‘Punished for Dreaming’ lecture and listening party to take place Oct. 17
Wednesday, October 9, 2024
Media Contact: Bonnie Cain-Wood | Manager, Library Communication Services | 405-744-7331 | lib-pub@okstate.edu
The Oklahoma Oral History Research Program will host “Punished for Dreaming: Lecture & Listen Party” from 6 to 9 p.m., Oct. 17 at Fulton Street Books & Coffee in Tulsa. The event is inspired by Dr. Bettina Love’s New York Times Bestselling book, “Punished for Dreaming: How School Reform Harms Black Children and How We Heal” and Stevie “Dr. View” Johnson’s accompanying album.
Love, who holds the William F. Russell Professorship at Teachers College, Columbia University, will lead with a lecture exploring her 40-year retrospective on systemic racism and educational reform in American school systems, and addressing the current state of education. Her work centers the lived-experiences of 25 Black Americans and establishes an economist-informed road map for reparations, repair and transformation.
Afterward, Dr. View, executive producer of “Punished for Dreaming (Presented by Dr. Bettina Love)” will transition the event into an album listening party, DJ set and discussion, featuring Dr. Love and artists Am’re Ford, Jacobi Ryan and K.O., who are featured on the work.
Dr. View, the assistant professor of creative practice in popular music at Ohio State University, sees his album as an immersive entry point into Love’s work.
“My scholarly and cultural experiences allow me to curate a music experience with a book discussion in a very different way,” Dr. View said. “The album is a kick-starter to convey messages and themes that take place in the book, and it’s my job as an administrator, DJ and as a human being, to engage people in what I view as servant leadership.”
Oklahoma Oral History Research Program assistant professor Dr. Autumn Brown, who organized the event, expressed excitement at uniting the OSU-Stillwater community and Tulsans of all backgrounds around innovative, scholarly research.
“We have to think about how communities are changing, how the dissemination of information is changing,” Brown said, “This event is doing it all — it’s just as academic as a formal lecture, just as entertaining as a typical listening party, and all of it is educational. We want to give students access to this cutting-edge research, and we want to extend our resources into the community.”
Love will be signing and selling her book at the event. Registration is required. Find more information and registration details at okla.st/PFDEvent.
This event is cosponsored by the Oklahoma Oral History Research Program, OSU Libraries, OSU Gender, Women’s and Sexuality Studies, the Center for Poets and Writers, The Center for the Humanities, the Laurence L. and Georgia Ina Dresser Professorship in Rural Teacher Education, Oklahoma Humanities, the Fae Rawdon Norris Endowment for the Humanities, The University of Tulsa Kendall College of Arts & Sciences, the OU Carceral Studies Consortium, the Restorative Justice Institute of Oklahoma, the OSU American Studies Department and the OSU Department of Africana Studies.