A Different Universe, at UCSC and Beyond: The Dickens Project's 2022 Programs on Race, Inequality, and 19th-Century Literature

FAIN: ZED-283897-22

Regents of the University of California, Santa Cruz (Santa Cruz, CA 95064-1077)
Renee Allyson Fox (Project Director: May 2021 to November 2023)

Retention of a staff position to support the activities of the Dickens Project.

The Dickens Project is a research consortium and community outreach organization based at UCSC and dedicated to creating communities around the study of 19th-century literature. In 2022, our programming will focus on how reading 19th-century literature can help us better understand contemporary systemic racism and inequality. Our week-long 2022 Dickens Universe will bring non-academic participants (ranging from high school students to senior citizens) together with Black studies and Victorian studies scholars to examine how 19th-century novels can sharpen our awareness of racist assumptions that underpin many of the structures that still organize our world today. In concert with the Universe, our two high school programs will both use creative lesson plans and projects to help students make connections between portrayals of racism and poverty in 19th-century fiction and their own experiences of 21st-century inequality.