Yes! In My Backyard Lecture
Branch Brook Park Alliance (Newark)
Lecture on the historic use of public parks as civic spaces to be held in association with Newark
Mini-2012
Child Indentures as Social Welfare Exhibit
Museum of Early Trades & Crafts (Madison)
Exhibit, catalog, and related programs exploring the social, cultural, and legal context surrounding the historical American practice of placing out orphans as indentured servants in the nineteenth century.
Major-2012
Digital Environmental Justice & Resource Archive
Ironbound Community Corporation (Newark). Expansion of the ICC Environmental Justice and History Resource Center located at the Newark Public Library through the digitization of videos, collection of oral histories, and organization of other materials related to issues of environmental justice in Newark. ICC will also sponsor a series of public events related to its ongoing work.
Major-2012
The Rule Documentary Film
Renaissance Newark Foundation, Inc. (Newark). Completion of a 90-minute documentary film on the history of Newark Abbey and it school, Saint Benedict’s Prep, exploring its potential to serve as a model for social justice in other inner cities. Film is intended for national PBS broadcast, educational distribution, and use at public events.
Major-2012
Speech and Hate Speech: Conflict Within the First Amendment
1:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Monroe Township Public Library, Monroe Township NJ
Screening and Discussion: Rescuing the River
7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Scotch Plains Public Library, Scotch Plains NJ
Face to Face: Community Conversations
Face to Face: Community Conversations is a community-based discussion program that encourages dialogue on issues central to civic life in New Jersey. This program features film screening/discussion events and supplementary activities that work together to foster and sustain meaningful public conversations.
Created Equal: New Jersey
Through its 2013 Face to Face program initiative – “Created Equal: New Jersey,” the Council will partner with twelve New Jersey communities to explore how the evolving meaning of equality, freedom, and democracy in the United States has shaped local experiences. Each community will host a film screening/discussion event on American civil rights history and collect and display local stories related to that struggle.
How to Apply
The Council is currently seeking partners for its 2013 Face to Face program initiative – “Created Equal: New Jersey.” Interested New Jersey communities are encouraged to apply as soon as possible. The Council will consider any application submitted by a nonprofit organization or public library on or before Monday, July 1. There is no cost to apply or participate in the program.
Please note, there are a limited number of spaces available in the program. The Council is looking to partner with capable and committed project teams, representing a diverse range of communities. If selected, you will receive one of the “Created Equal” films for your library’s permanent collection, marketing support from the Council, and a highly-qualified discussion facilitator. For more information, please contact us at facetoface@njch.org.
Created Equal Film Collection
A small group of moral reformers in the 1830s launched one of the most ambitious social movements imaginable: the immediate emancipation of millions of African Americans held in bondage, at a time when slavery was one of the most powerful economic and political forces in the United States. Produced and directed by Rob Rapley. Sharon Grimberg, executive producer for American Experience, WGBH.
Even as slavery ended in the south after the Civil War, new forms of forced labor kept thousands of African Americans in bondage until the onset of World War II. Based on the 2008 Pulitzer Prize-winning book of the same title by Douglas Blackmon. Produced and directed by Sam Pollard. Catherine Allan, executive producer for Twin Cities Public Television. Douglas A. Blackmon, co-executive producer. A production of TPT National Productions, in association with Two Dollars & A Dream, Inc.
The moving account of Richard and Mildred Loving, who were arrested in 1958 for violating Virginia’s ban on interracial marriage. Their struggle culminated in a landmark Supreme Court decision, Loving v. Virginia (1967) which overturned anti-miscegenation laws in the United States. Directed by Nancy Buirski; produced by Nancy Buirski and Elisabeth Haviland James. A co-production of Augusta Films and HBO Films. Distributed by Icarus Films.
The Freedom Rides of 1961 were a pivotal moment in the long Civil Rights struggle that redefined America. Based on Raymond Arsenault’s recent book, this documentary film offers an inside look at the brave band of activists who challenged segregation in the Deep South. Produced and directed by Stanley Nelson. Mark Samels, executive producer for American Experience, WGBH.
Meet the Scholars
Christopher Fisher
Associate Professor of History, The College of New Jersey
A specialist in twentieth-century American diplomacy, the Cold War, and race politics in the United States, Professor Fisher teaches in the Departments of History and African-American Studies at the College of New Jersey. He has taught various classes on topics in twentieth-century, American diplomatic, and African-American history. He received his doctorate from Rutgers University’s Department of History.
Wayne Glasker
Associate Professor of History, Rutgers-Camden
Wayne Glasker, Associate Professor (BA, Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania) is a specialist in African American and 20th century U.S. history. His fields of expertise include slavery, the Harlem Renaissance, race and ethnicity, and the civil rights movement. Glasker has been a member of the history department since 1991. Dr. Glasker is the author of Black Students in the Ivory Tower: African American Student Activism at the University of Pennsylvania, 1967-1990. He is also a contributor to The Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Routledge, 2005) and a frequent reviewer for Choice Magazine.
Glasker served as the Director of the African American Studies Program from 1998 to 2011. He teaches a graduate colloquium in African American history. He is currently working on a new book about Malcolm X, James Baldwin and the critique of colorblind integration.
Mark Krasovic 
Assistant Professor and Associate Director of the Institute on Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience, Rutgers-Newark
Mark Krasovic received his PhD in American Studies from Yale University in 2008. His research and teaching interests center on the cultural and political history of the modern United States, urban history, and the public humanities. He is currently completing a book manuscript, The Great Society and the Urban Crisis: Newark and the Dilemma of American Liberalism, which examines how the structures of 1960s liberalism – structures that brought together government officials, academics, and local Newarkers in new and complicated ways – confronted the perceived crisis of America’s cities. The manuscript is based on his dissertation, which was the honorable mention finalist for the American Studies Association’s Ralph Henry Gabriel Dissertation Prize. His research has been supported by the Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation and the New Jersey Historical Commission.
Dr. Krasovic also serves as the associate director of the Institute on Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience at Rutgers-Newark, where he was the 2008-2010 Geraldine R. Dodge Postdoctoral Fellow. At the Institute, he has served as the local Newark coordinator for the federal Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, a cosponsor of the “This is Newark!” Public Symposium on Urban Design, a facilitator for the New Jersey Council for the Humanities’ statewide film series, and the co-organizer of the Ironbound Environmental Justice History and Resource Center. He also serves on the executive board of the Newark History Society and the steering committee of the Queer Newark Oral History Project.
Project Supporters
The Council’s 2013 Face to Face program initiative – “Created Equal: New Jersey” has been made possible, in part, by the generous support of:
To support the ongoing work of the Council, click here.
Justice and the Constitution
Jewish Community Center of Middlesex County (Edison)
Two-part lecture series exploring how the U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the Constitution over time with respect to issues of justice.
Mini-2012