Racial Justice, Civic Engagement, and Misrepresentations of History: a CCE Book Club

This winter term, CCE AmeriCorps VISTAs Jilly dos Santos and Tenzin Dorjee along with AFC AmeriCorps VISTA Lizzie Friesen invite you to join a 4-week-long, fully funded book club on A More Beautiful and Terrible History: The Uses and Misuses of Civil Rights History as part of the Center for Community Engagement’s participation in AmeriCorps’ MLK Day of Service. We chose this book because it focuses on the dangerous distortions of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s and other civil rights leaders’ legacies and it provides a framework for understanding the complex history of racial justice in America.

Our goal is to hold thoughtful discussions on topics like whitewashing, secularization, and capitalist appropriation so that participants can more critically engage in anti-racist community engagement. We want participants to ask themselves, what really was MLK’s philosophy on civic engagement? How do my efforts (to be anti-racist, to promote fair housing, to fight against wage inequality, etc) support that philosophy or contradict it? What can I do with this information?
We will meet over Zoom to discuss these questions and more each Thursday 5pm-6pm EST starting Thursday, January 21st! Participants will receive each week’s topic and discussion questions in advance of each meeting. This winter term workshop is possible thanks to support from the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, the Anderson Freeman Resource Center and the Charles P. Scott Center for Spiritual and Religious Life.
How to Get Your Free Book: Fill out our registration form and indicate whether you want to receive a free physical book, eBook, or audiobook. While space is limited to 20 participants, there is no deadline to register. If we have open spots in weeks 2, 3 and 4, you are welcome to register and join us. Due to shipping constraints, participants outside of the US/US territories and participants who register after 10am EST on 1/18 must choose to receive either a free eBook or audiobook, which can be accessed from any computer or smartphone. Digital Kindle/Audible files will be delivered by 1/18 while physical copies will take 2-5 days from 1/18 in shipping. To mitigate this discrepancy, we will email all participants on 1/18 with a PDF of the first 10% of the book as is allowed by fair use and copyright laws. If you are a Middlebury alum, family member or community member, please contact us to be placed on our waitlist. For that and any other questions or comments, email jdossantos@middlebury.edu or tndorjee@middlebury.edu.
This workshop is synchronous, once weekly. Each session lasting 1 hour, Eastern standard time.