Welcome to the spring 2023 edition of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Newsletter for the Department of Theatre, Film, and Media Arts at The Ohio State University! As the summer approaches, we are happy to reflect on our accomplishments and achievements.
But first, congratulations on finishing the 2022-2023 academic year, which marked a period of extraordinary uncertainty and unease. Against the backdrop of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the school year began shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court repealed the landmark decision Roe v. Wade, dismantling 50 years of legal protection and jeopardizing women’s physical and mental health. At the same time, Ohio lawmakers were among a string of state legislators who proposed bills attacking LGBTQ+ rights, especially the rights of transgender youth. Moreover, the recently introduced Ohio Senate Bill 83, titled “The Ohio Higher Education Enhancement Act,” aims to fundamentally restrict the academy’s DEI efforts by—amongst other things—limiting research and teaching about such inequities.
The challenge to extract the possible from the impossible has pushed many of us to grow in new ways. We have adopted more equitable teaching methods, spoke up against injustices, and developed healthy habits and boundaries to safeguard our personal wellbeing.
This edition of the DEI Newsletter celebrates such changes by reflecting on presentations to the department by Matthieu Chapman, Guillermo Avilés-Rodríguez, and Christopher Harris. It also includes a brief interview with Rasel Ahmed, a community-based filmmaker who officially joined the Department of Theatre, Film, and Media Arts as an Assistant Professor at the beginning of the 2022-2023 academic year.
On the subject of film, the department is also delighted to celebrate the former students who are showcasing their work at the 2023 Cinema Columbus Film Festival. Dominique (Nikki) Martinez and Zane Abraham (both Bachelor of Arts in Film Studies, class of 2019) will premiere their feature documentary entitled Duranguito at the Drexel Theatre on April 27. Later that evening at the Drexel, Déja Russell (Bachelor of Arts in Moving-Image Production and Film Studies, class of 2022) will show her senior project film entitled Finding Eclosion.
We are also happy to share some new resources as we recharge and begin looking ahead to the 2023-2024 academic year. Among others, these include links to op-eds and articles about teaching neurodivergent students, the socio-emotional impact of mispronouncing “unpracticed” names, and the call for universities to move beyond apologies and toward restitution and repair for their historical complicity in slavery and colonization.
As ever, the DEI Committee welcomes your input and contributions for future installments of this newsletter. For it to act as a co-created resource that benefits—and reflects—all of us, it needs to be a resource that creates a community in which everyone can be heard and seen. If you are planning or participating in a DEI-related event, have news to announce or accomplishments to celebrate, or know of resources that should be shared with the department, please tell the committee about it by filling out this anonymous form or by emailing the committee chair John Brooks at brooks.1310@osu.edu.