SAVE THE DATE: The annual Bmore Historic unconference is scheduled for September 29, 2017 from 8:30am to 4pm at the Baltimore Museum of Industry. Please stay tuned for more details. The Orser Center has been a co-sponsor of Bmore Historic from the inaugural event in 2011. For more information, see the Bmore Historic website and RSVP on the Facebook page.

All friends of the Orser Center are invited to the upcoming Bmore Historic Happy Hour at the Village Learning Place in Charles Village (2521 St. Paul St.) on Friday, May 12 from 6 to 7:30pm.

Please join fellow old building lovers, history nerds, library geeks, neighbors, friends, and family for our Bmore Historic happy hour at the Village Learning Place on the evening of Friday, May 12. The Village Learning Place is a unique, nonprofit community library established by a group of Charles Village residents in 1997 in the former St. Paul Street Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library. The charming 1896 brick building, designed by local architect Charles L. Carson, includes a handsome outdoor garden where we’ll enjoy an evening of refreshments and informal conversation.

If you’re interested in participating in the Bmore Historic unconference this fall, this happy hour is a great opportunity to meet the organizers, ask questions, and share your ideas for sessions: http://bmorehistoric.org/

We are also partnering with the bLAM Collective to seek ideas for future#bLAMclass workshops: https://blamcollective.wordpress.com/events-2/blamclass/

Don’t forget to register on Eventbrite.

This event is free but we will be accepting donations to cover the costs of refreshments and help support the Village Learning Place. Registration is encouraged!

Michael Woodhouse

Inaugural Orser Center Fellow: Spring 2016

Thursday, April 28

4-6p

University Center 310 

During spring 2016, Woodhouse interned at Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts (BOPA), a non-profit organization within the heart of Baltimore. The internship included working with the lead art education coordinator Nicoletta Darita de la Brown, working hands-on with inner-city youth, and taking part in two major programs headed by BOPA during the 15-week internship: Light City Teen Scholars and Bright StARTS.

The Orser Center Fellow Student Award is $1,000 for an undergraduate student at UMBC completing an unpaid internship at a non-profit or cultural institution in Baltimore.

UMBC’s Orser Center for the Study of Place, Community, and Culture is pleased to announce the Spring 2016 Orser Center Fellows program. Any UMBC undergraduate student who has an unpaid internship with a Baltimore-based non-profit or cultural institution during spring 2016 can apply for the $1,000 Orser Center Student Award.

Students must submit a one-page personal statement describing their internship and the goals they want to achieve, a copy of their transcript, a letter or email of support from the organization offering the internship, and a letter of recommendation from a faculty mentor. We will accept application materials until January 15, 2016.

The Orser Center fellow must register for a three-credit course, AMST 498: Internship (or other UMBC approved 3-credit internship course), which requires the following: (1) 120 hours at the internship (2) weekly journal entries on the internship experience including hours worked (3) a final project relating the experience to issues in American studies. The student must also do a public presentation on the internship experience at UMBC at the end of the internship. The fellow will have access to the Orser Center office and library in the Department of American Studies.

The 2016 Orser Center Fellow should be committed to the Center’s mission of fostering innovative collaborations among scholars, students, and local community organizations. The Center seeks to put humanities research to work as a creative response to problems, challenges, and issues identified by communities in the greater Baltimore region.

Please email all application materials to Dr. Nicole King at nking@umbc.edu by January 15, 2016. Notification of award by January 22, 2016.

Chesapeake American Studies Association CHASA Conference 2015

The 2015 meeting theme “Urban Places, Digital Spaces” will investigate issues of place, space, and power as well as the role of media and digital culture in an urban context.

Registration: http://tinyurl.com/CHASA2015

Click for Directions to UMBC

Parking info: Please park in the Commons Garage (no fee) See the campus map

Note: the entrance to UMBC is currently under construction 

CONFERENCE SCHEDULE:

Plenary Panel Discussion on Friday – March 27 from 7-8:30pm in Commons 329

How and why does place matter in an urban context?

