Panelists highlight \u2018overlooked\u2019 stories of African Americans in Maine \u2014Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\nMaine\u2019s reputation as the nation\u2019s whitest state overlooks \u201ca rich history of Black and indigenous people in the state,\u201d writes Lewiston Sun Journal <\/em>reporter Andrew Rice in his coverage of a recent edition of the Great Falls Forum, a monthly speaker series hosted by Lewiston Public Library and sponsored in part by Bates.<\/p>\n\n\n\nNumbers only reveal so much, said Professor Emerita of Politics Leslie Hill, who moderated the discussion. \u201cYou would never tell your family story with just numbers\u2026You tell it with the stories,\u201d adding that \u201cwe need to unearth the stories.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"Associate](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2018\/01\/180124_Leslie_Hill_Campus_0018.jpg\")
Professor Emerita of Politics Leslie Hill moderated the October gathering of the Great Falls Forum. In this 2018 photo, she inspects a copy of a 1991 New York Times <\/em>advertisement, to which Hill and 1,600 other Black women lent their names, protesting the treatment of Anita Hill during Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nPanelist Rachel Ferrante \u201910, executive director of Museum L-A, described how museums are reckoning with the problematic legacy of being \u201ckeepers of history\u201d who have excluded African American history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Local historian and retired Associated Press journalist Bob Greene, a trustee of the Maine Historical Society, noted that his family dates to 1750 in the New Gloucester area. Other Black families arrived in Maine in the early 1600s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n- Read the story: \u201cGreat Falls Forum: Panelists highlight \u2018overlooked\u2019 stories of African Americans in Maine<\/a>,\u201d Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em>, Nov. 10, 2022<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nIsaiah Rice \u201915<\/h3>\n\n\n\nCan a Black queer couple survive in \u201980s-inspired horror flick? \u2014 The Reckoning<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2022\/12\/Isaiah-Rice-15-571x900.webp\")
Isaiah Rice ’15<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nIn an interview with The Reckoning<\/em>, filmmaker Isaiah Rice \u201915 explains how the seed of inspiration was planted at Bates for his short horror film, He\u2019s Watching You<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRice, a dance and politics major at Bates, recalls telling his Bates film professor how \u201canytime you see a Black queer man on film in a relationship, his partner is always white. And I remember voicing this to him, and he was like, \u2018Okay, so clearly this bothers you. What are you doing to change it?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In He\u2019s Watching You, <\/em>the two leads are \u201cBlack queer men in a relationship,\u201d but the focus of the story \u201cis not centered around their sexuality,\u201d Rice says. <\/p>\n\n\n\nWhile many films that have queer characters and story lines \u201cseem to focus on the trauma of coming out of the closet, hiding your sexuality from society, or at times being oversexualized,\u201d in He\u2019s Watching You<\/em>, like many other horror films, the couple is just \u201cin the wrong place at the wrong time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n- Read the story: \u201cCan a Black queer couple survive in 80s inspired horror flick?<\/a>\u201d The Reckoning<\/em>, Oct. 31, 2022<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nRonan Goulden \u201922<\/h3>\n\n\n\nAccent discrimination is still a pervasive issue in the workplace, research finds \u2014 Forbes<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\nA Forbes<\/em> story notes that discrimination based on accent is still a problem in the workplace, and cited an honors thesis<\/a> by Ronan Goulden \u201922, AmeriCorps VISTA and Civic Leadership Fellow in the Harward Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\u201cIt\u2019s](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/04\/190405Newly_Admiotted_Admission_0089-1.jpg\")
Ronan Goulden \u201922, preparing to lead a campus tour, poses outside Chase Hall during an Admitted Students Reception in April 2019. Quoted in Forbes<\/em>, Goulden\u2019s honors thesis in sociology explores accent discrimination. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nGoulden\u2019s thesis found that \u201cwithin the Lewiston-Auburn area of Maine there was accent discrimination against those with African accents.\u201d The people with perceived African accents are often assumed to be African refugees or migrants, and \u201cto have little education, job skills, intelligence, and trustworthiness within the workplace.\u201d An additional perceived English language barrier contributed to the idea of unemployability, wrote Goulden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOvercoming this type of discrimination should take a multi-pronged approach,\u201d wrote Janice Gassam Asare, a senior contributor at Forbes<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n- Read the story: \u201cAccent discrimination is still a pervasive issue in the workplace, research finds<\/a>,\u201d Forbes<\/em>, Nov. 18, 2022<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nAsha Tamirisa, music faculty<\/h3>\n\n\n\nSix artists awarded $5,000 fellowships from Maine Arts Commission \u2014 Portland Press Herald<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\nAsha Tamirisa, an assistant professor of music, was one of six Maine artists awarded a $5,000 fellowship from the Maine Arts Commission, which \u201crecognizes artistic excellence and helps advance careers in the arts throughout the state.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"Moments](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2022\/12\/221003_Joint_Ventures_Panel_3306.webp\")
