IOWA CITY, IA — In partnership with the Obermann Center and the Iowa City Public Library, the School of Library and Information Sciences is hosting several speaking events with Georgia Tech Associate Professor, André Brock, an Ida Cordelia Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor.

Brock is an Associate Professor at the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech, and is an interdisciplinary scholar with an MA in English and Rhetoric from Carnegie Mellon University and a PhD in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His scholarship includes published articles on racial representations in videogames, Black women and weblogs, whiteness, blackness, and digital technoculture, as well as groundbreaking research on Black Twitter. His article “From the Blackhand Side: Twitter as a Cultural Conversation” challenged social science and communication research to confront the ways in which the field preserved “a color-blind perspective on online endeavors by normalizing Whiteness and othering everyone else” and sparked a conversation that continues, as Twitter, in particular, continues to evolve.

September 20, 2023:  Black Online Culture, Blackfishing, and Digital Blackface and Welcoming Reception for Dr. André Brock, an Ida Cordelia Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor

• At the Iowa City Public Library, from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

Please join us in welcoming Dr. André Brock with a reception at the Iowa City Public Library the day before his talk on campus. There will be a talk by Dr. Brock at 6:00pm, followed by a reception at the library at 7:00 p.m. Food & beverages will be provided: light appetizers, dessert, nonalcoholic beverages.

September 21, 2023: Dr. André Brock, A Mode of Black Life: Afro-Optimism and the Black Digital, Ida Cordelia Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor Lecture

• At the Iowa Memorial Union, Black Box Theater from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.

What are the possibilities of Black life beyond liberation, resistance, and oppression? This talk draws upon antiblackness, Black indigeneity, libidinal economy, and science and technology studies to offer a compelling alternative: Afro-Optimism, or the manner in which Black folk build resources to thrive, not just survive, using examples from evocations of Black culture and the Black mundane on Twitter.

Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to attend all University of Iowa-sponsored events. If you are a person with a disability who requires a reasonable accommodation in order to participate in this program, please contact Katie McCullough in advance at (319) 384-1538.