Sidonio Ferreira on James Baldwin
Video Summary
Sidonio Ferreira is the special assistant to the vice chancellor for Student Affairs and Campus Life. He's been a member of the UMass community since he was an undergraduate student and has since served in a number of roles on campus. In this video, he describes being a student when James Baldwin was at UMass as a Distinguished Fellow, and the electrifying moments Baldwin created.
Related
1983
James Baldwin joins UMass as a Distinguished Fellow.
Pivotal American novelist, playwright, essayist, poet, and activist, James Baldwin, joined UMass as professor and Distinguished Fellow.
1978
James Baldwin is awarded a UMass honorary doctorate degree.
After novelist James Baldwin's honorary doctorate ceremony in 1978, some attendees gathered to talk with him at the house of Paul Puryear, a political scientist and former UMass provost. During the gathering, the idea of Baldwin teaching at the Five Colleges was brought up for the first time. (via the Massachusetts Collegian) Baldwin would later join UMass as a Distinguished Fellow in 1983.
James Baldwin spent much of his life being told he was too radical—too radical for white critics, too radical to speak at the March on Washington, and too radical for the Ivy leagues. This did not concern him. He “found his kind” at UMass, in the words of his then-personal assistant, Dwight “Skip” Stackhouse.
