Speaking of Books with Linda Rabben: Through a Glass Darkly: The Social History of Stained Glass in Baltimore

Powered by Research Education at University Libraries. Speaking of Books series features free, open to the community and public talks by UMD faculty authors on their recently published work.

Through a Glass Darkly is based on two years' on-the-ground, library and archival research in a city of architectural treasures that reflect a long history of racial, religious and ethnic segregation. Stained-glass makers struggle to produce beautiful products of an endangered craft.

Linda Rabben is an Associate Research Professor of Anthropology at UMD. She joined the department’s professional track faculty in 2015, after a long career in the nonprofit sector. The author of ten published books and numerous articles on human rights and related subjects, she worked for Amnesty International and other nongovernmental organizations for more than 30 years.

Dr. Rabben did anthropological field research in and on the United States, Britain and Brazil and was a UN election observer in Mozambique. She has spoken about human rights and migration issues to diverse audiences in the US, UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, Brazil and France. In 2014 she coordinated an international conference on the global grassroots environmental movement at American University in Washington, D.C. Since moving to Baltimore in 2021 she has been doing research on the city’s architectural history. Publication of her eleventh book, Through a Glass Darkly: The Social History of Stained Glass in Baltimore, is scheduled in November 2023.