NOTE: Faculty, if you are interviewed and quoted by news media, or if your work has been cited, and you have an online link to the article or video, please let us know. Contact us at news@csusb.edu.
March 2: CSUSB professor Stuart Sumida featured on ‘Lifestyles with Lillian Vasquez’
KVCR Radio
March 2, 2023
Animation consultant and Cal State University San Bernardino biology professor Stuart Sumida talks about some of the projects he's worked on and the process of translating the realistic and precise movements and behaviors of animals onto the big screen. Sumida is an expert in animal anatomy and paleontology and has worked as a consultant on over 70 animated films and video games, including on “The Lion King,” Pixar’s “Soul,” Oscar-nominated “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish,” and the “Horizon” video game series.
A piece of the Costa Chica’s Afro-Mexican culture is coming to San Bernardino
LAist
March 3, 2023
The CSUSB Anthropology’s two-day celebration of Oaxaca’s Afro-Mexican heritage and history was highlighted by the news site. Arianna Huhn, Cal State San Bernardino associated professor of anthropology and director of the museum, is the lead organizer of the museum’s upcoming exhibit, “Afróntalo.” The Feb. 25-26 celebration at the Garcia Center for the Arts in San Bernardino is an event leading up the exhibit’s September opening.
“The idea is really to focus on looking at Afro-descendants in Mexico, specifically, and Afro-descendants in the Americas broadly, which is a subject that unfortunately a lot of people don't know about,” Huhn said.
CSUSB’s Anthropology Museum celebrates AfroOaxacan Culture as Black History Month closes
Black Voice News
March 2, 2023
As Black History Month comes to a close, the Anthropology Museum at the California State University, San Bernardino (CSUSB) celebrated AfroOaxacan culture through art, dance, music and food. The free, two-day event at the Garcia Center for the Arts in San Bernardino celebrated the richness of Afromexican identity and encouraged attendees to learn more about the history of Afrodescendants in Mexico.
“I hope that more people are aware that there are Black people in Mexico and Black people across Latin America. Unfortunately, it’s just something that’s not taught. It’s not anybody’s fault that they don’t know that, it’s just not a common part about how we think about Latin America,” explained Arianna Huhn, associate professor of anthropology at CSUSB and director of the CSUSB Anthropology Museum. “I hope by coming here that people realize there are Black people and that there are rich cultures and histories associated with those populations as well.”
CSUSB museum celebrates Oaxaca’s Afro heritage
Precinct Reporter
March 2, 2023
Southern California’s rare snowfall on Feb. 25 could not keep the more than 120 people from attending a celebration of Mexico’s Afro heritage on the first day of a two-day event presented by Cal State San Bernardino’s Anthropology Museum at the Garcia Center for the Arts in San Bernardino.
The event featured the history, heritage, art, food, dance and music of Mexico’s Costa Chica region of Oaxaca, where many people who trace their ancestry to the country’s Spanish colonial period, when freed and enslaved Africans settled there. It was the first event leading up to the Anthropology Museum’s upcoming exhibition, Afróntalo, which will focus on the Afro-descendants in Mexico and the Afrolatine Californians. The exhibit is scheduled to open in September.
“Often people think of museums as static galleries,” said Arianna Huhn, director of the museum and associate professor of anthropology. “But museums today are dynamic spaces that use artifacts and storytelling to inspire community engagement and critical thinking. In this case, we were able to use a need for an upcoming exhibition – to construct a turtle and a bull that are used for dances in Afrodescendant communities in the Costa Chica region of Mexico – to inspire an event where we could further the exhibition’s message: Afrodescendants are present across the Americas, and each community has unique cultural traditions.”
“I hope that for those who attended the weekend event they left thinking about why it is that the histories and cultures and identities of Afrolatines – across the Americas, including right here in California – are not more widely discussed and recognized,” Huhn said. “And that they will do what they can to combat this erasure, and to call out any negativity toward Blackness in their own communities.”
These news clips and others may be viewed at “In the Headlines.”