“We Are Brooklyn: Immigrant Voices,” a multimedia exhibition based on oral histories conducted by Brooklyn College students, opens at Guttman Community College, CUNY (50 West 40th St. in Manhattan), on Tuesday, March 5, and will then tour two other CUNY campuses this spring before reaching its final destination at the Lefferts Historic House in Prospect Park, Brooklyn. At Guttman, the exhibition is supplemented by four oral histories, conducted by students in Professor Samuel Roger Finesurrey’s City Seminar course. “We Are Brooklyn: Immigrant Voices” was created from oral histories for the Brooklyn College Listening Project (BCLP), an oral history project formed by five Brooklyn College faculty members four years ago to enable their students to document the lives and stories of regular New Yorkers. Over that time, 800 Brooklyn College students have collected oral histories with family, friends, neighbors, and strangers, 500 of which are archived digitally. The exhibition is based on 10 oral histories of immigrants and children of immigrants. Through text, photographs, and audio on six-foot, double-sided panels, their stories are put in the context of U.S. immigration history, New York City as an immigrant city, and the actions and pronouncements of the Trump Administration. In “We Are Brooklyn: Immigrant Voices,” immigrants and children of immigrants from Dominican Republic, Mexico, Haiti, Pakistan, Albania, Italy, Guatemala, China, and Grenada share their lives and experiences. “These people’s lives and experiences talk back to the vitriolic rhetoric and policies of the Trump Administration,” said Jessica Siegel, associate professor of English and director of the BCLP. “We hope that visitors to the exhibition find resonance in reading and listening to these people’s stories.” At Guttman Community College, “We Are Brooklyn: Immigrant Voices” will run through March 30. It will move to Bronx Community College and run from April 1-12. On May 6, it will travel to the James Gallery at the CUNY Graduate Center, where it will be the opening exhibition for the Pressing Public Issues series of events. Finally, the exhibit will travel to the Lefferts Historic House in Prospect Park, Brooklyn, where it will be on display through Labor Day. For more information, please contact Bruce Lyons, director of Foundation Relations and Communications at Guttman Community College, CUNY, at bruce.lyons@guttman.cuny.edu or 646.313.8015.
