After meeting with Evan, my mentor, today, we have decided upon a semester plan of action that I am really happy with. It’s going to be a lot of work, but it is all going to help my project out in ways that I haven’t really begun to dive into yet and is going to prepare me, if even minimally, for my semester in Ghana. Here is the basic outline of what we came up with:
• Research the Arts of Africa, and especially the Arts of Ghana. Special attention to be paid to questions of historiography and display.
o Read African Art by Frank Willet
o Compose a 5-page response essay to Willet focused on themes and issues for further research
o Following these themes gather additional scholarly essays and write annotations for each essay
• Coordinate and hang an exhibition of works from Elon’s Art Collections related to themes or issues in African (and Ghanaian) art.
o Design an exhibition for display on campus. Chose location, works of art, resolve display and information issues.
o Wall labels and/or promotional materials
• Conduct related research on the perception of Africa and the History of Ghana, with special attention paid to colonial and postcolonial periods.
o Read:
• Mistaking Africa by Curtis Keim
• White on Black by Jan Nederveen Pieterse
• Photography Theory edited by James Elkins
o Select a “chapter” to share with faculty mentor for discussion.
o Compose a 2-3 response to each book.
• Report research process on Blog after each weekly meeting (on Wednesdays! So be sure to check in at least weekly. 
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• We will meet weekly and I will conduct at least 5 hours of research outside of these meetings.
This is a general idea of what I will be doing throughout the semester! Thanks for stopping by.
