Temple University Libraries are thrilled to participate in Archives Month Philly, a first-ever programming initiative organized by the Delaware Valley Archivists Group. This month-long festival, timed to coincide with American Archives Month, will kick off in Paley Library on Tuesday, October 1 at 3PM with Live from the Collections: In and Out of Poetry. The program features readings by poets Lyn Lifshin, Elaine Terranova, Daniel Scott Snelson and will be followed by a roundtable discussion moderated by Matthew Kalasky, director of the Nicola Midnight St. Claire, a critical voice in Philadelphia. The poets will read their own works, and works from the Libraries’ archives and discuss the process and performance of poetry.

Catch us again at the Lantern Slide Salon, taking place 6PM on October 1 at the Wagner Free Institute of Science. The salon highlights the historic lantern slide collections of some of the region’s most significant cultural and educational institutions, including Temple University Libraries. Other participants: The Athenaeum of Philadelphia, Independence Seaport Museum, Morris Arboretum, Swarthmore College Peace Collection, Temple University Special Collections and Research Center, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, and the Wagner Free Institute of Science.

Find out more about the initiative and programs at archivesmonthphilly.com

What is it about Walt Whitman that keeps us wondering? His intrigue goes so far beyond those iconic poems, like Leaves of Grass, that great work of American literature and innovation. He is a, poet, iconoclast, voice of democracy, voice of dissent, queer writer, and American celebrity.

On Thursday we’ll mark National Library Week and National Poetry month by pondering Whitman’s long-reaching legacy with David Haven Blake and Michael Robertson, two professors of English at the College of New Jersey. Katherine Henry, professor of English here at Temple, will ask questions and guide the conversation.

Both Haven Blake and Robertson consider not just Whitman’s poetry, but his cultural legacy, as well. The scholars are co-editors of Walt Whitman, Where the Future Becomes Present (University of Iowa Press, 2008). The book invigorates Whitman studies by garnering insights from a diverse group of writers and intellectuals. Writing from the perspectives of art history, political theory, creative writing, and literary criticism, the contributors place Whitman in the center of both world literature and American public life.

Blake is also the author of Walt Whitman and the Culture of American Celebrity (Yale University Press, 2006). Robertson is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships and author of Worshipping Walt: The Whitman Disciples (Princeton UP, 2008).

Join us for the conversation

Thursday, April 18, 3:30 pm, Paley Library Lecture Hall

On Thursday, March 7 the Center for the Humanities at Temple’s series on Digital Humanities, co-sponsored by Temple University Libraries, will continue at the CHAT lounge in Gladfelter Hall. Kathleen Fitzpatrick, professor of Media Studies at Pomona College and Director of Scholarly Communications at the MLA will discuss “The Humanities in and for the Digital Age.” Dr. Fitzpatrick will address how digital technologies have rapidly changed the landscape of scholarly publishing, and how they have equally changed the ways that scholars themselves engage with their work. This talk explores a few of those changes as they have begun to affect the humanities, including the new roles being played by scholarly societies in today’s communication environment.

Envisioning Emancipation, by Deborah Willis and Barbara Krauthamer and published by Temple University Press, is quickly gaining attention as an important and innovative text on the power of photography in the journey to emancipation. In this pioneering book, the authors have amassed 150 photographs—some never before published—from the antebellum days of the 1850s through the New Deal era of the 1930s. They vividly display the seismic impact of emancipation on African Americans born before and after the Proclamation, providing a perspective on freedom and slavery and a way to understand the photos as documents of engagement, action, struggle, and aspiration.

Press coverage has included extensive write ups by the New York Times Lens blog to an interview and photogallery on CNN.com. Among those to laud the book’s efforts are Thelma Golden, the chief curator and director of the Studio Museum of Harlem and reviewers at Publisher’s Weekly.

Krauthamer and Willis will be on campus for a book talk, signing and reception on Friday, February 8. The program takes place at 3PM in the Great Court of Mitten Hall (1931 N. Broad Street).

