Friday, February 8, 4-6:30pm, The Ohio State University Faculty Club [North Dining Room (second floor)], 181 S. Oval Dr.

Activist and University of Virginia Professor Jalane Schmidt and organizer Grace Aheron will share their experiences as influencers in the efforts to organize resistance to the white supremacist Unite the Right Rally that occurred in Charlottesville, Virginia on August 11 and 12, 2017. Highlighted across international news outlets, August 11 and 12 were more than just two days, they were the result of centuries-long white supremacy building power in that town and across the nation. As part of the resistance efforts, Schmidt and Aheron will share lessons learned from organizing in Charlottesville, focusing on next steps for their communities and for the nation, particularly for communities of faith.

• Jalane Schmidt (University of Virginia) writes, “My research and teaching are focused upon African diaspora religions of the Caribbean and Latin America, and particularly festivity and ritual. I teach courses which consider the effects of colonization and the slave trade upon religious practice in the Americas. In my book project on 20th-century Cubans’ devotion to their patron saint, I examine religious, racial, and cultural hybridity in the Americas by interpreting the national expansion of this popular cult. In my emerging research, I am investigating how the history of slavery is performed in spirit-possession rituals and expressed in material culture. Particularly, I am concerned with how contemporary mediums describe heightened sensory perception as a means for navigating traumatic emotional terrain.”

• Grace Aheron (Charlottesville, VA) is a Queer, multi-racial Southerner born and raised in Southwestern Virginia. She spent the past five years organizing and building community in Charlottesville, Virginia. Currently, she is a student at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. She is passionate about moving white people and faith communities into action against white supremacy.

Admission to this event is free and open to the public.

Sponsored by OSU Center for the Study of Religion, 614-688-8010.