, Performance, and Citizenship, 1890 -1930 won book awards from the American Theatre and Drama Society and from the Society for the Study of American Women Writers. Her scholarly articles include “James Baldwin, Performance Theorist, Sings the Blues for Mister Charlie,” which appears in American Quarterly, and “Love in Action,” which draws parallels between racial violence at the last turn of the century and anti-LGBT violence today (published by Callaloo).
Koritha’ s professional development expertise has long been recognized. She has been invited to offer guidance to scholars at every stage of their careers by various types of institutions, including the Ford Foundation, the American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR), Lehigh University, Kenyon College, and Vanderbilt University. She curated a slate of 9 to 15 professional development workshops for ASTR’s 2011, 2012, and 2013 annual conferences, and she is a regional liaison for Ford Fellows, with primary mentoring responsibility for scholars in Ohio, West Virginia, and Western Pennsylvania. She has also mentored professors who earned research support from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation.
Workshop Description: “Responsible Teaching in a Violent Culture”
American society seems to be getting more polarized and more violent, but teachers—at every level—feel more trepidation than confidence about addressing issues that are even slightly controversial. This workshop empowers teachers to develop strategies that allow them to be proactive rather than reactive, to operate from a clear affirmative stance rather than respond only when a nasty incident forces the issue. Based on Koritha’ s expertise regarding how violence functions and the purpose of all forms of violence (from hate speech to physical attacks), this workshop emphasizes philosophical approaches teachers can adopt and offers concrete practices that put theory into motion. Instructors will leave with conceptual frameworks they can use to assess the strategies they are currently using in the classroom, but they will also be able to use the frameworks to develop additional strategies. As important, instructors will leave the session with activities they can immediately take into the classroom.
To register for this event, email Justin Hughes at justin.hughes@ttu.edu. Additional questions may be directed to Dr. Michael Borshuk, Interim Director of the Humanities Center, at humanitiescenter@ttu.edu.
