Watch the video for the opening event of the new exhibition, Rhyme, Rhythm, and Resistance: Enacting the Art of Dissent. The program features vocalist, composer, and culture worker Mankwe Ndosi, librarian and DJ T-Kay Sangwand, and author and scholar Rumya S. Putcha in conversation with exhibition curator Patrice Green. Together, they explore the intersection of music, literature, and activism, highlighting the powerful role of the arts in social movements as told through the collections of the Schlesinger Library.

Art has always been an integral part of protest and resistance. Poetry, music, and other written and performed arts have long been used to express distaste for political movements, displeasure with working conditions, and disdain for the status quo, among other issues. This exhibition explores the people behind protest songs, poetry and spoken word, musicals and plays, and the movements that made them. It follows a centuries-long effort in the United States to reconcile a poor regard for women’s experiences with a lack of care from parties in power. Using affect theory as a framework, we aim to provide space to take women’s words as seriously as their actions and a critical feminist lens through which to view motivations for speaking up.

Harvard Radcliffe Institute gratefully acknowledges the Helen Blumen and Jan Acton Fund for Schlesinger Library Exhibitions, which is supporting this exhibition.

Speakers
Mankwe Ndosi, vocalist, composer, and culture worker

Rumya S. Putcha, associate professor of music and women’s studies, the Hugh Hodgson School of Music and the Institute for Women’s Studies, University of Georgia

T-Kay Sangwand, DJ and librarian for digital collection development, Digital Library Program, University of California Los Angeles

Moderator: Patrice Green, curator for African American and African diasporic collections, Schlesinger Library, Harvard Radcliffe Institute