Archives and the (in)Visible Body: Social, Political, and Economic Upheaval in America

My name is LeTriece Calhoun, and I’m a fifth-year doctoral student in Pitt’s Composition program, housed in the English Department. Although it might sound superficial to say on a site dedicated to scholars who wholeheartedly delve into public and digital humanities, I truly love technology and learning. I’ll walk you through what I’m doing here at Pitt, what I’m doing with this Humanities Engage opportunity, and how I think it’s going to work.        

For the course Seminars in Composition: Gender Studies, I’m creating a module titled Archives and the (in)Visible Body. Its purpose is to introduce the archive as something that is capable of rendering a body both visible and invisible and to shake the notion that archives are apolitical and all-encompassing. This module enhances student engagement, as I am asking them to search through the Black Panther, a newspaper that was the official organ of the Black Panther Party, and find material that is both relevant to the sociopolitical climate faced by Black people today and also to their personal experience with the COVID-19 pandemic. The reason for comparing our present with the late 1960s and 1970s time of the Black Panther Party’s heyday is because both moments starkly reflect overt social, political, and economic upheaval in America.

Archives and the (in)Visible Body will focus on dealing with Black Panther materials found in Pitt’s Archival and Special Collections department in Hillman Library and available digitally through the Archives and Special Collections website. With the support and work with my faculty collaborator, Annette Vee, we are constructing a module that engages in an in-depth review of the Black Panther Party, its historical context, and its political motivations. In regards to the overall theme of gender studies, students will review how revolutionary materials addressed the social and political oppression of Black women during this time. The Black Panther Party was founded on a fervent need to assert the humanity of Black people during a time in our history where state violence was heavily enacted upon the Black body. Here, we will be able to see how state violence was enacted upon black men and women physically through undue police violence and socially through the construction of stereotypes, such as that of the “Welfare Queen” aimed at Black women. Then, as a class, we will apply the analysis and arguments found in these materials to illuminate dynamics occurring during the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. In particular, police brutality will be an obvious point of connection.

I acknowledge that knowledge production and composition production take time; therefore, most of the work done in this module will be done asynchronously. I believe that giving my students a deadline to participate in discussion boards online or engage with my feedback on their assignments would be most effective.

As a queer woman of color in this field, I am always conscious of my body, my approach to scholarship, and my presence in the classroom. My goal in teaching is to show my students that their identity and writing is important, not only on a cultural scale but also a personal one. I take that same approach in developing materials for others. All I aim to do is help them find resources that can further enhance their pedagogical identity. It is my hope that my peers can see that engaged, digital curriculum can be a way to introduce students to the possibilities of academic work.

LeTriece Calhoun
English
August 17, 2020
 

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