Chesterton Perspectives brings you:

Singing the Blues: A Moral Alternative to Vengeance and Apathy?

A conversation with Angel Adams Parham, Associate Professor of Sociology and senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture (IASC) at the University of Virginia

November 11, 2024
7:30 pm EST in person at 111 The Knoll Rd
7:45 pm EST via Zoom

Register Here

Many of America’s most tense public battles over the last decade hinge on disputes about rival readings of history. Yet we have irreconcilable accounts of what happened and why, let alone who is responsible and how to move forward. These historical stalemates foster an increasingly polarized culture.

But what if our disputes brought together not only what we think happened in the past, but how and why we choose to remember it? A fuller exploration uncovers the way history is shaped by our moral imagination, bringing together emotions such as anger and optimism. As a sociologist and trenchant commenter on the ways social communities shape their own stories, Angel Adams Parham looks to a deeper vision of history that goes beyond simplistic stories.

Could we “sing the blues” as Angel Adams Parham phrases it? A different way of understanding history could help us move forward in hope without forgetting the sins of our past.

Angel Adams Parham; Associate Professor of Sociology and Senior Fellow, Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia

Angel Adams Parham is Associate Professor of Sociology, senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture, and Associate Director for the major in Political and Social Thought at the University of Virginia. Through her research in historical sociology, she engages in inquiry that examines the past in order to better understand how to live well in the present and envision wisely for the future. Her first book, American Routes: Racial Palimpsests and the Transformation of Race (Oxford, 2017), received several awards. Her latest book, co-authored with Anika Prather, was published in 2022 and is entitled The Black Intellectual Tradition: Reading Freedom in Classical Literature. Parham has published articles on the intersection of Black writers and classical liberal education in popular outlets including the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Public Discourse, Comment Magazine, The Hedgehog Review, and Common Good Magazine. Her work finds expression in the community in her capacity as the co-founder and executive director of Nyansa Classical Community, an educational organization which provides curricula and programming designed to connect with students from diverse backgrounds, inviting them to take part in the Great Conversation, cultivate the moral imagination, and pursue truth, goodness, and beauty. Parham has been a member of the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, as well as the recipient of a Fulbright grant. She received her bachelor’s degree from Yale University and completed her doctoral work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.