Community conversations find space for Hamline constituents to meet and communicate with intention over a pre-selected topic or theme. Hamline University’s Office of Inclusive Excellence hosts multiple community conversations a year to unite our community over discussions that are structured to make meaningful topics accessible and safe for everyone.
For the conversation on Feb. 13, the topic of “Wrestling Rest in Restlessness” was conceptualized by Director of Inclusive Excellence, Dr. David Everett, and Carolyn Holbrook of the Creative Writing department. After the two had conversations in the fall semester about centering a Black History Month conversation around storytelling, Holbrook thought to bring in Douglas Kearney, Erin Sharkey and Chaun Webster to read for the event, all local published writers and educators.
“[Everett] contacted me because he wanted to do something different for the Black History Month Community Conversation,” Holbrook wrote in an email. “He is aware that, in addition to teaching at Hamline, I have a nonprofit arts organization, More Than a Single Story … Our mission is to position the literary arts as a catalyst for cross-cultural healing and social justice.”
The topic of discussion was designed for Black History Month, with the specific intention of addressing the emotional fatigue Everett and Holbrook had witnessed in students.
“It seemed like the more [Holbrook] and I talked, the more it started to kind of crystallize around student experience and how we’ve seen so many things thrown at students in the past few years,” Everett said.
Student stress, particularly as a result of social unrest, was also what Holbrook sought to address in conversation, and hoped the written work shared at the event would hold a comforting message for students.
“During a virtual planning meeting with Dr. Everett, the topic of the stress of student life came up, so we decided to focus on the importance of encouraging students to find ways to rest and take care of themselves,” Holbrook said in an email. “We hoped that the poems and essays the writers shared and the discussion that followed would help students think about the historical and current relationships between rest and struggle, how and why retreat is not surrender, and the interrelatedness between rest and study as it relates to Black people in America both historically and currently, and in fact all students.”
On March 7, Director of Native American Law and Sovereignty Institute and Professor of Law at Mitchell-Hamline, Angelique EagleWoman is visiting campus for a presentation on the United States and Tribal Relations, and the event will be the basis for Hamline’s next community conversation occuring on March 21.
“We’re hoping to have some Native American community partners, as well as some Indigenous creators to have a good sharing in that space on that day,” Everett said.
More information and dates for upcoming events can be found through the Office of Inclusive Excellence, at hamline.edu/about/office-inclusive-excellence.