Description

This series of brief virtual events for the VCU Libraries community highlights timely subjects, celebrates achievements, practices creativity and more. Community Zooms offer opportunities for learning and conversation. They are organized and hosted by the VCU Libraries Development Office.

Sessions are held Thursdays at 10:30 a.m. and last approximately a half hour to 45 minutes each. Attendees may join via Zoom.

To receive a link to join the sessions, please complete this online form. For questions or accommodations, please contact the VCU Libraries Development Office at libdevelop@vcu.edu.

URL

Please complete this online form to receive the URL.

Upcoming Sessions 

May 5, 2022
Starting the Conversation: Richmond's statues as tools that teach 

Join us as Marland Buckner, Interim Executive Director of the Black History Museum & Cultural Center of Virginia (BHMVA), discusses how the Museum looks forward to using the Confederate monuments as teaching tools designed to inform deeper discussion about the complex dimensions of American apartheid - “Jim Crow” – and the ways in which that discussion can catalyze and contribute to a broad based truth, accountability, and reconciliation process.

Guidelines

Prior to joining a session, attendees are encouraged to check that Zoom is working properly on their computers or devices by testing it at https://zoom.us/test.

At the start of every session, attendee’s microphones will be muted. This allows everyone to hear the organizers and presenters clearly. Attendees will be invited to unmute their microphones and speak at different times during the session.

If you have questions or comments while others are speaking, you can type them in the chat.

As at physical events, attendees are asked to help make sessions inclusive of all participants by using respectful language and allowing others to speak, even if they disagree with viewpoints being expressed.

VCU Libraries reserves the right to remove attendees from sessions for disruptive behavior.

Be advised that VCU Libraries will record all sessions for its private archives but may make use of the recordings for future projects, including publicity.

Previous Sessions 

Jan. 27, 2022
Exploring recently-processed collections

Throughout the pandemic, Processing Archivist Dillon Thomas has continued arranging and describing research collections housed in VCU Libraries’ Special Collections and Archives (SCA). Thomas will share his experience and relate some of the interesting stories he gleaned while working with the Ernest Gunzberg papers, the ACLU - Southern Women’s Rights Project records and the Henry Valentine II papers.

These three manuscript collections represent very different voices, time periods and subject areas but they are all part of the rich resources documenting, in diverse ways, the history of Richmond and the central Virginia area. In this community zoom, Thomas will also provide an overview of the unique resources found in these collections while emphasizing the important role of the archivist in making these materials accessible.  

Feb. 3, 2022
Faith, Racism and Coming of Age in the 1970s: the writing of Malcolm and Me

Award-winning author and journalist Robin Farmer will discuss the writing process that led to her 2020 young adult novel, Malcolm and Me, which explores themes of faith, racism and coming of age in the 1970s that are partly autobiographical. During this presentation, she will outline steps for writers of all ages to take real-life incidents and turn them into essays, books and even movie or television scripts!

Farmer’s debut novel, Malcolm and Me, was a 2019 winner of the She Writes Press and SparkPress Toward Equality in Publishing (STEP) Contest. Originally from Philadelphia, Farmer now lives in Richmond. She has written articles for the Washington Post, Richmond Magazine, Hartford Courant and the Richmond Times-Dispatch. As a national award-winning journalist, Robin specialized in narrative nonfiction projects as part of the Special Projects/Investigative team for the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Her work led to a Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan. A freelance writer since 2009, her clients include corporations and universities. Robin holds a degree in journalism from Marquette University. She is a recipient of residencies at the Rowland Writers Retreat, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Djerassi Resident Artists Program.

When not writing and working on her second book, Robin volunteers with organizations empowering local writers and teen girls.

March 3, 2022
Tour the Miller Collection 

VCU Libraries recently acquired the Richmond Academy of Medicine Joseph Lyon Miller Collection, an amazing group of history of medicine resources. Come learn how Dr. Joseph L. Miller, a 1900 graduate of the University College of Medicine, built his research collection from remote Thomas, W.Va. His collection includes books from the 15th through 19th centuries that illustrate evolving printing processes and the art of illustration in published works. Miller’s collection also includes letters, documents, photographs, engravings, and prints that all tell the story of the development of medicine from Galen to Roentgen.

March 17, 2022
What's Everyone Reading? Krystle Dandridge at the Book Bar 

Just last month, Krystle Dandridge opened The Book Bar, one of the city’s only Black-owned bookstores, featuring BIPOC authors. The Book Bar encourages community participation through special events and initiatives like the reading group Book Bar Book Club. Located on East Main Street in Shockoe Slip, this welcoming, relaxing space has been shaped in part by Dandridge’s career as a licensed therapist in the human services field and her volunteer work with disadvantaged youth in South Africa. Current campaigns across the country banning books, many of them by Black authors, have added impetus to Dandridge’s vision to create opportunities for intentional reading, broadened perspectives and self-realization.

April 7, 2022
Reclaiming the Dream, with Michael Paul Williams 
"MLK’s words and work are being weaponized against us. We must reclaim the dream," observes Michael Paul Williams, longtime Richmond Times-Dispatch columnist and winner of the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary. Join him for a timely, provocative discussion about race, history, and a vision for Richmond’s future, moderated by Friends of VCU Libraries board member Kenneth Foster.

 

Image: Photo by Allie Smith from Unsplash