In this episode, Shelvis Ponds sits down with Dr. Adam Rosenblatt, Associate Professor of the Practice of the International Comparative Studies Program at Duke University. Sponsored by the Division of Student Affairs at Duke.

Beginning of Transcript:

SHELVIS PONDS: In this episode, we sit with Adam Rosenblatt, professor in the International Comparative Studies Department at Duke University, to discuss the importance of space, particularly his work with analyzing graveyards to better understand how suchspaces can indicate economic disparities among different social groups. Well, Adam, it is good to see you. I want to, you know, I’m here today to talk more about your thoughts on just space as it pertains to, you know, thinking about the work that you do surrounding cemeteries and learning how to read and using cemeteries as spaces to read and think critically about the lives they’re in, the voices they’re in and thinking about those spaces from a social justice mindset.ADAM ROSENBLATT: Yeah, so one thing I’d say is that you’re absolutely right that my work is partly about understanding the history’s that cemeteries embody, reflect, and also sort of perpetuate and keep going in some cases. But, it’s always a very passive way to construct the cemeteries:it’s like history happens and then it’s written on the cemeteries and we can read it. Right? It’s like cemeteries as text. But, my book is tentatively called Cemetery Citizens and part of the point of it is that cemeteries also create new kinds of communities. So my book is sort of about cemeteries, but much more than that is about the people who come and work in cemetaries, especially volunteers who are trying to reclaim cemeteries that are sort of neglected, marginalized, etc. So I don’t only see cemeteries as these passive spaces that reflect our history, but I also see them as spaces where history’s made or, you know, new kinds of communities of care and resistance are coming together, sometimes where people are arguing with each other about how to remember the dead and how to use a space. Should there be nature trails and a kind of very accessible colorblind outdoorsy reclamation project or should there be Black Lives Matter/Blacks Death Matter resistance-oriented lense? You know? These things, it’s notonly, the projects
I’m studying, whether they’re around race or disability or whatever, it’s not only people coming together and being like, “Let’s clean up the liter, and have a barbeque! We all love each other!”. It’s also like these are contested spaces.SHELVIS PONDS: You mentioned neglected and marginalized cemeteries. Could you define what, is there a difference between a neglected and a marginalized cemetery? Because when I think of neglect, I think of care and upkeep. But, when I, I’ve never heardof a marginalized cemetery. What is the distinction between neglected and marginalized, if there is any? ADAM ROSENBLATT: Yeah, it’s a great question because I’ve been really struggling with these vocabularies a lot and I’ve been in dialogue with the folks that I'm working with who’ve worked in the cemeteries about it. The words neglected and especially abandoned, to me, are really loaded and it indicates, for example, the African-American cemeteries in Richmond, and for all I know, the case of Geer Cemetery here in Durham as well, you can spin that neglect or abandonment a lot of ways. But, it’s precisely that it’s a description that doesn’t immediately point to a responsible party that allows for a bunch of narratives not all of them, you know, are really fair or accurate. So, in Richmond at least a lot of the storyline goes like: How did this cemetary get to this point? You know, these kind of overgrown African-American cemeteries that have vandalism, they have illegal dumping. How did they get to this point? And then you look and you compare to just right across the street to like Oakwood Cemetery which has this