By Celena Glaghassi, Staff Writer
On Friday, March 20, the Department of Mathematics, in collaboration with the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, hosted a film screening of the documentary “Journeys of Black Mathematicians: Forging Resilience.” Sponsors from different departments across campus, including Africana Studies, Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics, Environmental Science, Physics, Psychology, and many more, also contributed to bringing the film screening to Gettysburg College. The event ran from 3—5 p.m. and was held in Joseph Theater (Breidenbaugh 201). To begin the event, Chair of the Mathematics Dr. Kimberly Spayd briefly introduced the film and the invited guest, Dr. Dennis Davenport.
Dr. Davenport is the Director of Graduate Studies and Associate Professor of Mathematics at Howard University, a Historically Black University (HBCU). In 1987, Dr. Davenport became one of the first people to ever earn a PhD in Mathematics from Howard University. From then until 2003, he was an assistant, then an associate professor, at Miami University in Ohio, which he noted, “was a university before Florida was a state.”
The documentary, directed by George Paul Csicsery and produced by Zala Films in 2020, traces the history of Black mathematicians and scholars and the evolution of Black culture in STEM fields. Featuring panoramic interviews of Black Mathematicians, beginning with Edward Bouchet and W.W.S. Claytor, the documentary focuses on the effects of HBCUs in encouraging and pushing people of colour toward the field of mathematics.
“You’re part of something bigger,” said one of the interviewees, Evelyn Boyd Granville, the second Black woman to earn a PhD in Mathematics.
Virginia K. Newell recalled a time when people of colour were limited to learning basic arithmetic and described her effort to introduce high-level math classes in North Carolina schools.
Scott Williams shared the story of a time when Black college students protested for the integration of a local movie theatre by standing in line for films and paying for tickets using pennies, which slowed the lines and prevented white people from being able to enter the theatre.
“Math was like a really safe haven for me, because I wasn’t, like, very popular or had a lot of friends growing up,” explained Elijah Leake, a Chicago area student who was nearing his graduation from DePaul University at the time of filming the documentary.
Following the film, Dr. Spayd asked Dr. Davenport about inclusivity and diversity in the math community.
Davenport answered by sharing a personal anecdote, “One thing that I found out when I was first hired at Miami, they were saying, ‘you’re coming out here because we want you to bring in more people of colour.’”
He continued, explaining that, at the time, Miami University recognised 10% of its student body as minorities. He said, “I figured out, really, what I was supposed to do [was] convince these white kids that there were people of colour that could think and do math.”
Following a few brief questions and a discussion regarding AI in the field of mathematics, Dr. Spayd thanked everyone for attending the screening and concluded the event.
