The 44th Annual Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Series: La Fuerza de las Voces Negras: Afrolatinidades en las Americas The Power of Black Voices: Afro-Latin Identities in the Americas

We look forward to seeing you at the 2024 Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Series "La Fuerza de las Voces Negras: Afrolatinidades en las Americas; The Power of Black Voices: Afrolatin Identities in the Americas" on Saturday, February 17, 2024. We're excited to hear from esteemed speakers: Ariana Curtis, Tanya K. Hernandez, Nodia Mena and Lorgia Garcia Pena and celebrate the power of diverse voices! Don’t miss it!

Right after MTW, please join us at the Newark Museum of Art for our reception, where The Bradford Hayes Quartet will perform live to celebrate the 44th installment of the Marion Thompson Wright Lecture Series.

La Fuerza de las Voces Negra / The Power of Black Voice Afro-Latin Identities in the Americas / Afrolatinidades en las Americas

This thematic has been formulated in response to a fundamental un-addressed issue of colorism and racism within the Latine / Hispano and Black diasporic communities. In addition, this US election year and the globalizing rightwing organizing makes this gathering a particularly important moment to grapple with the many dimensions of anti-Blackness in the diaspora, the Americas and Caribbean, but also in the US.

With razor thin electoral margins and the powerful alignment of fossil fuel interests and laissez faire "free" market forces in play, this is the most important public moment of alliance building for our work at the Price Institute. Koch-Bannon anti-democratic, neo-fascist organizers are counting on "divide and conquer" dirty tricks to make the challenges of bringing together our many communities and intersected shared interests all the more difficult. We write to ask for your support in getting the word out for this convening for all those directly entangled AND also for the rest of us taking on related and comparable cleavages. All this fragmentation and hurt needs our undivided attention and emergency care. The future of our planet in this age of corporate, billionaire-made climate catastrophe depends on further uniting a global democratic "we"--a cross-cultural mix people who can work with Indigenous local knowledges and traditional ecological knowledges to regenerate and flourish our home regions together. The challenges of grappling with the divisive othering within diasporic and mixed communities are urgent projects for all realms of our shared planetary wellbeing.

We encourage all to register via the attached QR code and have attached a color poster we encourage you to print out, share with your communities, and encourage your students to attend.