Lafayette College to host Keefe Colloquium in the Public Humanities
Lafayette College will welcome scholars and student researchers to campus in March for the Keefe Colloquium. Scholars will share their research and discoveries that will help to build a series of exhibitions to be shared in the next three years through the work of Lehigh Valley 250, an organization that will mark the nation’s 250th anniversary.
The conference will be held 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. March 23, at Williams Center for the Arts. The event is free and open to the public, but registration is required.
Twelve researchers from Lafayette, Bucknell University, Lehigh University, Moravian University, Muhlenberg College, and the University of California, Irvine will share their findings, and discuss the perspectives and forces that shaped America’s beginnings. Lafayette scholars will include: Wendy Wilson-Fall, professor and chair of Africana studies; Olga Anna Duhl, Oliver E. Williams Professor of Languages; Rico Reyes, director of art galleries and curator of art collections; Margarete Lamb-Faffelberger, professor emerita of German; Christopher Phillips, professor of English. Diane Shaw, former director, Special Collections and College Archives, will also assist at the event.
“Community responsive curating is a dialogical process,” Reyes says. “Conversations and sharing knowledge make up the foundation of exhibition planning that incorporates multiple voices from academic researchers to the lived experience of community members. The Keefe Colloquium in the Public Humanities is one of the first steps to ensure this project is truly based in the community.”
The Keefe Colloquium in the Public Humanities is made possible with generous support from the Keefe Family Foundation. Additional support for Lehigh Valley 250 has been provided by the following funders: Bergh Family Foundation, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Max Kade Foundation, Keystone Savings Foundation, William T. Morris Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.