The Libraries are now finalizing our spring public programming “Beyond the Page” series. Once again this semester’s talks, panels, lectures, and programs explore the “American Idea.” The series kicks off on Friday, February 8 at the Great Court in Mitten Hall with a book talk by Deborah Willis and Barbara Krauthamer on their recent publication, Envisioning Emancipation. Other programs include conversations on American main streets, American drinking traditions, and a special National Library Week program on Walt Whitman, American Icon. We will also have exhibitions on civil rights activist and Philadelphia hero, Father Paul Washington (at the Blockson Collection) and American Poetry (at Paley Library).

Here’s all of what we’ve got to offer this spring:

Spring 2013 Public Programs

• Envisioning Emancipation: A Book Talk and Signing With Deb Willis and Barbara Krauthamer

February 8, 3:00 PM, Mitten Hall, Great Court, 1913 N. Broad Street

In their pioneering book, Envisioning Emancipation, renowned photographic historian Deborah Willis and historian of slavery Barbara Krauthamer have amassed 150 photographs—some never before published—from the antebellum days of the 1850s through the New Deal era of the 1930s. The authors vividly display the seismic impact of emancipation on African Americans born before and after the Proclamation, providing a perspective on freedom and slavery and a way to understand the photos as documents of engagement, action, struggle and aspiration. Envisioning Emancipation illustrates what freedom looked like for black Americans in the Civil War era. From photos of the enslaved on plantations and African American soldiers and camp workers in the Union Army to Juneteenth celebrations, slave reunions and portraits of black families and workers in the American South, the images in this book challenge perceptions of slavery. They show not only what the subjects emphasized about themselves but also the ways Americans of all colors and genders opposed slavery and marked its end. Filled with powerful images of lives too often ignored or erased from historical records, Envisioning Emancipationprovides a new perspective on American culture.

•  On American Main Streets: A Conversation with Miles Orvell and Sandy Sorlien

February 21, 2:30 PM, Paley Library Lecture Hall 1210 Polett Walk

What is an American Main Street? Is it a memory or image that has been perpetuated through American writing and art? A real space within new urbanist town planning? Or is it a place where some are welcome and others are shunned? Perhaps it is all of the above. Join us to examine these real and imagined notions of American main streets with Miles Orvell and Sandy Sorlien. Orvell is the author of The Death and Life of Main Street: Small Towns in American Memory, Space, and Community (University of North Carolina Press 2012) and professor of English and American studies at Temple. In 2009, he received the Bode-Pearson Prize for lifetime achievement, awarded by the American Studies Association. Sorlien is the author of Fifty Houses: Images from the American Road (Johns Hopkins 2002), and is finishing a book about Main Streets in America with the working title The Heart of Town.

Annual Women’s History Program at the Blockson Collection

• Women Activists in Philadelphia: From Civil Rights to Black Power

March 7, 3:00 PM, Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection, Sullivan Hall, 1330 Polett Walk

Celebrate Women’s History Month at the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection’s annual program honoring women who have changed history. This year’s presenters and honorees include veterans of the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements, all of whom reside in Philadelphia. Join us as these women share their moving and powerful stories about their roles as activists.

• Drinking History: How Beverages have Changed America

March 26, 3:30 PM, Paley Library Lecture Hall, 1210 Polett Walk What is American drink? Is it warmed-over traditional British beverages, such as tea and ale? Or is it versions of ethnic beverages brought by successive waves of immigrants—sangria, tequila, bubble tea? Or is it the fiercely marketed creations of America’s beverage industry—Kool-Aid, Snapple, Coors, Coca-Cola? Andrew F. Smith, author of the just released Drinking History: 15 Turning Points in the Making of American Beverages (Columbia University Press) will discuss how beverages have changed American history and how Americans have invented, adopted, modified, and commercialized tens of thousands of beverages. Involved in their creation and promotion were entrepreneurs and environmentalists, bartenders and bottlers, politicians and lobbyists, organized and unorganized criminals, German and Italian immigrants, advertisers and consumers, prohibitionists and medical professionals, and everyday Americans in love with their brew.

