Cape Verdean historian and filmmaker receives research fellowship

Posted by O Jornal staff on Feb 3, 2012 in Community News | Comments Off

BOSTON — Historian and filmmaker Dr. Claire Andrade-Watkins, an Associate Professor of Visual and Media Arts at Emerson College, was named a 2012 James Bradford Ames Research Fellow.
 UMass Boston’s Department of Africana Studies program is designed to promote research by academic scholars and other professionals related to the historical, social, economic and political contributions of African Americans and Cape Verdeans on New Bedford, Nantucket Island, Martha’s Vineyard and Cape Cod, Mass.
 The second generation Cape Verdean American born and raised in Fox Point, R.I., will focus her research on the island of Nantucket, where she will conduct the pre-production research for a documentary film focusing on the work of Augusto C. Ramos and Dr. Frances Karttunen. The two Nantucket residents have worked together to create permanent public recognition of people of color who resided and continue to reside on the island.
 Dr. Andrade Watkins received her A.B. degree from Simmons College and her Ph.D. from Boston University.
 In 2006, she released her award-winning feature length documentary, “Some Kind of Funny Porto Rican?: A Cape Verdean American Story” — the first in a series of three documentaries about the Cape Verdean community in North America.