Since our school’s inception, the Humanities Department at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics has played a critical role in fulfilling our school’s mission to cultivate informed, empathetic, and engaged citizens and leaders who will work for the betterment of the world. NCSSM Humanities regularly sponsors events—including film screenings, art exhibitions, and guest speakers—that invite students, faculty, staff, and members of our communities to engage with diverse voices and explore the ways that the humanities are essential to our mission and to the future of our world.
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2022-2023 EVENTS
The NCSSM Fine Arts and Humanities Departments are honored to partner with Hidden Voices and the North Carolina Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty to present a series of events meant to foster conversation and understanding about the lived experiences of people affected by the death penalty in the United States and to place North Carolina’s modern death penalty within the context of 400 years of history.
HIGHLIGHTS FROM PREVIOUS EVENTS
Community Building events
The “Amplify!” project featured photographic images of NCSSM students and graduates who voted for the first time in the election of 2018 or in 2020. It also included excerpts from conversations with students about their views on voting, why their voice matters and their visions for the future. The portraits were displayed at NCSSM, outdoors in Alley 26, and in the lobby of Durham City Hall—the physical hub of municipal government and were unveiled as a part of Third Friday Downtown on October 19, 2018.
Building Coalitions for Positive Change was a virtual event focused on how communities can create a more just future. Featuring a keynote address by Madame Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (2011 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and former President of Liberia), a question-and-answer period, and a panel discussion with community leaders, the event explored how, together, we might bring about systemic change to build a better world.
film Screenings
On January 10, 2019, NCSSM hosted a screening of the Wilmington on Fire, a documentary that chronicles the Wilmington Massacre of 1898. After the screening, Mike Williams, the director of the Black on Black Project, moderated a panel discussion with director Christopher Everett and artist Anthony Patterson. The Wilmington Massacre of 1898 was a bloody attack on the African-American community by a heavily armed white mob with the support of the North Carolina Democratic Party on November 10, 1898 in the port city of Wilmington, North Carolina.
On October 9, 2018, director Frederick Murphy joined us for a special screening and discussion about his award-winning documentary, The American South As We Know It. The film explores the lives and experiences of African-Americans during the Jim Crow era. This film depicts a time when racial tension was at its peak. The educators, historians and brave "everyday" people featured in this documentary, express their vested interest in creating a comprehensive narrative of what life was like for African- Americans in the south.
art exhibits
