The University of Maryland Arts and Humanities Center for Synergy, Maryland Humanities Council and their major partners will kick off Baltimore Stories, funded by a NEH Humanities in the Public Square grant on March 23rdThe project is designed to help examine the roles of narrative in the life and identity of the city and will produce an educational website to help educators and the public in other cities investigate the roles of narrative and race. This major event will bring together a large and diverse audience of citizens from across the city to discuss narrative, race and power.

Confirmed morning speakers include David Simon, author, journalist and writer of Homicide: Life on the Streets and The Wire and Dr. Khalil Gibran Muhammad, historian and director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. The afternoon session will be a response to the morning's ideas, led by Dr. Christopher Bonner, historian at the University of Maryland and a panel of local humanists, public intellectuals, activists and the audience.