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IAAA Directors Institute of African American Affairs & Center for Black Visual Culture 50th Anniversary Celebration October 17, 2019 IAAA Directors In 1969, ROSCOE C. In 1946, Dr. Brown was employed as a social investigator BROWN JR. (1922–2016) with the NYC Department of Welfare and as a physical was named founding director education instructor at West Virginia State College until of the Institute of African 1948. Brown attended New York University, where he American Affairs (IAAA) and earned his master’s degree in 1949 and his PhD in served in that position for education in 1951, and became a professor at New York eight years before leaving to University for twenty-seven years. become the president of Bronx Community College in EARL S. DAVIS had a fifty- 1977. During his time at the year career, which began and IAAA, Dr. Brown hosted Soul ended with New York of Reason (SOR), a popular University. He received an radio series produced by MSW in 1957 from the WNYU and WNYC from Graduate School of Public 1971 to 1986. SOR aired on Administration and Social commercial radio station Service, and practiced social Roscoe Brown, Founding Director, WNBC and later on NYU's work in the field until 1972, 1969 – 1977 station WNYU and featured when he joined the Silver interviewees ranging from politicians to professional School of Social Work athletes to medical professionals to contemporary artists. (SSSW) staff as the assistant Dr. Brown focused on building a platform for dean for admissions, financial contemporary academics, thinkers, authors, and aid and student affairs. Davis community leaders who spoke directly to students, faculty, directed NYU’s IAAA from staff, and community members about issues impacting 1979 until 1994, and returned Earl S. Davis, 1979 – 1994 black communities in the United States and abroad. to the SSSW part time from 1995 to 2008 as a special recruiter with the mission of Prior to his tenure at NYU and IAAA, Dr. Brown had a attracting black students. distinguished military career as a famed Tuskegee Airmen. Dr. Brown was the former commander of the famous During his time as director, the Institute initially functioned 332nd Fighter Group, a celebrated group of African as an orienting and coordinating body for black student American pilots who fought in World War II. The Group's organizations, supporting projects and presentations of 100th squadron flew the P-51 Mustang painted with red student groups along with sensitizing the university and tails. Dr. Brown famously downed one of the German the black community at large on issues of general interest Messerschmitt Me-262 jets. He flew sixty-eight combat and concern, including housing trends and education. missions by the war's end. He was awarded the Conferences during Davis' time as the director included Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal with Eight Oak the “Black Male Conference” (1982), “Black Theatre Leaf Clusters, and the Presidential Unit Citation. In 2007, Conference” (1982), and the “Future Impact of Minority Dr. Brown was among the 200 last surviving Tuskegee Politics in NYC” (1986). Airmen collectively awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest civilian award, by former President George W. Bush at the U.S. Capitol rotunda. 6 IAAA Directors MANTHIA DIAWARA is black concerns. He serves on the advisory board of a writer, filmmaker, October, and is also on the editorial collective of Public cultural theorist, scholar, Culture. In 2003, Dr. Diawara released We Won’t Budge: and art historian. Dr. An African Exile in the World, the title of which is a tribute Diawara holds the title of to Salif Keita’s anthemic protest song Nou Pas Bouger. University Professor at New York University, DEBORAH WILLISwas where he was the former named the director of the director of the Institute of IAAA in 2018. Dr. Willis, African American Affairs University Professor and Manthia Diawara, 1994 – 2018 from 1992 to 2018. Chair of the Department of Photography and Imaging at Dr. Diawara was born in Bamako, Mali, and received his the Tisch School of the Arts, early education in France. He later received a PhD from assumed directorship of Indiana University in 1985. Prior to teaching at NYU, Dr. IAAA on September 1, 2018. Diawara taught at the University of Pennsylvania and the A noted photographer and University of California at Santa Barbara. Much of his historian of African American research has been in the field of black cultural studies, photography and culture, Dr. though his work has differed from the traditional approach Willis teaches courses in formulated in Britain in the early 1980s. Along with other Tisch and the College of Arts notable recent scholars, Dr. Diawara has sought to Deborah Willis, 2018 to present and Science on photography incorporate consideration of the material conditions of and imaging, iconicity, and African Americans to provide a broader context for the cultural histories visualizing the black body, women, and study of African diasporic culture. An aspect of this gender. She is a recipient of the John