Author Archives: museummark

Cindy Claure-Veizaga has created this guide to online resources about Barry Farm in Anacostia, Ward 8. Washington DC. This serves as a supplement to the student-authored website, Southeast Voices: History and Memory in Barry Farms, Ward 8 (Holding on to Home: The Untold Story of Barry Farm) See all student-authored online community research exhibits forContinue reading “Guide to online resources about Barry Farm”

My students Isabella (“Izzy”) Bradbury and Nadia Liban at American University have created two works of expressive art honoring“Atwai” (Deceased) Pochahsquinest Bassett, (1936-1968). Izzy created the multimedia collage piece “At Last!” and Nadia wrote a poem, “I can still see the stars.” We hope this page will serve as a resource for others learning aboutContinue reading “Artwork by Izzy Bradbury and a Poem by Nadia Liban, honoring Atwai Bassett”

During Fall 2025, students in Dr. Mark Auslander’s Race and Racism course (American University) undertook small group community research projects, exploring the dynamics of racism, anti-racism, resilience, and resistance in our immediate environs. Many students were deeply concerned by current efforts to reshape historical memory in museums, including the Smithsonian museums. Others partnered with friendsContinue reading “Community Research Projects (Race and Racism, ANTH 210), Fall 2025 American University”

Overview: During Fall 2025, students in Dr. Mark Auslander’s “Global Studies and Cross Cultural Analysis” course (ANTH205), at the University of Southern California’s Capital Campus (Washington DC) pursued research projects on objects of exchange (primarily international exchange) that have come to rest in the nation’s capital. As a class, we have been especially interested inContinue reading “Objects in Motion: Student Anthropology Projects (USC Capital Campus, Fall 2025)”

This weekend (November 21-23) the Umbrella Art Fair (International Square, 1850 K Street, NW Washington DC) features a dazzling installation presented by the Capital Hill Boys Club Intergenerational Gallery. The project emerges out of the celebrated National Gallery of Art exhibition, Afro Atlantic Histories, April 10 – July 17, 2022https://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/afro-atlantic-histories which originated in a majorContinue reading “Remixing Zanele Muholi’s Ntozakhe II: The Echos Project of the Capital Hill Boys Club of Anacostia DC”

Recently, my USC-Capital Campus students and I visited the Capital Hill Boys Club Intergernational Art Gallery at 16th and Marion Barry Avenue, SE in Washington DC’s Ward 8. (We had been inspired by Elizabeth O’Gorek’s excellent article, “A Hub For Artists: Capital Hill Boys Club Art Gallery” (East of the River) July 16, 2025https://eastoftheriverdcnews.com/2025/07/16/a-hub-for-artists-capital-hill-boys-club-art-gallery/) WeContinue reading “Celebrating the Murals at the Capital Hill Boys Club Gallery”

by Ellen Schattschneider and Mark Auslander We just read Christie Thompson’s delightful interview with L.M. Bogad (author of “Tactical Performance: The Theory and Practice of Serious Play”) on the long political tradition of absurdist protest and “tactical frivolity” that is exemplified by the Portland Frog Brigade, Operation Inflation, and the other dancing costumed frogs andContinue reading “Amphibious Assaults: Why are Dancing Protest Frogs “Good to Think”?”

My students and I have been pondering a fascinating line in the September 1749 will of Richard Bennett III, who died in Queen Anne’s County, Maryland, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore: Bennett wills to Ann Bell (actually Beall), whom he identifies as “a little girl that lives with me under the care of her aunt theContinue reading ““I give and bequeath to said Ann Beall, the negro girl Bettey that plays with her”: Slavery, Sentimental Kinship, and Slow Violence in British Colonial America, 1749”

What do we know of the Peggy, the slave ship that transported 144 enslaved Africans from The Windward Coast in West Africa in 1770, evidently selling scores of them in the port of Georgetown, Prince George’s County, Maryland, which three decades later became part of the District of Columbia? It would appear that the PeggyContinue reading “The slave ship Peggy in Georgetown Port [DC], 1770”

Building on research by Lisa Fager of the Black Georgetown Foundation and staff members at Dumbarton House, my students and I are researching the life and legacy of Grace (Gracy) Ann Duckett, born c. 1791 in Maryland, deceased July 28, 1874 in Georgetown, District of Columbia. Gracy appears to have spent the majority of herContinue reading “In Search of Grace (“Gracy”) Ann Duckett, c. 1791-1874, enslaved by Samuel and Lydia Whitall of Georgetown”