March '24 News Blog
News briefs from the HCC campus and beyond
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Moja's Mojo
If you thought you heard singing and the beat of a backing bass guitar drifting down the third-floor hallway of Donahue one recent afternoon, you weren't day dreaming. The sounds were coming from DON 342, where musician and activist Heshima Moja was the guest lecturer for "Be the Change," an honors colloquium co-taught by professors Vanessa Martinez (anthropology) and Ileana Vasu (math). The course explores the concept of change in all its forms: societal, cultural, political, personal, mathematical, and religious, among others, and encourages students to become their own agents of change. Moja, according to his bio, "walks the world where music, art, and scholarship intersect" and takes inspiration from jazz and other world music, as well as the works of global figures including James Baldwin, Eugenio Maria de Hostos, Gaye Theresa Johnson, Fernando Ortiz, Juan Flores, Maria Theresa Linares Savio, and Steven Biko: "A constant question that I seek to answer in my exploration and creation of musical works is, 'How do we preserve cultural memory (the stories, traditions, and practices) of Black and Brown people while still allowing contemporary narratives to evolve independently of the experiences of the past?" Moja's latest album is called "The Awakening," which his website describes as "a sonic journey through soundscapes rooted in the jazz tradition and infused with Spoken Word, Latin Music, spirituals, and Hip-Hop." (Above: Moja, during his March 20 visit to HCC)
Global Pride
Earlier this month, professors Raúl Gutiérrez and Mónica Torregrosa celebrated the latest batch of HCC students to earn their Global Seal of Biliteracy certifications. The Global Seal of Biliteracy is a national credential that recognizes literacy in English and Spanish. To receive the certification, students must sit for an hours-long proctored exam that assesses their reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills, and scores them according to national standards. Ten students who were enrolled in Spanish for Heritage Speakers during the fall 2023 semester earned their Global Seal of Biliteracy. "The class was super interesting," said Gutierrez. "We had folks from the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico, El Salvador - and me being Mexican - so we had a lot of different dialects, and we talked about different accents and different ways of speaking. What does it mean to learn Spanish at home versus the classroom and how do we negotiate those identity issues?" Demonstrating bilingual fluency is a marketable skill, said Gutiérrez, and students can add their Global Seal certifications to their resumes and LinkedIn profiles. Pictured above, from left to right: Professor Gutierrez, students Yadielix Martinez Fernandez, Adriana Vargas Perez '24, Kelly Morales '24, Professor Torregrosa, students Alannah Brunt '24, Rosemary Vazquez Gonzalez, and Arturo Rivera. Not pictured: students Jennifer Molina, Coralys Benitez Lopez, Elda Benvenutty, and Aaron Bergeron.
Theater People at Play
HCC theater students and staff took a field trip to The Hartford Stage March 7 to see the the Pulitzer-Prize winning play, The Hot Wing King, by Katori Hall. "Fantastic show!" reports HCC theater professor Tim Cochran. "It was wonderful to see so many students participate in the event and enjoy the performance."
