Book Friday!

The graduate population of the CPA has been increasingly interested in fostering a continuous intellectual community that extends past the summer conference, with the proposed Book Friday Reboot as a key means of doing so. The thought is that CPA graduate students can take the helm in planning Book Fridays, and shift the priority to diving deep into the text through group discussions. While there still will be an effort made to invite authors into the space to speak to their work, the group’s overall goal is to offer a space where graduate students and junior scholars can come together to talk about Caribbean Philosophy and Thought in a cordial community. The group will select which texts they read from the newly published books the CPA advertises on their socials in an attempt to support and uplift the contemporary work being done in the field.

Who is encouraged to attend?

We are particularly keen on acting as a community space for junior scholars (namely graduate students and early career faculty) but of course others are welcome to enter the space and participate! The most appropriate time for non junior faculty to participate though, would be on days when we invite authors to come speak to the group. 

Group Ethic: The graduate reboot of Book Fridays prioritizes deep engagement with texts and ideas in a collegial space. Participants are not expected to be experts in the texts being read. The only requirement for participation in the group is to come with curiosity and an interest in sharing thoughts together. To promote a space where graduate students can think through texts together, each reading will be split between two months. The first engagement with the reading will take place in a low pressure environment with only the reading group participants present. In these first engagement sessions, participants can also make time to prepare and refine questions that they would like to ask the authors together. The second engagement with the text will take place with a visit from the author(s), where participants will have the space to ask questions and hold an informed dialogue.

RSVP: https://forms.gle/BAnhJEZh9HzZeBEY7

More Info + Proposed Schedule:  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kqmK6aSoK1EIDzZxUuEhpvPCcW7DzojFBsGzCEBezf4/edit?usp=sharing

Point People: Gwendalynn Roebke (roebkeg@sas.upenn.edu), Ale Gutiérrez (agutierrez01@tamu.edu), and Teresa Fazan (teresa.fazan@gmail.com)