http://www.brockington.org/Careers/summary.php?j=126

(applications due June 18, 2014)

Brockington and Associates is seeking an experienced archaeological field and lab technician based in our Mt Pleasant, SC office. The position requires an individual with a bachelor’s degree in archaeology, anthropology, or a related field, and a minimum of field school or the equivalent field experience.
This job will require the successful applicant to perform both field and laboratory duties as needed.
Work schedule will include 40 hour weeks. No overtime is expected on these assignments. We will provide vehicles for daily travel between the project area and the office. Single- occupancy hotel rooms and meal allowance are provided when traveling is required. Brockington offers benefits including, health and dental insurance, 401K and paid vacation

Driving required: Yes

Application due date: Applications must be received no later than 5:00 pm on June 18 or they will not be processed or considered.

Director Proud of Avery’s Role in Celebrating Black Life

Patricia Williams Lessane has served as executive director of the Avery Research Center for African American History and Culture at the College of Charleston since August 2010.

Before joining the College, Lessane was a faculty member at Roosevelt University and a consultant for The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. She holds a bachelor’s in English from Fisk University, a master’s in liberal studies from Dartmouth College and a Ph.D in Anthropology from University of Illinois at Chicago.

Q: As a cultural anthropologist, one of your research focuses is on Black life in popular culture. Can you talk about this topic in the context of what you have accomplished at Avery?

A: I think our public programs — specifically the conferences, film screenings, and public lectures — best reflect my interest in Black life in popular culture and the intersection of race, class, and gender in Black life. We’ve been able to bring some of the best minds to the College, including Drs. Harry and Michelle Elam (Stanford University), Dr. Joyce Ann Joyce (Temple University), Dr. Cathy Cohen (University of Chicago), filmmaker Julie Dash, and Dr. Johnetta Cole (Director of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art) to name a few.

Q: What are some of your current projects?

A: I teach every semester. It gives me the opportunity to connect with our students, and I enjoy talking to them and discussing the topics I am passionate about. I teach courses in African American Studies and Anthropology, including African American Society and Culture, Black Bodies in Television and Film, and The Peoples and Cultures of Africa. Next spring (2015), I will teach a First Year Seminar course on the Great Migration.

I am co-editing with Dr. Conseula Francis, an anthology of essays on the work of filmmaker Julie Dash, and co-editing with Dr. Violet Johnson (University of Texas College Station) and Dr. Gundolf Graml (Agnes Scott College) a volume of essays, Deferred Dreams, Defiant Struggles: Critical Perspectives on Blackness, Belonging and Civil Rights (part of the FORECAAST Series by the Collegium of African American Research).

I am working on an essay about the 50th anniversary of Nothing But a Man, a film by Michael Roemer and Michael Young. And, I am so excited about our recent NEA award to develop a documentary about the remarkable life and work of Vertamae Smart-Grovesnor. So I will be making a film with Julie Dash!

I am equally thrilled that our 2014 symposium, “The Marrow of Tradition: The Black Film in the American Cinematic Tradition,” will screen and highlight the work of African American filmmakers and generate critical dialogue about the Black film tradition and the salient ways issues of race, class, gender, oppression, resistance, and liberation struggles have historically inculcated in the work of radical pioneers of race film and many that followed.

We take our name from Charles Chestnutt’s remarkable novel of the same title. A fearless commentator on racial violence and injustice, Chestnutt’s novel chronicles the events, which lead up to a fictional race riot in Wellington, North Carolina.

RELATED: Read a 2011 profile of Lessane in The Post and Courier.

Q: What object, story, or person associated with Avery has had a strong impact on you and why?

A: I have spent a good deal of time on the papers of Dr. Millicent E. Brown, so I’ve gotten to know a great deal about her life and work in civil rights and as a Black pedagogue. While I haven’t done any research on the Septima P. Clark collection, I am just so proud to be able to say that we have it. She is such an important figure in African American history, the Civil Rights Movement, and Black Charleston.

Most recently, I used the Joseph Towles Collection for my Anthropology 322 course — The Peoples and Cultures of Africa. It’s such a rich collection. As an anthropologist, having the work of anthropological luminary Colin Turnbull -a brilliant but unsung African American anthropologist — at my fingertips is truly an added bonus of working here. My dream is to develop a mixed media traveling exhibit about Towles.

Q: Anything else you’d like to share about Avery?

A: Three of our Avery staff members are headed to the Ivy Leagues this summer! I am headed to the Harvard Institute of Higher Education Management Development Program, and Mary Battle and Shelia Harrell-Roye will both be at Yale for the Yale Public History Institute.

 RELATED: Watch a 2011 video interview with Lessane.

Ten College of Charleston students presented research April 11-12, 2014 at the annual Colonial Academic Alliance Undergraduate Research Conference in Towson, Md.  These scholars represent the best research papers submitted by students from all majors. The conference is the signature academic and outreach event sponsored by the Alliance, under the auspices of the Colonial Athletic Association, of which the College is a new member in 2013-14. 

The conference included a keynote presentation by Don Thomas, a former NASA astronaut who now heads the Hackerman Academy of Mathematics and Science at Towson University.

