Presented in partnership with the Newport Middle Passage Port Marker Project, Dr. Barros Gomes will explore how the dynamics underlying the fundamental gendered/raced/sexual relationships that were created under colonialism exist in the same form in global patriarchal capitalism and pop culture, including mainstream music and pornography. She will also explore contemporary Black feminist literature which critiques foundational Black feminist thought on this subject. In an effort to bridge the two, she will analyze media representations of the Black female body in the context of human rights and sexual rights, as this offers global and historical perspective without minimizing the agency of those whose bodies have historically been exploited for profit.

Dr. Akeia de Barros Gomes is the Curator of Social History at the New Bedford Whaling Museum where she is responsible for curation of exhibitions, exhibit installation, historical research related to exhibitions, publications, lectures, symposia, collections guides, interpretive public programs and public outreach. She has documented and done archaeological work on Native American, African American, and Caribbean histories, culture and landscapes, and has done anthropological fieldwork in Caribbean Rastafarian communities, in West African Vodun communities, and Northeastern Native American communities. Before coming to the New Bedford Whaling Museum in August of 2017, she taught for nine years as an anthropology professor in the Departments of Psychology and Human Development, American Studies and Political Science at Wheelock College in Boston and taught as an adjunct professor of Anthropology at the University of Connecticut. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Salve Regina University, and a Master of Arts and Doctoral degree from the University of Connecticut.

Free

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Date: Wednesday, July 21, 2021 – 6:00pm to 7:00pm