Library Exhibition Celebrates Africana Studies at Bowdoin

Story posted September 16, 2009

Freedom's Journal, an exhibition celebrating the 40th anniversary of Africana Studies at Bowdoin College and the founding of the College's John Brown Russwurm African American Center, will be on display on the second floor of Hawthorne-Longfellow Library throughout the academic year.

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"Nat Turner," an etching by D.R. Wakefield from Almost Jerusalem (Chevington Press, 2005).

The exhibition features selections from the Library's George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives. The archival record of the College and the Library's rare book and manuscript collections provide a wealth of primary resources for Africana Studies learning and research. These materials are particularly rich in documenting College efforts to incorporate African American culture into its social and academic life, and in supporting the study of slavery and antislavery movements in the United States and England, Caribbean planter life, and the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Many of the books and manuscripts on display were acquired by the Library or the College's literary society libraries during the 19th century. Others have come as gifts, especially from College alumni, or through purchase—all in support of the academic pursuits of Africana Studies scholarship at Bowdoin.

Among the featured items are the Advocate of Freedom, an early antislavery newspaper published in Maine, the commencement part prepared by John Brown Russwurm, Bowdoin's first African American graduate (Class of 1826); editions of Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, which was written in Brunswick; and letters written by abolitionists Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth.

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"Slave ship Brooks," in Cabinet of Freedom (N.Y., 1836).

Africana Studies is an interdisciplinary program designed to bring the scholarly approaches and perspectives of several traditional disciplines to bear on an understanding of black life. Students examine the rich and varied cultures, literature, and history of black people in Africa and in the African diaspora, including colonial America and the United States, the Caribbean, and Latin America. This interdisciplinary approach captures the multifaceted quality of African American scholarship and widens students' perspectives in various academic departments at the College.

The John Brown Russwurm African American Center, located across College Street from Hawthorne-Longfellow Library, serves as a gathering place for Bowdoin's Africana Studies community, where students live, study, plan programs, and join in informal discussions and social gatherings. It is named to honor the memory of Russwurm who, following Bowdoin, subsequently enjoyed a successful career in journalism both in this country, where he helped to found and edit the first black-owned and operated newspaper in the U.S., Freedom's Journal, and in Liberia, where he immigrated in 1829.

The exhibition is open seven days a week. For further information, call 207-725-3288.

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