“The Colonial Academic Alliance Research Conference provided an excellent opportunity for us to showcase the different types of research and creative projects on which College of Charleston students and faculty collaborate,” said Dr. Trisha Folds-Bennett, dean of the Honors College. “The group of students chosen to represent us were energetic, engaged, and professional. Professor Andrea DeMaria and I were both impressed with their contribution to the conference, and thank the Office of Academic Affairs for funding the trip.”

Student presenters from the College of Charleston included:

Jami Baxley (classics and archaeology; James Newhard, faculty adviser)

Alexandra Cattran (physics and astronomy; Linda Jones, faculty advisers)

Lance Cooper (political science; Gibbs Knotts, faculty adviser)

Colin Cotter (chemistry & biochemistry; Gamil Guirgis, faculty adviser)

Hannah Evans (English & African studies; Simon Lewis, faculty adviser)

Grace Moxley (chemistry and biochemistry; Andrea DeMaria and Beth Sundstrom, faculty advisers)

Jackelyn Payne (health and human performance and communication; Andrea DeMaria and Beth Sundstrom, faculty advisers)

Sarah Turner (biology; Allison Welch, faculty adviser)

Aleisha Walker (teacher education and sociology and anthropology; Christine Finnan, faculty adviser)

John Wise (religious studies; Katie Hladky, faculty adviser)

Written by Professor Chris Day for the Post & Courier

Posted: Monday, May 26, 2014 12:01 a.m.

Nigeria does not have a kidnapping problem. It has a Boko Haram problem. The armed group’s abduction of hundreds of young girls is a shameless abuse of human rights. But the recent social media obsession with the issue misses that the four-year-old insurgency is a direct reflection of the country’s more fundamental ills – systematic corruption, failed development and grinding poverty.

This makes the decision by the United States to send 80 troops to Chad to help find the missing girls all the more frustrating. It is a nice gesture. But it is little more than a humanitarian fig leaf that masks the avoidance of more meaningful, albeit thorny political engagement needed to deal with Nigeria’s violence.

What distinguishes Boko Haram is its intersection with political Islam and its use of violence. The group is a splinter of a broader political movement that unsuccessfully sought to impose Sharia law in parts of northern Nigeria. It gained strength through linkages with al-Qaeda’s regional affiliates, and the group populated its decentralized structure with fighters recruited from northern Nigeria’s alienated, unemployed youth that were radicalized with anti-Western messages.

What started as attacks against government officials expanded to high profile bombings, shootings of civilians, and kidnappings – in other words, terrorism. In response, Nigeria’s security forces have been incompetent and ham-handed. Overtures towards dialogue are met with mistrust.

While Boko Haram’s leaders use radical Islamic discourse, it is a mistake to paint the group as “Islamist,” per se, as if violence is a manifestation of being Muslim. Prominent Muslim leaders worldwide have denounced the group. Either way, the motivation to deal with Boko Haram should not be based on the professed religion of its members, but on the violence that they commit.

The United States has a mixed experience with using military force for humanitarian ends. Operation Provide Comfort in 1992 saved thousands of Iraqi Kurds stranded on the Turkish border, setting the scene for more “operations other than war.” Later in the decade, the U.S. led NATO into the first “humanitarian war” in Kosovo. But interest in Africa was curtailed by the Somali debacle of “Black Hawk Down” fame, where the relatively successful Operation Restore Hope went off the rails when the army meddled in Mogadishu’s warlord politics. Soon after, Operation Support Hope helped Rwandan refugees in Zaire, but long after the genocide was over.

Africa has never been a priority for American foreign policy. But for the past decade the U.S. has entered into military partnerships with several African governments. Based in Stuttgart, Germany, the United States Africa Command, or AFRICOM, helps secure and stabilize Africa by building and training professional armies. African allies assist the U.S. in regional counterterrorism efforts. American boots hit the ground to provide logistical assistance for specific operations, like the current hunt for Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army.

In Nigeria the U.S. has several choices. The cold approach of doing nothing has obviously been ruled out.

Going in with guns blazing brings enormous risks. Nigerian politics is amongst Africa’s most incomprehensible and can chew up and spit out even the most seasoned analyst, policy maker, or soldier. Getting bogged down in shambolic Nigeria would be a nightmare. Any intervention must have clear goals, a reasonable chance of success, and guarantee it will not do more harm than good. And the American public is already worn down by a decade of war fatigue and is allergic to any military entanglement.

The current next-to-nothing humanitarian path is politically visible but actually meaningless. It is like delivering food aid to refugees fleeing violence instead of addressing the political causes of the violence itself. It has the self-absolving veneer of trying to “make a difference” but does little to solve the underlying problems deeply rooted in Nigeria’s decaying state.

A potential upside to the current approach is that troops could be using the mission as cover for something bigger – hopefully they are taking good notes.

Either way, Nigeria is a fragmented, violent country and Boko Haram requires more than reconnaissance for a rescue mission that may or not materialize. This is merely meddling with no strategy and is more reminiscent of a movie screenplay than good policy. Nigeria’s abducted girls, and indeed all the country’s victims of insurgent violence, deserve much more.