Asha Tamirisa, an assistant professor of music, speaks during a Back to Bates panel discussion on Oct. 3, 2022. Tamirisa was one of six Maine artists awarded a $5,000 fellowship from the Maine Arts Commission. (Theophil Syslo | Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nTamirisa works with sound, video, and film in performance and installation art. She plans to use the fellowship to build a studio and support the release of a full-length experimental music album, on which she plans to collaborate with Maine-based visual artists and audio engineers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n- Read the story: \u201cSix artists awarded $5,000 fellowships from Maine Arts Commission<\/a>,\u201d Portland Press Herald<\/em>, Nov. 30, 2022<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nStanton Bird Club, Thorncrag Nature Sanctuary<\/h3>\n\n\n\nStanton Bird Club celebrates Thorncrag\u2019s 100 years as Lewiston\u2019s refuge \u2014 Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\nA story in the Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em> looked at the history of Thorncrag Nature Sanctuary<\/a>, which got its start a century ago, in 1922, through a gift of land from Alfred Anthony, a Bates professor and trustee, when he retired to New York City.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe sanctuary is managed by the Stanton Bird Club, named after the famed early Bates professor Jonathan \u201cUncle Johnny” Stanton, who was \u201cloved in the community beyond Bates,\u201d said Jeri Maurer, bird club volunteer president. \u201cMany would attend his bird-watching excursions, and all students took a mandatory ornithology course. Some of his taxidermies are still perched <\/a>in the halls of Bates\u2019 buildings to this day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2022\/12\/10075a77f6eb10d944a21bc05d05cee5-toned.webp\")
Legendary Bates Professor Jonathan “Uncle Johnny” Stanton, third from right, poses with students during one of his famous bird walks in 1895. The local Stanton Bird Club, which manages Thorncrag Nature Sanctuary, is named for Stanton.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nLike other outdoors places, Thorncrag saw a surge in use during the early days of the pandemic. \u201cIt was really an opportunity for everybody to be outside and away from all that fear,\u201d said Maurer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n- Read the story: \u201cStanton Bird Club celebrates Thorncrag\u2019s 100 years as Lewiston\u2019s refuge<\/a>,\u201d Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em>, Nov. 27, 2022<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nWilliam Allen Saunders, Class of 1899<\/h3>\n\n\n\nBiography details life of longest serving Black teacher at Harpers Ferry’s Storer College \u2014 West Virginia Public Broadcasting<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2019\/11\/Saunders-1899-Mirror-831x900.jpg\")
William Allen Saunders, Class of 1899, shown in his Bates yearbook, is the subject of a new biography. (Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nLynn Pechuekonis talked with Shepherd Snyder of West Virginia Public Broadcasting<\/em> about her new biography of William Saunders, Bates Class of 1899<\/a>, the longest serving Black teacher at the historical Storer College in West Virginia. <\/p>\n\n\n\nAt Storer College, Saunders was \u201cknown for helping struggling students, he boarded students in his home. And he taught an amazing breadth of classes,\u201d said Pechuekonis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo it was really hard to earn a degree at Storer College in the 20th century without sitting through at least one class from Professor Saunders.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Maine\u2019s reputation as the nation\u2019s whitest state overlooks \u201ca rich history of Black and indigenous people in the state,\u201d writes Lewiston Sun Journal <\/em>reporter Andrew Rice in his coverage of a recent edition of the Great Falls Forum, a monthly speaker series hosted by Lewiston Public Library and sponsored in part by Bates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Numbers only reveal so much, said Professor Emerita of Politics Leslie Hill, who moderated the discussion. \u201cYou would never tell your family story with just numbers\u2026You tell it with the stories,\u201d adding that \u201cwe need to unearth the stories.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Panelist Rachel Ferrante \u201910, executive director of Museum L-A, described how museums are reckoning with the problematic legacy of being \u201ckeepers of history\u201d who have excluded African American history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Local historian and retired Associated Press journalist Bob Greene, a trustee of the Maine Historical Society, noted that his family dates to 1750 in the New Gloucester area. Other Black families arrived in Maine in the early 1600s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In an interview with The Reckoning<\/em>, filmmaker Isaiah Rice \u201915 explains how the seed of inspiration was planted at Bates for his short horror film, He\u2019s Watching You<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rice, a dance and politics major at Bates, recalls telling his Bates film professor how \u201canytime you see a Black queer man on film in a relationship, his partner is always white. And I remember voicing this to him, and he was like, \u2018Okay, so clearly this bothers you. What are you doing to change it?