Inspired by Past Mass Movements, UMass Amherst’s Feinberg Family Distinguished Lecture Series Explores Revolutionary Visions of the Future

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AMHERST, Mass. – This fall, the University of Massachusetts Amherst history department’s Feinberg Series will host more than a dozen major public events featuring nationally and internationally renowned scholars and movement leaders speaking on the theme “Another World Is Possible: Revolutionary Visions, Past and Present.” Series events will explore the radical imaginations of social movements and everyday people who have worked toward creating a new world.

The series kicks off Thursday, Sept. 6 at 6 p.m. in Mahar Auditorium with a panel titled “Reawakening the Black Radical Imagination,” featuring three prominent voices from the resurgent black freedom struggle of recent years in the United States: Mary Hooks of Southerners on New Ground, Kali Akuno of Cooperation Jackson, and Princeton University Professor Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, author of From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation.

The series keynote on Sept. 20 at 6 p.m. will feature the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. Barber’s address will put the struggle against economic injustice in the historical context of the 1968 Poor People’s Campaign led by Martin Luther King, Jr., before his assassination. Tickets are free and available online, by phone or at the Fine Arts Center Box Office.

“For so many, ‘1968’ stands out during a particularly tumultuous period as a moment with which we are still trying to come to terms,” says assistant professor Toussaint Losier of the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies. “Through this year’s lecture series, particularly the keynote address, we’re going to learn from how those at the forefront of some of today’s most dynamic struggles about how the past shapes our collective political imagination, our sense of what is possible.”

Other events will explore revolutionary movements in El Salvador ( Sept. 13) and Venezuela (Oct. 17), utopian movements in New England and Israel (Oct. 1), feminism and domestic work in the U.S. (Nov. 1), “radical” movements that have oppressed rather than liberated people (Nov. 5), the role of science fiction in movements for social change (Nov. 13), and enslaved people’s visions of emancipation (Nov. 27). Several additional workshops and a semester-long course for K-12 educators will offer opportunities to discuss series themes in smaller groups and apply historical lessons to classrooms and diverse other settings.

Hosted by the UMass Amherst history department, the series commemorates the 50th anniversary of the mass upheavals of 1968. History professor Sigrid Schmalzer, a co-chair of the series planning team, says that the series looks to history with an eye to issues facing the world right now. “From climate change to white supremacism to the threat of nuclear war, the future of our society feels increasingly uncertain. But history is filled with precarious situations and uphill battles, and social movements around the world have faced those challenges and dared to envision new worlds based on equity and justice. We have a lot to learn from how they have imagined the future – and how they have worked to create it.”

UMass historian and series co-chair Kevin Young says that the events are intended to examine potential solutions, not just problems. “Those who criticize the status quo are invariably met with the questions: ‘I know what you’re against, but what are you for?’ or ‘I know things are bad, but what are the alternatives?’ In fact, history’s dissidents have proposed a wide range of alternative policies and institutions, but most of those alternatives have been repressed and lost to our collective memory. Some of the alternatives were democratic and egalitarian, others ugly and oppressive, and some a mix of both. Now more than ever, we must recover and learn from those histories.”

The series borrows its title from a phrase used by Zapatista rebels in southern Mexico, and many others: “another world is possible.” Activists in the more distant past were often guided by the same belief: that alternatives to an unjust status quo were both conceivable and achievable. As they struggled to survive in the face of tyranny and oppression, many also fought to develop new revolutionary systems based on principles like equity, autonomy, inclusiveness, and environmental sustainability.

The biannual Feinberg Family Distinguished Lecture Series is made possible through the generosity of UMass alumnus Kenneth R. Feinberg and associates. Each series focuses on a pressing contemporary issue in historical perspective. The previous series on mass incarceration was attended by several thousand western Massachusetts residents. Brian Ogilvie, professor and chair of the history department says, “As historians, we are uniquely positioned to bring a long-term perspective to burning contemporary issues in politics, law, political economy, and social justice.”

The Feinberg Series is offered in collaboration with more than 40 community and university partners.

All events are free and open to the public. Media interviews with participants are available upon request.

For a complete schedule of events see https://www.umass.edu/history/feinberg-series.