News-Letter

Growing up in Detroit, Professor Melanie Shell-Weiss was surrounded by the diversity she would one day examine with students at Johns Hopkins. The courses she has created, such as "Making America: Immigration, Race, and Citizenship," grew out of her interest in racial dynamics growing up in an urban environment she describes as "having rather awkward race relations, to say the least."

"I imagined, when I was eighteen years old, that I would be writing histories of Detroit. And then when I was in high school, my family moved across the state to a tiny little tourist town in western Michigan, which is as different from Detroit as a place you can imagine. It also was a place where, while it was very, very geographically beautiful, right on Lake Michigan, very small town, it also was a very, very white, very rigidly Christian, Dutch Christian reformed place. And we were very much outsiders there.

"So I think that also left a deep impression on me in terms of thinking about ethnic relations and community relations. It certainly was something that made me think a lot about who I am and my family's ethnic background, and what made me different from the people around me."

On the advice of a member of her dissertation committee, she has branched out from her Detroit roots in order to examine the social dynamics of race in other cities, on one of which she has written a book about entitled "They all came from someplace else": Immigration, Race, and Labor in Twentieth Century Miami.

"I have a lot of family in Florida, and I hate the cold, and I hate the winter, so any excuse to go somewhere nicer and warmer was very appealing! And rather than thinking about race relations as about black vs. white, Miami is definitely a city that underscores the importance of the Latino experience, and really how nuanced and complicated American race relationships are."

Baltimore is also a city with prominent cultural diversity, which many people don't realize is as extensive and established as that of a traditional immigrant city such as New York. Professor Shell-Weiss is working with the Baltimore Immigration Memorial Foundation in order to change that perception.

"One example is that the historic immigration piers are no longer standing. And unless you talk to a historian or someone who's researched this, most folks, including folks who grew up in Baltimore, have no idea these even existed or where they were, and that's really troubling. For a long time Baltimore was, for a number of years in the late 19th and early 20th century, the second- or third-largest port of entry after Ellis Island.

"It's a very interesting project to me both because it hits near to what I do from a scholarly standpoint, but also it's provided a great opportunity to get groups of immigrants both old and new, as well as folks who are native-born talking to each other in their city. And actually comparing their histories, and noting their similarities and the differences."

Shell-Weiss hopes that the kind of communication she's advocating both through her teaching career and community service will help to alleviate racial tensions in the United States, Baltimore and even the Hopkins community.

"There was a big raid here in Baltimore just recently, where 69 people were arrested, both at a temporary employment agency and at UnderArmour. Here's a case where, under the auspices of national security issues, ICE justifies going in and arresting a huge number of people, whose children are then left at the public elementary schools with no one to pick them up afterwards.

This recently happened in Massachusetts, this has happened in Connecticut; there seem to be more and more of these raids. It's important to note the incredible burden that children and women, in particular, end up bearing in this. In the cases in Connecticut and Massachussets where this has happened, there are huge numbers of children who are now being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder. So, what's the bigger cost on the American system? Wouldn't it be better to provide education, to provide basic health care, to address baseline human rights and human needs? That to me seems like the thing that we as a democratic nation should be doing.

"I think we do have a lot of issues on this campus with being very isolated from the city around us. And students are not the only ones who feel this way. There are many faculty who are intimidated by the neighborhood around the University or have this idea that it's not safe. Students are told this sometimes before they come; they're told this by other students. Also, because the public transportation system in this city is limited, unless you have a car, it can be difficult to really get into the city."

But what Professor Shell-Weiss focuses on emphasizing is the success of existing contacts between the Hopkins community and the city that houses it; and what you can do to break the trend.

"I remain really impressed with the number of tutoring programs, the Baltimore Scholars program is really first-rate. The Institute for Global Studies has been doing all kinds of great stuff for a long time. I think Africana Studies is making a really renewed push to do a whole range of really, really cool projects to support Baltimore history and also to be engaged in the community.

The Black Faculty and Student Association, The Black Faculty and Staff Association, both organizations have worked extensively with the city for a long time, there are strong community ties there. I think having a framework for starting to do this work helps, and I think it's good for new students on campus who are trying to get to know Baltimore, with the limits of transportation and everything else. Whether you're a Writing Sems or any other variety of majors, there are these pockets of good connections.

"I think one shortcoming on our campus is that we tend to just not talk to each other enough. I think there's not necessarily a lot of knowledge about what folks are doing other places, everybody kind of puts their head down and works on their stuff. All it is, is that personal connection, talking to someone in the hallway, having coffee with somebody, talking with one of your classmates, hearing about what they're doing."

Next semester, Professor Melanie Shell-Weiss will be teaching her "Making America" course as well as "Comparative Freedom Struggles: The U.S. Civil Rights and South African Anti-Apartheid Movements."

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