• Walt Whitman: An American Icon

April 18, 3:30 PM, Paley Library Lecture Hall, 1210 Polett Walk

Walt Whitman’s legacy—iconoclast, celebrity, and the father of American poetry—is unparalleled in its influence on American writing and culture. Join David Haven Blake and Michael Robertson, professors of English at The College of New Jersey (TCNJ) and co-editors of Walt Whitman, Where the Future Becomes Present to discuss the impact that Whitman has had on American culture—an impact that reaches far beyond his influence on poetry. Blake is also the chair of the English Department at TCNJ, and author of Walt Whitman and the Culture of American Celebrity. Robertson is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships and author of the award-winning book Worshipping Walt: The Whitman Disciples (Princeton UP, 2008). This program will be moderated by Katherine Henry, associate professor of English at Temple.

This program takes place during National Library Week. Join us, and celebrate Temple’s Libraries!

• Annual Library Prize for Undergraduate Research and Library Prize for Undergraduate Research on Sustainability and the Environment Awards Ceremony

May 2, 4:00 PM, Paley Library Lecture Hall

Please join us as we celebrate the best in undergraduate research at the annual awards ceremony for Library Prizes. This year’s winners will present their research, and afterwards, we will celebrate their tremendous accomplishments. Join us to finish the semester with our signature program at Paley Library.

• Annual Juneteenth Celebration: Honoring Father Paul Washington Day

June 19, 3:00 PM, Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection, Sullivan Hall, 1330 Polett Walk

Join us to celebrate the life and legacy of Father Paul Washington on Juneteenth, the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States.  Father Washington, the rector of the Church of the Advocate in North Philadelphia from 1962 until he accepted emeritus status in 1987, is part of the legacy of resistance and perseverance symbolized in the history Juneteenth.  Washington was a consistent voice in defense of the disenfranchised. He served on the city’s Human Relations Commission for seven years beginning in 1964, opened his church to the first Black Power Convention in 1968, ordained 11 women to the Episcopalian priesthood against the standard rules of the church in 1974 and has been called “he high priest of the progressive movement in Philadelphia.”

Upcoming and Ongoing Programs

• Chat in the Stacks

Co-Sponsored Programs

The Libraries support a number of additional lectures, forums, and symposia across campus every semester, helping to build dialogues across campus.

Spring 2013 Exhibitions

At Paley Library

• Some American Poetry

This spring the Special Collections Research Center explores 20th century alternative and small press American poetry as told through the many archival and rare book collections in its holdings. This journey through American verse begins with Philadelphia-region forefathers Walt Whitman and Edgar Allen Poe.  Highlighting the works of Lyn Lishfin, the trailblazer known as the “Queen of the Small Presses;” Hawaiian Tony Quagliano, author of such sharp-tongued missives on language such as Semiotic Self-Deconstruction and Get Out of Poetry by Sundown; New York Poet’s Cooperative member John Burnette Payne; and Philadelphia-native-turned-West-Coast-vanguard Dottie Grossman, the exhibition will also feature regional poets and editors Louis McKee, Joe Farley, Jessie Sampler, and Robert Abrahams.

At the Blockson Collection

• The Legacy Father Paul Washington

Father Paul Washington was a champion for the oppressed.  This exhibition features items from Father Paul Washington’s collection housed in the Blockson Collection that chronicle his legacy.

Take a visit to Paley Library Lecture Hall at 4PM on Thursday, November 29, and join in the conversation on The American Idea of Museums.

This talk will examine the history of American museums and the way that two local institutions, the Barnes Foundation and the Wagner Free Institute of Science, both carry on and move forward the purpose and function of contemporary museums.

Panel speakers are The Ohio State University’s Steven Conn, Susan Glassman of the Wagner Free Institute of Science in Philadelphia and the Barnes Foundation’s Blake Bradford. This program will be moderated by Kenneth Finkel, distinguished lecturer in the Department of American Studies.