Hortense Spillers, Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English at Vanderbilt University, will deliver the Provost’s Distinguished Women’s Lecture, titled “The Idea of Black Culture,” at 5p.m. Sept. 9 (Tuesday) in the auditorium of McKenna Hall at the University of Notre Dame. The presentation is free and open to the public.
Spillers’ talk will examine the complexities of the African Diaspora, which embody a rich synthesis of cultures from the site of the Americas.
The author of “Black, White, and in Color: Essays on American Literature and Culture,” Spillers also has edited two volumes, “Comparative American Identities: Race, Sex, and Nationality in the Modern Text” and “Conjuring: Black Women, Fiction, and Literary Tradition.” She earned her doctoral degree from Brandeis University.
A series of campus events on the lecture’s theme are planned in conjunction with the lecture, including an art exhibit, “Afro-Latino/as and the Americas” in McKenna Hall’s Galera America through Oct. 15; an exhibit on the first floor concourse of the Hesburgh Library through Sept. 12 and continuing on the second floor Sept. 16 to Nov. 30; and a lecture and gallery walk titled “Blacks, Art and the Americas” Sept. 10 (Wednesday) at 4p.m. in the Annenberg Auditorium of the Snite Museum of Art.
The Provost’s Distinguished Women’s Lecture Series encourages innovative forms of interaction between highly regarded women visitors and Notre Dame faculty, students and administration. Spillers’ visit and related events are also sponsored by the Department of English and the Institute for Scholarship and the Liberal Arts.
Contact: Cyraina Johnson-Roullier, associate professor of English, Johnson.64@nd.edu
Originally published by at newsinfo.nd.edu on August 26, 2008.