VIRTUAL PROGRAM
Color – Caste – Denomination: Emily Dickinson’s Race and Class Contexts
This virtual program is free to attend. Registration is required.
Color – Caste – Denomination –
These – are Time’s Affair –
Death’s diviner Classifying
Does not know they are –
-FR836
Could Emily Dickinson’s striking poetic vision have been realized anywhere but Amherst? Would she have had the time to hone her craft without the domestic labors performed by individuals outside the Dickinsons’ privileged class? What was Amherst like for those who were not members of the provincial elite and how did they shape the poet’s world?
In this program, learn more about the forces of race and class impacting Emily Dickinson’s Amherst life. We’ll discuss the Dickinson family’s settler colonial roots, industry in Amherst, the town’s changing demographics, musical influences on the poet, and more. Along the way meet individuals in the employ of the Dickinson household as house and grounds workers and hear more about their lives and experiences.
Illustrated talks will be followed by a live Q&A session.
Presentations by Emily Dickinson Museum Tour Guides:
Emily Bernhard
Judith Hudson
Pete Redington
Becky Lockwood