New Throughlines website a resource for premodern studies educators
Ayanna Thompson helped launch Throughlines, a free video and multimedia website designed to help college educators talk about race in premodern studies. Courtesy photo
A few years ago, Ayanna Thompson, executive director of the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, was teaching a lecture class on early British literature. The class was unusually animated and engaged, excited to talk about the most challenging topics. But when they got to "Othello," there was sudden silence. In that quiet, Thompson realized that her students had never been in a space where they can talk about race openly.
Phi Beta Kappa Society presents Sidney Hook Memorial Award to Ayanna Thompson
On the heels of the launch of the Throughlines curriculum, Thompson has been honored with a Sidney Hook Memorial Award by the Phi Beta Kappa Society, the nation's most prestigious academic honor society. The award is given once every three years to an “individual demonstrating excellence in each of three endeavors — scholarship, undergraduate teaching and leadership in the cause of liberal arts education.”
This experience, and many experiences like it, catalyzed the launch of Throughlines — a free video and multimedia website designed to help college educators bring discussions of race into premodern (pre-1500 A.D.) history, literature and culture classrooms.
Throughlines is the only resource of its kind and signals a major expansion of RaceB4Race — the research network and symposium series by and for BIPOCThe acronym stands for Black, Indigenous and people of color. scholars working on issues of race in premodern studies.
The Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies will celebrate the Throughlines launch with an in-person and livestreamed eventTo learn more about the livestream, contact Leah Newsom at leah@asu.edu. at the Barbara Barrett and Sandra Day O'Connor Washington Center in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 20.
The event will feature lectures from celebrated scholars Dan-el Padilla Peralta (Princeton University), Leslie Alexander (Rutgers University), Ian Smith (Lafayette College), Dennis Britton (University of British Columbia) and Ruben Espinosa (Arizona State University) — all of whom crafted content for Throughlines.
Under the leadership of Thompson and Espinosa, with funding from the Mellon Foundation, Throughlines offers educators completely free, accessible and curated teaching materials, such as lectures, classroom activities and syllabi.
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