Elm City LIT Fest: KEYNOTE SPEAKER- Lucy Hurston

119 Whalley Avenue,New Haven CT 06511

12 September, 2021

Description

Keynote speaker Lucy Hurston, niece of Zora Neale Hurston, in conversation with Prof. William H. Foster LUCY HURSTON Lucy Anne Hurston, niece of major 20th century writer Zora Neale Hurston and Professor of Sociology at Manchester Community College in Manchester, Connecticut, is the author of the remarkable multimedia biography, "Speak, So You Can Speak Again: A Life of Zora Neale Hurston" (2004). The work consists of text, photographs, a CD of Zora herself speaking and singing, and various pieces of removable memorabilia, including letters, maps, vintage magazine articles, and rough drafts of Zora's poems. Zora Neale Hurston was a major figure of the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s, a poet, novelist, essayist, playwright, travel writer, and leading scholar of African American folklore. By the 1940s her work had slid into obscurity. She died in poverty and was buried in an unmarked grave in 1960. Alice Walker is credited with reviving widespread public interest in Hurston, beginning with a 1975 "Ms. Magazine" article, "In Search of Zora Neale Hurston." Hurston's work is now considered one of the cornerstones of American literature, and is required reading in high schools and colleges throughout the country. WILLIAM H. FOSTER William H. Foster III has been a writer since the age of 8 and published since age 11. Poet, essayist, playwright, and editorialist, he has written 15 books and 10 plays. He is presently retired as a Professor of English at Naugatuck Valley Community College in Waterbury, Connecticut. Professor Foster holds a BA from the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, MA, and a Masters degree from Wesleyan University. A long-time comic book collector and researcher, Professor Foster has been an expert commentator for both CNN News and National Public Radio. He was a consultant on the historical image of Blacks in both comic strips and comic books for the Words and Pictures Museum of Fine Sequential Art in Northampton, MA, and also a consultant to the 2004 exhibit, “Heroes, Heartthrobs, and Horrors: Celebrating Connecticut’s Invention of the American Comic Book” presented by the Connecticut Historical Society. His exhibit on the “Changing Image of Blacks in Comics” has been displayed at a number of venues across the country, including Temple University’s Paley Library, the 1998 Comic-Con International Comic Arts Conference, the 2000 Festival of Arts and Ideas and in 2012 for the Texas Visual Arts Association in Dallas. He presented his research at the 2001 conference of The International Association for Media and History in Leipzig, Germany and at the 2002 Conference on Analyzing Series & Serial Narrative at John Moores University in Liverpool, England. In 2007 Professor Foster’s exhibit was displayed at both the Geppi Entertainment Museum in Maryland and the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art in New York. He was an invited speaker to the 2007 International Symposium on Langston Hughes at Central China Normal University in Wuhan, China. In 2008 he was appointed to the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Comic Art. In 2010 his research was sited in the Encyclopedia of African American Popular Culture. In 2011 he appeared as an expert on the PBS series, History Detectives. In that same year he spoke at the International Popular Culture Association conference in San Jose, Costa Rica. In 2012 he was an invited speaker at the Atl.Com Festival in Malmo, Sweden, and the Comics Forum in Leeds, England. In 2013 he lectured at the Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA., the New School in New York, and at Trinity College in Hartford, CT. He also appeared as an expert commentator in the PBS documentary, “Superheroes: A Never ending Battle.” He was also tapped to be a judge for the 2014 International Comic ConWill Eisner Comic Industry Awards. He is the author of two collections of essay on Blacks in Comics: “Looking for a Face like Mine” (2005) and “Dreaming of a Face like Ours” (2010).