Join us at an upcoming community reception to meet Samaa Abdurraqib, MHC's Executive Director!
You'll hear a welcome from MHC's board chair, words from a community partner, and hear Samaa share her vision and goals for the coming years.
You'll also have a chance to chat informally with Samaa over light refreshments. We hope you'll join us.
Recommending Author Colin Woodard has made his selections for the MHC's statewide community read—Morgan Talty's debut shorty story collection Night of the Living Rez and Meghan Gilliss's debut novel Lungfish.
“Raw, powerful, loving, this is a book that many Mainers will feel especially close to.”
Colin Woodard, Recommending Author
…there’s the beauty of place and nature and connectedness, the drama of families and marriage and parenting and living over the edge and out to sea.”
Colin Woodard, Recommending Author
Participatory Arts at Mechanics' Hall
The Mainer Project: A Community Conversation
From Maine to Around the World
After All: A Musical Reflection on the Trajectories of Our Nation
Braiding Circles
Starting this year, the MHC and Maine State Library are joining up Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance to make Read ME even better. The Read ME summer reading program has always aimed to elevate the work of up-and-coming Maine authors–in part by enriching the ways we bring together established Maine authors with folks just getting their voices out. We are excited to deepen our relationship with the vibrant community of Maine writers through this partnership.
“MWPA is happy to join with MHC and the Maine State Library on the Read ME program! We have long admired this program in which each year one wonderful Maine writer picks two Maine books (and two writers!) to focus on in the coming year through events and reading groups at participating libraries throughout the state. Maine is lucky to have so many writers who live here and are inspired by this place in all kinds of ways, and this program helps us all discover new work.
Gibson Fay-LeBlanc, MWPA Executive Director
Colin Woodard is the author of six books including American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America; Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood; and The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier. He’s on the staff of the Portland Press Herald -- where he received a George Polk Award and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist -- and is a fellow at the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy.
His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Economist, Smithsonian, Politico and dozens of other publications. Born in Waterville, he is a graduate of Mt. Abram High School, Tufts University and the University of Chicago.
Cedric Gael Bryant presents his talk Definitions, Definers, and the Defined: Literacy and Orality in Toni Morrison’s Beloved at Winter Weekend 2020. Bryant is the Lee Family Professor of English at Colby College. His talk was accompanied by dance and movement vignettes by René Goddess Johnson.Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Dr. Carolyn Denard presents her talk "Why Read Beloved in 2020?" at Winter Weekend 2020. Denard is the Chief Diversity Officer at Georgia College and Founder and Board Chair of the Toni Morrison Society.Podcast: Play in new window | Download
There’s something irresistible about an anniversary. Maine’s bicentennial, the centennial of women’s suffrage, the upcoming 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence: All invite public commemoration. But what are we doing when we mark these anniversaries? Celebrating our past? Interrogating it? Something else entirely?
Presented in partnership by the Maine Humanities Council, Maine Suffrage Centennial, and Maine Historical Society.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Photo by Jen Sorkin[/caption]
On May 7, 2019, Maine author Monica Wood was awarded our 2019 Constance H. Carlson Public Humanities Prize.
In attendance was Governor Janet Mills, who honored Monica by delivering the event's opening remarks. Hear the Governor's remarks below.Podcast: Play in new window | Download