Toward a People's History of Landscape: Black and Indigenous Histories of the Nation's Capital

FAIN: EH-281243-21

Texas A & M University, College Station (College Station, TX 77843-0001)
Andrea Roberts (Project Director: March 2021 to present)
Thaïsa Way (Co Project Director: July 2021 to present)

A three-week, residential institute for 25 college and university faculty on social and landscape history in Washington, DC, focusing on African American and Indigenous contributions.

An NEH Summer Institute for twenty-five higher education faculty to convene at Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection in Washington DC from June 12 to July 1, 2022, led by Dr. Roberts (Texas A&M) and Dr. Way (Harvard). The Institute brings together humanist scholars to explore new approaches to the scholarship and teaching of landscape histories, centering Black and Indigenous historical narratives in the founding of the United States and the District of Columbia. Participants will develop a web-based repository of teaching modules focused on Washington DC and eight selected sites across the nation. While seminars organize the program, field trips contribute to stewarding a landscape scholarship of integration for educators and researchers. Participants will detect new ways and disciplinary frames for understanding and teaching place meaning, experience and significance as they collectively create a model for a peoples history of landscapes of the United States.