Description

In collaboration with several arts and community organizations, the Rutgers Advanced Institute for Critical Caribbean Studies will develop an innovative approach to understanding the spiritual practices of African Diaspora communities in the United States. Departing from anthropological models that take such communities as objects of analysis, “Understanding Spirit” will stage horizontal collaborations between scholars from different disciplines, community organizers, local artists, and spiritual leaders, challenging the presumed epistemic authority of academic experts and putting all participants in positions of teacher and learner. Rooted in New Jersey and New York, and focused particularly on an engagement with music and the arts, the project’s work will extend to sites of learning in both New Orleans and Puerto Rico. An annual series of events—developed around the themes of community memory, healing, and future renewal—will include performances, exhibitions, readings, public conversations, and collaborative institutes, with materials and learnings drawn from these events populating an expansive open access archive and informing varied and original forms of public-facing scholarship