From politics and religion to race, education and healthcare, Humanities Connection brings together some of New Jersey’s most fascinating scholars, authors, filmmakers and educators in conversation about critical topics facing our state, nation and world. Sponsored by the New Jersey Council for the Humanities and broadcast on WFDU (89.1 FM), Fairleigh Dickinson University’s public radio station, Humanities Connection, hosted by Bob Mann, airs the last Sunday of each month at 8 a.m. Podcasts will be available following each broadcast.
Episode:
Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care
Aired July 25, 2010
As healthcare becomes increasingly technical, both patients and healthcare providers often feel that the human touch has been lost. Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care is an award-winning, hospital-based, scholar-led humanities reading and discussion program for health care professionals that benefits both them and their patients. In this episode, Dr. Diane Kaufman, Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychiatry and Pediatrics at UMDNJ, Suzanne McConnell, writer, professor and fiction editor for the Bellevue Literary Review and Mary Rizzo, Associate Director of NJCH, discuss how literature has been improving the practice of medicine in New Jersey hospitals.
Bringing Literature & Medicine to Your Hospital
The Importance of Empathy
The Residue of Trauma
Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care is currently at five hospitals in New Jersey. Rizzo discusses how the program works and explains how to bring Literature & Medicine to other hospitals in the state.
As medical practice gets increasingly technical, healthcare practitioners often feel that they’re unable to adequately connect with their patients. Kaufman explores how literature can help a doctor be open to the complexity of their patient’s lives and experiences.
Working in healthcare is a stressful occupation. Kaufman and McConnell discuss how literature can help healthcare professionals cope with the burnout experienced by so many in the field.
To Learn More Visit...
NJCH Literature & Medicine: Find out more about Literature & Medicine in New Jersey, one of the New Jersey Council for the Humanities major programs.
Maine Humanities Council Literature & Medicine: Creators of Literature & Medicine, the Maine Humanities Council offers tremendous resources related to the program nationwide and globally.
Center for Humanism and Medicine at UMDNJ-NJMS: Featured on this episode, the Center for Humanism and Medicine at UMDNJ-NJMS is at the forefront of combining the humanities with medical education.
Suzanne McConnell: In addition to facilitating Literature & Medicine sessions at UMDNJ and VA Healthcare New Jersey, Suzanne McConnell is an accomplished writer, editor and teacher.
Episode:
The Chopsticks-Fork Principle: Multiculturalism and Humor
Aired June 27, 2010
Writer and philosopher Cathy Bao Bean (pictured above) explores how humor can help us make sense of our increasingly diverse world. Based on her popular Horizon Speakers Bureau program “The Chopsticks-Fork Principle” Bean uses her personal experiences as a Chinese immigrant adapting to American life to highlight the philosophical differences between the East and West. The Horizon Speakers Bureau is available to New Jersey nonprofit organizations.
Lucky Strike and Shut Up: Humor and Multiculturalism
Model Minority
Living with a Split Identity
Dealing with Diversity in Daily Life
When her family immigrated to the U.S., the only words her sister knew were "Lucky Strike and shut up." Bean talks about how important humor is in informing our approach to multiculturalism.
Can a positive image still be a stereotype? Bean discusses the model minority stereotype, how it arose and its impact on Asian Americans.
Bean asserts that everyone is at least bi-cultural, in terms of gender and ethnicity. Rather than ignoring one, Bean argues that living with a split identity is not only possible, but fruitful.
Living in New Jersey, one of the most diverse states in the nation, means interacting on a daily basis with people from varying cultures, races, ethnicities and religions. Bean offers her advice on how best to contend with difference.
To Learn More Visit...
Horizon Speakers Bureau: The New Jersey Council for the Humanities offers nonprofit organizations in New Jersey the opportunity to host a speaker on topics ranging from New Jersey history to religious studies to public policy.
Cathy Bao Bean: Find out more about Bean's work, where she'll be speaking and her memoir, The Chopsticks-Fork Principle.
Episode:
A Place Out of Time: The Bordentown School
Aired May 30, 2010
Filmmaker Dave Davidson and alumnus Dr. Art Symes discuss the history and significance of the Manual Training and Industrial School for Colored Youth, better known as the Bordentown School, the subject of the documentary film A Place Out of Time: The Bordentown School. A unique educational institution that existed from 1886 to 1955, the Bordentown School’s history highlights the major issues that have faced African Americans since the end of slavery.
Ruby Dee Introduces the Bordentown School
Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois: Educational Philosophy
Separation or Segregation?
The Demise of the Bordentown School
In this clip, acclaimed actress and civil rights activist Ruby Dee describes the Bordentown School. Filmmaker Dave Davidson discusses Dee’s role in the documentary.
Around the turn of the 20th century Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Dubois espoused differing theories on how African Americans should best be educated. Both of their theories shaped the Bordentown School, profoundly affecting its curriculum.
African Americans contended with segregation by creating separate worlds that allowed for the development of important social institutions. In this clip, Dr. Clement Price, Rutgers University-Newark, and Dr. Art Symes discuss how segregation shaped the African American community.
In 1955 American society changed “with all due speed” in response to the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Dave Davidson examines how the Brown decision intersected with New Jersey politics, led to the closing of the Bordentown School.
To Learn More Visit...
Hudson West: Dave Davidson and Amber West's production company makes documentary films about arts, history and education.
A Place Out of Time on PBS: Learn more about the film as well as when it will be broadcast on local PBS affiliates.
Politics and religion usually top the list of subjects deemed too controversial for public discussion. In this episode of Humanities Connection, Dr. Joseph Devlin (pictured above), professor of religious studies at LaSalle University, explains not only the necessity of talking about politics and religion together but why in his Teacher Institute seminar, America and the Politics of World Religions, he argues it is impossible to understand one without the other.
Religion and Politics
Myth, Defined
Why You Should Attend the NJCH Teacher Institute
Dr. Joseph Devlin explores why, even in a seemingly secular nation like the U.S., we need to think about the intersections between religions and politics.
In common usage, "myth" is often used to describe stories that are not true. Dr. Devlin offers a different conception of myth as a cultural frame that helps us make sense of the world.
Rich Schwartz, social studies coordinator for Whippany Park High School and NJCH Teacher Institute master teacher, describes the benefits teachers receive from attending a summer teacher institute.
To Learn More Visit...
NJCH 2010 Teacher Institute: Find out more about the NJCH Teacher Institute, including how to apply to attend one of five thought-provoking seminars being held this summer.
Episode:
Revolution ‘67
Aired March 28, 2010
Host Bob Mann talks with Dr. Clement Price and filmmakers Marylou Tibaldo-Bongiorno and Jerome Bongiorno about their film Revolution ’67, which examines the historical and sociological causes and effects of the 1967 Newark "riots."
Riots or Rebellion?
Objectivity and Documentary Filmmaking
Looting
Dr. Clement Price discusses why the events of July 1967 in Newark should be considered a revolution rather than a riot.
Marylou Tibaldo-Bongiorno and Jerome Bongiorno talk about maintaining objectivity in the portrayal of the police in Revolution ’67.
Looting during the "riots" was not random. Dr. Price discusses “targeted looting” as well as looting of black-owned stores, called “soul brother destruction.”
To Learn More Visit....
Bongiorno Productions: Information on the film, the filmmakers, upcoming screenings as well as a curriculum for teachers using Revolution '67 in their classes.
P.O.V. on PBS: Revolution '67 was first broadcast on P.O.V. in 2007. The site includes additional background material and resources, including a discussion guide.
Riots--1967: This website uses interviews, maps and video to examine the 1967 riots in Newark and Detroit, which occurred within days of each other.
