Chaminade University is pleased to announce that Allison Paynter, PhD is one of a select group of faculty members nationwide chosen by the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC) and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History to participate in a special American history seminar on “Slave Narratives.” The multidisciplinary seminar for faculty members in history, English, and related fields will use the slave narratives—as well as some other assigned secondary reading—to comprehend the lived experience of slaves themselves in the transition from bondage to freedom. From a pool of 66 highly competitive nominations, 27 faculty members were selected to participate in the seminar, which will be held at Yale University June 19–24, 2016.
In announcing the selection of participants, CIC President Richard Ekman said, “Strengthening the teaching of American history at colleges and universities is of critical importance. This seminar will provide a great opportunity for participating faculty members to gain a better understanding of the experience of emancipation and the 19th century events that were so important in shaping our world today. We believe that Dr. Allison Paynter will play a strong role in the seminar.”
David W. Blight, Class of 1954 Professor of American History at Yale University, will lead the seminar. Seminar participants will examine both antebellum and postbellum narratives. The seminar is generously funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. For more information, visit the CIC website at www.cic.edu/AmericanHistory.
About Allison E. Paynter, PhD
Allison E. Paynter, PhD is an associate professor of English at Chaminade University. She has served as chair of the English department from 2006-2009 and was instrumental in re-formulating the curriculum. Gender, ethnicity, poetry and dance are recurring themes in her various guest lectures and published articles. As an engaged professor, she teaches the craft of writing to undergraduates every year in her classes and fosters a sense of why good writing is important, through classes that are designed to be both fun and challenging. Believing that the spoken word is as important as the written word, she is a performance poet who performs at many venues in Hawaii. She also is the facilitator for Aulama, Chaminade University’s student literary journal. Her chapter on black female writers in the 19th century marketplace will appear in the upcoming literary anthology, Imag(in)ing America: The Black Body in Literature.