Abraham Smith, Resident Learning Associate in History

"I think having a person who defines himself as black and who is Latin American helped students to see race and Latin America in a different way." Abraham Smith of Washington, DC, who was speaking about himself, consented to an interview for E-clectic shortly before leaving Bates College at the end of his tenure as the first graduate scholar in residence with the Mellon Learning Associates Program in the Humanities. That tenure was from January through December 2003.

A Ph.D. candidate in history at Howard University, Abraham's academic interest lies in examining the role of race in the construction of societies in Latin America and the Caribbean, with particular interest in late nineteenth-century Cuba. In his words, he is "looking to expand the discussion by examining the role race played as it related to crime during the period in question."

While Abraham readily acknowledged the incorporation of race into the curriculum at Bates and other academic institutions, he nevertheless believes, "On the non-academic side, the question of race at Bates has to be addressed directly and head-on. There's a lot of political correctness here, and p.c. tends to blur the need to address issues…[not wanting] to offend people and such."

He thinks the idea behind Movement 384 is a good thing because "any organization formed to address social issues is good. Having said that, the College itself could have some type of mandatory, ongoing seminars in race, gender and class," he suggested.

Abraham had praise for the Study Abroad program at Bates because of the inevitable expansion of the knowledge and experience base that such study provides for the students involved. He found Bates students "savvy book-wise. Most of these kids are pretty sharp, but when it comes to real life [outside of the academy], they're inexperienced with things beyond the narrower view of history given them in high school and in their life experience." Abraham accompanied some students from Movement 384 on a recent trip to a Human Rights Watch film festival in Portland, sponsored by Waynflete School. The festival featured movies about South Africa and South America, he reported, and students from Bates, some of whom had studied abroad in South Africa were able to inform the discussion out of their own lived experience.

"I didn't go in the role of advisor," he noted. "I just went. The relationship I've developed with students is really good, and eating at Commons made conversations possible that wouldn't have happened otherwise. A special shout to the people in Commons," he laughed. "They've been great to me." He mentioned that workers in Commons would ask about his son, Abraham Junior, and his wife Tina, who remained in Washington while Abraham was in residence at Bates.

In addition to Commons workers, Abraham acknowledged what he called "all the heavy hitters" of the History Department. He singled out Joe Hall for his helpfulness when he first came to Bates, but his highest praise was for Professor Lillian Guerra, who was Abraham's sponsor and mentoring faculty. A past evaluator for Preparing Future Faculty (PFF), Lily, whose areas of historical interest align with Abraham's in Cuba and the Caribbean, met Abraham through PFF and proposed him as a learning associate at Bates.

"The high point here was working with Lily," Abraham said. "I learned so much from her-that history is interdisciplinary. You can use all kinds of elements to teach history-poetry, film, short story, narrative. I'm definitely going to use her strategies."

Abraham looks forward to a life of teaching, but for next semester he will work at the Library of Congress and continue to write his dissertation.