HP Program Director Jorge Otero-Pailos sits down with Gretchen Sorin, Director of the Cooperstown Graduate Program of Museum Studies, to discuss Sorin’s book “Driving While Black: African American Travel and the Road to Civil Rights.” The book has since been adapted as an acclaimed documentary on PBS.
Gretchen Sorin’s work highlights not only the centrality of Black road travel–and Black travel guides such as The Green Book necessitated by segregation and anti-Black racism–to the American automobile experience, but also the conspicuous loss of historic sites associated with Black-owned and Black-friendly roadside institutions. Sorin brings attention to the historic insufficiency of the traditional American preservation enterprise in protecting sites centered on narratives of Black travel, the vast majority of which have already been lost. Sorin’s words are a call to action for all preservationists who seek a radically more inclusive and anti-racist field. This conversation was recorded in February 2021.
Source by Columbia GSAPP
