Black Space Ep. 8: Dr. Sonya Donaldson

Dr. Sonya Donaldson

Creator of of digital humanities project, Singing the Nation.

JCTC’S TALK SERIES ‘BLACK SPACE’ WITH ASHLEY NICOLE BAPTISTE CONTINUES WITH PROFESSOR AT NEW JERSEY CITY UNIVERSITY AND CREATOR OF DIGITAL HUMANITIES PROJECT, SINGING THE NATION,  Dr. SONYA DONALDSON, NEXT ON NOVEMBER 18th  @8:00pm EST

Baptiste, an actor and a veteran youth theatre educator with the JCTC Youth Theatre and the Stories of Greenville initiative, “I want to create an intentional virtual space where Black artists from around the world can come together and have a human-to-human exchange about art, race and life,” she says. “This series is about expansion, and pushing past preconceived notions of blackness.”

Baptiste's next guest is Dr. Sonya Donaldson. Sonya Donaldson is Associate Professor of English at New Jersey City University, where she teaches World Literature, African Diasporic Literatures, and Hip Hop. She is the creator of the digital humanities project, Singing the Nation, an archive of performances of James Weldon Johnson’s “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” In addition to her digital humanities project, Donaldson is also completing a book manuscript, Irreconcilable Differences?: Memory, History, and the Echoes of Diaspora, which examines autobiographical narratives, music, and performances by Black writers and artists in Germany, the U.K., and the USA. She was a recipient of a Mellon Career Enhancement Junior Faculty Fellowship, a Virginia Humanities Fellowship, and was a Visiting Scholar at the University of Virginia’s Scholars Lab. Donaldson is also the former Technology Editor at Black Enterprise magazine, and completed stints at Inc. magazine, Ziff-Davis publications, and the L.A. Daily News. Her scholarly work has appeared in Callaloo, The Feminist Wire, African and Black Diaspora: An International Journal, and Women, Gender, and Families of Color. She serves on the advisory board of the Black German Heritage and Research Association.

You can follow her at:

Twitter: @sunnygrrrl

Instagram: @sunnygrrl

DH Project: http://singingthenation.com 

Digital Black Atlantic Essay: https://dhdebates.gc.cuny.edu/read/the-digital-black-atlantic/section/b5c2c6f7-c1a2-4645-8cf7-9d5cc70aa019#ch02

 The conversation is taking place Thursday, November 18th at 8:00pm EST; FB Live and Zoom webinar

Webinar Link: 

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82593617154?pwd=RWtTckZlbDhXZldvMVFqQVpLd2hLUT09

Meeting ID: 825 9361 7154  | Passcode: 409141

“As our city gentrifies while retaining its diversity, and indeed as the world is changing in fundamental ways, being right in the middle of these conversations is essential,” says JCTC’s artistic director, Olga Levina. “For us as a theatre company dedicated to sparking conversations that lead to deeper respect and understanding, we know we need to create a safe place to listen and learn and collaborate.”