Terrance Hayes
Weaving imagination with life experience, poet Terrance Hayes shared his work as this fall’s Bingham Visiting Writer. His expressive—sometimes playful, sometimes raw—poems broached love, family, race, relationships, masculinity and music. Mr. Hayes began with several poems from Lighthead, for which he won a National Book Award in 2010. Mr. Hayes was born in Columbia, South Carolina. He earned his B.A. from Coker College and his M.F.A. from the University of Pittsburgh, where he is a member of the English department faculty. How to Be Drawn, his most recent collection of poems, was a...
Read MoreDanielle Flora
Professional dance is a competitive industry, but the benefits to those who make it are sublime, film and television choreographer Danielle Flora told students. Aspiring dancers should never stop learning, attending classes and watching peers’ performances, she said. “Entertainment can be a rough business, but dancers I’ve worked with have been able to see the world while on tour with some of the most famous musicians. They spend their lives doing fun and creative things.” Ms. Flora began her dance career as a New York Knicks City Dancer before joining Saturday Night Live, where she...
Read MoreCatalyst Conversations: The Dialogue Between Art and Science
“You can talk yourself out of something really easily,” media artist Deb Todd Wheeler told Milton students in an assembly sponsored by the Nesto Gallery. “Ideas sometimes need a little bit of sideways thinking.” Ms. Wheeler visited Milton with artist Deborah Davidson, technologist Eric Gunther, and scientist Andrew Berry as part of Catalyst Conversations. Ms. Davidson founded Catalyst Conversations, which explores a dialogue between art and science. As the world becomes increasingly technology-oriented and visual, the connection between art and science has grown, evident in artistic...
Read MoreKeiko Orrall
Recognizing and respecting one another’s differences—rather than using them as ammunition in debate—is the key to civil discourse, Massachusetts State Representative Keiko Orrall told students. Rep. Orrall spoke at the invitation of Milton’s Conservative Club, and she acknowledged that the tact she describes is notably absent from national politics today. Rep. Orrall, the Republican national committeewoman from Massachusetts, cautioned students against assuming that people with opposing political views are “the enemy,” saying such polarizing attitudes prohibit compromise and grind...
Read MoreFanshen Cox DiGiovanni
Educator, actor and producer Fanshen Cox DiGiovanni performed her one-woman multimedia show, One Drop of Love, in which she explores her own racial identity in the context of her family history and American census methods. Ms. Cox DiGiovanni periodically scanned the faces of students as if she were collecting United States census data, using methods from the 1700s to the present day. Census methodology throughout history has grouped people into single, incomplete racial categories without considering the multiracial identities of many Americans. The title of Ms. Cox DiGiovanni’s show...
Read MoreSarah Colt ’88
Independent documentary filmmaker and alumna Sarah Colt ’88 spoke with students as this year’s Henry R. Heyburn ’39 Lecturer. Sarah shared her process of developing documentaries of historical subjects, specifically the work involved in creating her film Geronimo, one part of the PBS American Experience series on Native American history. Before starting her own company in 2008, Sarah produced the highly-acclaimed biography RFK and earned an Emmy Award for Outstanding Science, Nature, and Technology for co-producing The Secret Life of the Brain. Her credits include the Emmy-nominated...
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