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In He\u2019s Watching You, <\/em>the two leads are \u201cBlack queer men in a relationship,\u201d but the focus of the story \u201cis not centered around their sexuality,\u201d Rice says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While many films that have queer characters and story lines \u201cseem to focus on the trauma of coming out of the closet, hiding your sexuality from society, or at times being oversexualized,\u201d in He\u2019s Watching You<\/em>, like many other horror films, the couple is just \u201cin the wrong place at the wrong time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A Forbes<\/em> story notes that discrimination based on accent is still a problem in the workplace, and cited an honors thesis<\/a> by Ronan Goulden \u201922, AmeriCorps VISTA and Civic Leadership Fellow in the Harward Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Goulden\u2019s thesis found that \u201cwithin the Lewiston-Auburn area of Maine there was accent discrimination against those with African accents.\u201d The people with perceived African accents are often assumed to be African refugees or migrants, and \u201cto have little education, job skills, intelligence, and trustworthiness within the workplace.\u201d An additional perceived English language barrier contributed to the idea of unemployability, wrote Goulden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOvercoming this type of discrimination should take a multi-pronged approach,\u201d wrote Janice Gassam Asare, a senior contributor at Forbes<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Asha Tamirisa, an assistant professor of music, was one of six Maine artists awarded a $5,000 fellowship from the Maine Arts Commission, which \u201crecognizes artistic excellence and helps advance careers in the arts throughout the state.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tamirisa works with sound, video, and film in performance and installation art. She plans to use the fellowship to build a studio and support the release of a full-length experimental music album, on which she plans to collaborate with Maine-based visual artists and audio engineers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A story in the Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em> looked at the history of Thorncrag Nature Sanctuary<\/a>, which got its start a century ago, in 1922, through a gift of land from Alfred Anthony, a Bates professor and trustee, when he retired to New York City.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The sanctuary is managed by the Stanton Bird Club, named after the famed early Bates professor Jonathan \u201cUncle Johnny” Stanton, who was \u201cloved in the community beyond Bates,\u201d said Jeri Maurer, bird club volunteer president. \u201cMany would attend his bird-watching excursions, and all students took a mandatory ornithology course. Some of his taxidermies are still perched <\/a>in the halls of Bates\u2019 buildings to this day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Like other outdoors places, Thorncrag saw a surge in use during the early days of the pandemic. \u201cIt was really an opportunity for everybody to be outside and away from all that fear,\u201d said Maurer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lynn Pechuekonis talked with Shepherd Snyder of West Virginia Public Broadcasting<\/em> about her new biography of William Saunders, Bates Class of 1899<\/a>, the longest serving Black teacher at the historical Storer College in West Virginia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At Storer College, Saunders was \u201cknown for helping struggling students, he boarded students in his home. And he taught an amazing breadth of classes,\u201d said Pechuekonis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo it was really hard to earn a degree at Storer College in the 20th century without sitting through at least one class from Professor Saunders.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nIsaiah Rice \u201915<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Can a Black queer couple survive in \u201980s-inspired horror flick? \u2014 The Reckoning<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n\n\n\nRonan Goulden \u201922<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Accent discrimination is still a pervasive issue in the workplace, research finds \u2014 Forbes<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n\n\n\nAsha Tamirisa, music faculty<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Six artists awarded $5,000 fellowships from Maine Arts Commission \u2014 Portland Press Herald<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n\n\n\nStanton Bird Club, Thorncrag Nature Sanctuary<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Stanton Bird Club celebrates Thorncrag\u2019s 100 years as Lewiston\u2019s refuge \u2014 Lewiston Sun Journal<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n\n\n\nWilliam Allen Saunders, Class of 1899<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Biography details life of longest serving Black teacher at Harpers Ferry’s Storer College \u2014 West Virginia Public Broadcasting<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2022\/12\/Lynn-Strong_select_sm.6371_R2-1-675x900.webp\")