The Humanities Truck participated in the 2021 “Adams Morgan Day” Festival, which focuses on the neighborhood of Adams Morgan and its culture, diversity, and history. Oral history interviews were conducted to gauge festival-goers' relationship to Adams Morgan, meaningful spaces in the neighborhood, and how those spaces may have changed over time. In this interview, Ama talks about enjoying Adams Morgan coffee shops and grading papers there before the pandemic. She also speaks about the changing city and gentrification.
This interview is with Beth Marhanka, director of the Gelardin New Media Center at the Georgetown University Library, conducted via TheirStory on October 18, 2021. It covers her experience working during the COVID-19 pandemic, her own brush with COVID, her feelings about her profession, and Georgetown University Library's position in its greater campus community. Also discussed are changes to the library during the pandemic. Interviewer is India Pasiuk.
In this interview, Rick Reinhard discusses the path that led to his photographic career as well as the many important experiences that he has had throughout that career. Additionally, he discusses his involvement in the neighborhood of Mount Pleasant and the changes that Mount Pleasant and DC has gone through throughout his life, highlighting events like the 1991 Mount Pleasant Uprising.
Sheena Styles works at a public school in Washington DC teaching 4th grade math and science. In this interview we discuss her early experiences with education, how she became a teacher. She discusses the significance of teaching demographics and how systemic shifts in DCPS have increased the amount of white women in teaching and reduced the number of teacher of color. She also discusses the kind of impact the national Black Lives Matter protests had within her classroom and the importance of anti-racist teaching practices. She tells her story of how the Covid-19 virus shut down her school, how the school addressed issues with equity, and the ways she has had adapt to teaching virtually. She shares her thoughts on teacher and student safety in the face of Covid-19 and the importance of teaching as a profession and the significant work teachers do within society.