Uncategorized – Suffolk First-Year Seminars

“From Jazz to Jay-Z” Looks at ‘Frank Stewart’s Life in Jazz’

January 28, 2020

Quentin Miller’s SF 1178 “From Jazz to Jay-Z: Black Music and Literature” course visited a retrospective of the jazz photography of Frank Stewart at the Cooper Gallery at Harvard University. Of Stewart, the Cooper Gallery writes:

Frank Stewart’s deep investigation of his African American roots through music, coupled with his intimate back- and on-stage access, offer a rich view of the jazz world via a post-modern vision that is firmly rooted in diverse artistic traditions. Jazz legends and younger stars — Miles Davis, Ellis Marsalis, Dianne Reeves, Cassandra Wilson, Etienne Charles, and Cécile McLorin Salvant among them — are featured in eighty photographs. They include gelatin silver prints and large-size digital compositions created since 1973 by Stewart, lead photographer for Jazz at Lincoln Center and the 2017 winner of the Jazz Journalists Association Award for Career Excellence.

“Curators, Collections, and Exhibits” at the Charlestown Navy Yard

January 27, 2020

Eric Dewar’s SF 1182, “Curators, Collections, and Exhibits,” visited the Charlestown Navy Yard to tour the archive and collections maintained by the National Park Service. Their holdings include objects from the Boston National Historic Park, the Charlestown Navy Yard, and archaeological collections from excavations in Boston. They also toured the public exhibits at the USS Constitution Museum.

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“A Brave New World” students visit Boston’s North End

October 26, 2018

Students in Leslie Eckel’s SF1148 “Brave New Worlds” explored Boston’s North End, stopping at Mike’s Pastry to sample their famous cannoli.

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Visiting the “Hoop Hall”

March 18, 2018

On Friday, November 4, 2016, Dr. Rich Miller lead two sections of his Seminar for Freshmen on an all-day field trip to Springfield, MA, to visit the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame (or “The Hoop Hall”) to study, enjoy, and experience the rich history and cultural legacy of basketball in the US and beyond.

For ten weeks, the “Hoop Dreams” classes studied basketball history in the US looking at issues of race and gender and the importance of high school and college basketball in paving the way for racial integration and equal rights for women and minorities. Students began their visit on the top floor of the Hoop Hall star gazing at all the legends of basketball and learning about the often difficult roads many had to success.

Moving to the lower levels, students enjoyed interactive exhibits as well as the many exhibits showcasing uniforms, famous games, players, and the impact of basketball, past and present, on race relations, gender equality, and the role sport, played, and still plays, in the fabric of American identity.

In addition to teaching his usual SF 178 in the Fall semester, Miller also taught an Honors section of the same course but themed this section around female and Native American hoop history and concerns. This Honors section blazed new ground and may be the first undergraduate course taught with this particular focus.

Ending the day, Dr. Miller joined the students on the Hoop Hall’s full size basketball court to shoot some hoops and discuss how returning to the Hoop Hall again and again with his classes opened his eyes to new ways basketball may be studied using a variety of media, texts, and themes.

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