Christopher Day is an assistant professor of political science at the College of Charleston.

Written by Professor Chris Day for the Daily Beast

Tillis Named Dean of School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs

The College of Charleston announced today that Antonio D. Tillis has been named the new dean of the School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs. Tillis will join the College on July 1.

Tillis comes to the College of Charleston from Dartmouth College, where he has served as Chair of African and African-American Studies. While at Dartmouth, he also served on the Faculty Strategic Planning Advisory Committee and associated working groups on pedagogy, teaching and mentorship, and global Dartmouth.

“Dr. Tillis brings to the College of Charleston an exceptionally strong record of scholarly accomplishments complemented by outstanding leadership experiences in Latin American and Latino Studies and African and African-American Studies,” says College of Charleston Provost George Hynd. “His wide-ranging international experience, particularly in regard to facilitating study abroad opportunities for students, will serve him well as he works with the faculty, students, staff and advisory board members in the School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs. His experience, collaborative energy and vision will serve him well as he begins his tenure as the new dean of the School of Language, Cultures, and World Affairs.”

Prior to Dartmouth, Tillis served as the inaugural director of Latin American and Latino Studies and as Director of Undergraduate and Graduate Studies and Study Abroad for African-American Studies at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana.

An active and engaged scholar, Tillis has published a monograph, Manuel Zapata Olivella and the ‘Darkening’ of Latin American Literature, a critical bilingual work, Caribbean African, Upon Awakening, the Poetry of Blas Jiménez, and two edited volumes. His first book has been translated into Portuguese and published by the State University of Rio de Janeiro Press, Brazil, and he is currently completing a book-length manuscript on the works of Dominican-American writers Angie Cruz, Nelly Rosario, Loida Martiza Peréz, and Junot Diaz.

“I am simply delighted to join students, distinguished colleagues, staff and administrators at the College of Charleston,” says Tillis. “I look forward to adding my competencies as a teacher-scholar-administrator toward making an already intellectually dynamic College and School, even more stimulating.”

Tillis is past president of the College Language Association, founded in 1937 for African-American scholars of English and foreign languages, and serves on numerous editorial boards in his field. He is a former Fulbright Scholar to Brazil and is co-editor of the series “Black Diaspora Worlds: Origins and Evolutions from New World Slaving” with Lexington Publishing, a division of Rowan and Littlefield. He holds a B.S. from Vanderbilt University, an M.A. in Spanish literature from Howard University and a Ph.D. in Latin American literature with an Afro-Hispanic emphasis from the University of Missouri at Columbia.

The College of Charleston announced today that Antonio D. Tillis has been named the new dean of the School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs. Tillis will join the College on July 1.

Tillis comes to the College of Charleston from Dartmouth College, where he has served as Chair of African and African-American Studies. While at Dartmouth, he also served on the Faculty Strategic Planning Advisory Committee and associated working groups on pedagogy, teaching and mentorship, and global Dartmouth.

“Dr. Tillis brings to the College of Charleston an exceptionally strong record of scholarly accomplishments complemented by outstanding leadership experiences in Latin American and Latino Studies and African and African-American Studies,” says College of Charleston Provost George Hynd. “His wide-ranging international experience, particularly in regard to facilitating study abroad opportunities for students, will serve him well as he works with the faculty, students, staff and advisory board members in the School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs. His experience, collaborative energy and vision will serve him well as he begins his tenure as the new dean of the School of Language, Cultures, and World Affairs.”

Prior to Dartmouth, Tillis served as the inaugural director of Latin American and Latino Studies and as Director of Undergraduate and Graduate Studies and Study Abroad for African-American Studies at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana.

An active and engaged scholar, Tillis has published a monograph, Manuel Zapata Olivella and the ‘Darkening’ of Latin American Literature, a critical bilingual work, Caribbean African, Upon Awakening, the Poetry of Blas Jiménez, and two edited volumes. His first book has been translated into Portuguese and published by the State University of Rio de Janeiro Press, Brazil, and he is currently completing a book-length manuscript on the works of Dominican-American writers Angie Cruz, Nelly Rosario, Loida Martiza Peréz, and Junot Diaz.

“I am simply delighted to join students, distinguished colleagues, staff and administrators at the College of Charleston,” says Tillis. “I look forward to adding my competencies as a teacher-scholar-administrator toward making an already intellectually dynamic College and School, even more stimulating.”

Tillis is past president of the College Language Association, founded in 1937 for African-American scholars of English and foreign languages, and serves on numerous editorial boards in his field. He is a former Fulbright Scholar to Brazil and is co-editor of the series “Black Diaspora Worlds: Origins and Evolutions from New World Slaving” with Lexington Publishing, a division of Rowan and Littlefield. He holds a B.S. from Vanderbilt University, an M.A. in Spanish literature from Howard University and a Ph.D. in Latin American literature with an Afro-Hispanic emphasis from the University of Missouri at Columbia.

‘Reign of Rice’ focuses on rice archeology – South Strand News.