The plenary panel will discuss how place matters in an urban context. Panelists will begin with a brief discussion of their intellectual history and current projects. Then the panel will discuss the conference’s central questions: How and why does place matter? What is the role of media and digital culture in urban culture? How does digital culture influence cities? How has the spatial turn in the humanities influenced our understanding of place? How are issues of power and identity grounded in place? What is often neglected in our discussions of the digital in the city? How can we cross the digital divide?

Trevor Muñoz is Associate Director of Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH) as well as Assistant Dean for Digital Humanities Research at the University of Maryland Libraries.

Michelle L. Stefano leads the partnership between UMBC and Maryland Traditions, the folklife program of the Maryland State Arts Council. She divides her time between serving as Visiting Assistant Professor of American Studies at UMBC and the Assistant Director for Maryland Traditions.

D. Watkins is a writer, speaker, and educator who grew up in East Baltimore. His writing has been published widely. Watkins holds a Master’s in Education from Johns Hopkins University and an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Baltimore. He is an adjunct professor at Coppin University and runs a creative writing workshop at the Baltimore Free School.

 * For more info on the panelist see the previous post.

Saturday, March 28: CHASA 2015 Conference

 9:30-10:30am: Registrations (with a light breakfast served)

10:30-11:45: Session I 

Panel A: Diverse Method of Engaging Places

Responsive Ethnography: Potential Impacts of Digital Storytelling on Ethnographic Research (Kalima Young, American Studies, University of Maryland, College Park)

Digital Cairns in Physical Space (Joe Reinsel, Media Art, University of Michigan, Flint)

El Paso Petrochemical and the Biopolitics of “Public Good” in the Texas Permian Basin (Sarah Stanford-McIntyre, American Studies, College of William & Mary)

Baltimore Brick by Brick: Transforming Blight through Digital Story Telling and Material Community Benefits (Shannon Darrow, Retrofit Baltimore)

Chair: Kelly Quinn, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian

Panel B: Social History in the 21^st Century: What Would a “New” Baltimore Book Look Like?

Linda Shopes (Independent historian/consultant) one of the editors of The Baltimore Book

Ed Orser (American Studies, UMBC) contributor to The Baltimore Book

Kate Drabinski (Gender and Women’s Studies, UMBC) teaches The Baltimore Book

Betsy Nix (Legal, Ethical, and Historical Studies, UB) teaches The Baltimore Book

Chair: Nicole King (American Studies, UMBC)

LUNCH 12-1:15pm 

Session II 1:15-2:30

Panel A: Explore Baltimore Heritage: Teaching and Telling Stories Go Better Together

Auni Gelles (History, UMBC & Heart of the Civil War Heritage Area)

Sydney Jenkins (Education Programs Assistant, Maryland Historical Society)

Denise Meringolo (Public History, UMBC)

Chair: Eli Pousson (Director of Programming & Outreach, Baltimore Heritage)

Panel B: Western Narratives of Black Deviance: Deforming Urban Neighborhoods in the Baltimore/Washington Corridor

Rosemary Ndubuizu (Women and Gender Studies, Rutgers University)

Robert Thomas Choflet (American Studies and African American Studies, University of Maryland, College Park)

Mary Corbin Sies (American Studies, University of Maryland, College Park)

Chair: La Marr Jurelle Bruce (American Studies, University of Maryland, College Park)

Session III 2:45-4pm

Panel A: Critical Perspectives on Digital Spaces

 Creating “Gothic” Spaces: Scene, Style, and Community in the “Goth” Subculture (Leah Bush, American Studies, University of Maryland, College Park)

Urban Markets and the Virtual Rural: Whole Foods Market’s Re-Presentation of Agricultural Production (Allison Lakomski, Cultural Studies, George Mason University)

Deceptive Innovation: The Rhetoric of a Monopoly (Matthew Poissant, American Studies, UMBC)

Anthropology by the Wire: A Multimedia Research Project (Matthew Durington, Anthropology, Towson University)

Chair: Kate Drabinski

Panel 2: Training Session: Omega +Curascape with Eli Pousson, Baltimore Heritage

 4:15-5pm Closing remarks & best student paper award

 Optional dinner in Baltimore at 6pm (dinner not funded by CHASA)