Wednesday, May 7, 2025
9:15 am - 5:45 pm
Albert Johnson Conference Room in African American Studies, 660 Social Sciences Building, Berkeley, CA 94720
The annual Department of African American Studies St. Clair Drake Symposium:
Dispatches from the Field: A Black Studies Symposium
The 2025 St. Clair Drake will respond to our current political moment while creating space for critical reflection on the challenges we face as emerging scholars. The planning committee designed the conference specifically for graduate students across disciplines whose work engages with Black Studies methodologies, frameworks, theories, and the global Black diaspora. The conference is designed to share research that navigates the current political climate’s impact on our scholarship, connect and build solidarity networks with peers from other disciplines and institutions, and develop strategies for continuing our work despite institutional and political obstacles.
Program Schedule:
Coffee + Pastries (9:15am)
Opening Remarks (9:35am)
VéVé Clark Scholars + Honors Thesis (9:45am-10:55am)
Close Looking: Black Art’s (Im)possibilities (11:00am-12:30pm)
Lunch (12:30pm-1:00pm)
Keynote Roundtable: Dispatches from the Field (1:00pm-2:25pm)
Black formations: Institutions, Community, Resistance (2:35pm-3:45pm)
Where Do Answers Lie?: Black Study Across Disciplines (3:50pm-5:15pm)
Closing Remarks (5:20pm-5:45pm)