The exhibition provides visual reference for the conference, titled "The First and the Forced: Indigenous and African American Intersections." The conference is the capstone event of the three-year "Shifting Borders of Race and Identity" grant project funded by the Ford Foundation.
Faculty from KU, Haskell and Johnson County Community College, with organizational support from KU's Hall Center for the Humanities, are exploring how borders have changed and continue to move within the United States and how those shifts have influenced conceptions of race, ethnicity, culture and identity.
Funded by the Ford Foundation and the Kansas Humanities Council, the exhibit features eight interviews with African-American, Indigenous and mixed people discussing their concepts of their own identity, while placing their stories within the larger context of historical, social and cultural themes. The exhibition includes photographs, documents and artwork illustrating each participant's story and will be accompanied by a DVD featuring the interviews.
The oral histories and exhibition were organized by members of the Shifting Borders steering committee faculty from KU, Haskell and Johnson County Community College and students in KU's Indigenous Nations Studies graduate program. Students helped design the exhibition, conduct the oral history interviews and write the grant proposal to the Kansas Humanities Council. After display at the Spencer museum, the Kansas State Historical Society's KITES Program will take the exhibition to schools, museums, libraries and community centers throughout Kansas.
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