D. and Catherine T. formulation has been the privileging of “Blackness” in all its MacArthur Fellowship and a Richard D. Cohen Fellow in possible forms rather than as relevant to a single, perhaps African and African American Art at Harvard University’s monolithic definition of black culture. Hutchins Center. She is a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow and an Alphonse Fletcher, Jr. Fellow. Concurrent to her Dr. Diawara has contributed significantly to the study of assuming this role, Dr. Willis also founded the Center for black film. In 1992, Indiana University Press published his Black Visual Culture, a space for scholarly and artistic African Cinema: Politics & Culture and in 1993, Routledge inquiry into the understanding and exploration of images published a volume he edited titled Black American focusing on black people globally, with critical evaluation Cinema. A filmmaker himself, Dr. Diawara has written and of images in multiple realms of culture, including how directed a number of films, including An Opera of the representations are constructed in various archives and World (2018), a documentary based on the African opera visual technologies. Her books includeBlack Bintou Were, a Sahel Opera, which recounts an eternal Photographers, 1840–1940: An Illustrated Bio- migration drama. Bibliography(1985) , The Black Female Body: A Photographic History (with Carla Williams) (2002), and His 1998 book In Search of Africa is an account of his Posing Beauty: African American Images From the 1890s return to his childhood home of Guinea and was published to the Present (2009), among many others. by Harvard University Press. Dr. Diawara is a founding editor of Black Renaissance Noire, a journal of arts, culture, and politics dedicated to work that engages contemporary 7 Program Thursday, October 17, 2019, 6pm Helen & Martin Kimmel Center For University Life New York University 60 Washington Square, South Rosenthal Pavilion, 10th Floor New York, New York 10012 Black Portraitures V / IAAA 50th Anniversary Welcome Dr. Cheryl Finley introducesAnna Maria Horsford, Host Welcome: Dean Allyson Green, Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Dr. Lisa Coleman and First Lady of New York City Chirlane McCray Ronald K. Brown/Evidence “One Shot” dance performance IAAA remarks fromEarl S. Davis, MSW, Dr. Manthia Diawara,andDr. Deborah Willis Black Feminist Histories:Dr. Farah Jasmine Griffin in conversation with Dr. Angela Davis and Dr. Gina Dent Jazz vocalist Candice Hoyes accompanied by pianistJonathan Thomas Performance by Joyce Jones followed by party withDJ April Hunt in E&L, 4th Floor Good night and thank you! 8 Host Committee Awam Amkpa Isolde Brielmaier Michael D. Dinwiddie Howard Dodson Melvin Edwards Cheryl Finley Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Paula Giddings Danny Glover Farah Jasmine Griffin Rujeko Hockley Kellie Jones Sarah Elizabeth Lewis Mia Mask Louis Massiah Jennifer L. Morgan Pamela Newkirk Eric Robertson Clyde Taylor Susan L. Taylor Hank Willis Thomas Ellyn M. Toscano Michele Wallace Carrie Mae Weems Kevin Young 9 Earl S. Davis & BROWNSTONE…37Years Ago: What would you consider your legacy at IAAA? What pathways were you able to forge at IAAA? I don’t think about things like that. I just did the best that I Hopefully, individually and collectively, we strove to could via the IAAA to benefit the university and the black inform, sensitize, and energize the university and the black community through our expansive and all-inclusive community about salient issues that impact people of programming and presentations—always focusing on the color, e.g. “Health Issues in the Black Community,” 1986; African Diasporic scope and content of the black “Caribbean Empowerment,” 1987; “Celebrating African experience and culture, wherever it existed. Literature,” 1987; “Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage,” 1989; “Castro, Blacks and Africa,” 1990; and “Race, Can you talk about the things you wish you had Gender and Representation,” 1991. We also offered accomplished as director? guidance and support to many student organizations of Aside from expanding the minority-focused library we color—to approach and enter heretofore were developing for students and staff, we attempted “unapproachable” careers, professions, and pathways. In to establish a student-requested exchange program all, over 150 programs and projects were presented. with HBCU and African universities, which never reached fruition. 10 Looking back, what would you say was IAAA’s Images from the article, “Earl Davis: Institute of Afro-American Affairs” biggest accomplishment? (November 1982). Brownstone was a student-run journal founded in 1982. Mr. Brown was interviewed by Michael D. Dinwiddie who is I’m happy to say that aside from offering meaningful currently an associate professor in the The Gallatin School of programs dealing with the black diaspora, we held NYU to Individualized Study. its motto: “A Private University in the Public Service” and connected NYU to the Black Community—and vice versa.
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