Author Nic Stone to visit Summerville campus next week
Flyers promoting Stone’s upcoming visit have been posted in many areas around campus. (photo by Mikaela Graf)
By Mikaela Graf | Staff writer
Author Nic Stone will be visiting the Maxwell Theatre at 3 p.m. on Tuesday, May 3. Stone is known for her bestselling novel “Dear Martin” that, according to www.georgiarecorder.com, was one of 17 books to be removed from Columbia County schools due to concerns of “coarse language and sensitive content” in 2019.
The free event requires all attendees to register prior at https://augusta.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_88lzEe7vtiyWggS.
Director of the AU Writing Project Rebecca Harper began the series online in fall 2020 as a way to fight feelings of disconnection from the pandemic. She is excited to finally bring the series on-campus, and she said that Stone’s stories supply the perfect basis for these first in-person discussions.
“They’re wonderful, great solid stories that allow our students and adults to interact and engage with a wonderful narrative,” Harper said.
Harper said that Stone’s visit can provide a unique insight into the risk and effect of including sensitive subjects in young adult novels.
“Hearing from the person who wrote something that is getting banned and who is writing something that is very timely and powerful– just to hear her story and to hear the story behind her books – I thought that would be a good to kind of circle back around,” Harper said.
Stone’s first session, On Being Human, will begin at 3 p.m., followed by a second session, Conversations About Teaching Dangerous Books, at 4 p.m. Harper hopes that these sessions will insight meaningful discussion inspired by the literature.
“I think that people will be able to see that a lot of really, great powerful conversations can come out of literature,” Harper said. “And that there is a place in classrooms for new books that are more representative of the world we live in, the people who are reading them, and the communities that we are a part of.”
The Office of Diversity and Inclusion is co-sponsoring Stone’s visit. Chief Diversity Officer Tiffany Townsend said that important conversations can be made easier when they are connected to art.
“In many ways, I think that it makes it less sensitive, because we are talking about something that is hypothetical or academic, and so, people feel less uncomfortable to really start those conversations, but the issues are the same,” she said.
According to Townsend, such conversations are necessary to address the past and begin healing race relations.
“If you put a Band-Aid on an open wound and you don’t address the wound first, it never heals,” Townsend said. “You have to take it out – you have to let it air out. You have to put life into it before it heals. It’s the same thing with some of these issues.”
The Writing Project encourages anyone who is inspired by these discussions to buy a copy from the Book Tavern during the event.
Harper and Townsend are grateful for Stone’s collaboration on this event and are excited to see where the conversations she sparks will lead.
Townsend said, “I really do appreciate Nic Stone and other authors who are able to put this in their writing and really help us to start grappling with some of those questions.”
Contact Mikaela Graf at mgraf@augusta.edu.
