Intellectual History Commons^™

Ethnic Irony In Melvin B. Tolson's "Dark Symphony", Elizabeth Newton

Publications and Research

This article historicizes musical symbolism in Melvin B. Tolson’s poem “Dark Symphony” (1941). In a time when Black writers and musicians alike were encouraged to aspire to European standards of greatness, Tolson’s Afro-modernist poem establishes an ambivalent critical stance toward the genre in its title. In pursuit of a richer understanding of the poet’s attitude, this article situates the poem within histories of Black music, racial uplift, and white supremacy, exploring the poem’s relation to other media from the Harlem Renaissance. It analyzes the changing language across the poem’s sections and, informed by Houston A. Baker Jr.’s study of “mastery …

"Martin Luther King, Jr.'S Greater Vision: Manually Bending The Arc Of Time Towards Justice", Kristopher B. Burrell

Publications and Research

This speech was given by Dr. Kristopher Burrell on January 16, 2017at St. Paul’s Church — National Historic Site, Mount Vernon, NY.

"How Mature Are We? The Enduring Legacy Of Martin Luther King, Jr.'S 'Beyond Vietnam' Speech", Kristopher B. Burrell

Publications and Research

This speech was given by Dr. Kristopher Burrell on January 15, 2018 at St. Paul’s Church — National Historic Site, Mount Vernon, NY.

What Kinds Of Comparison Are Most Useful In The Study Of World Philosophies?, Nathan Sivin, Anna Akasoy, Warwick Anderson, Gérard Colas, Edmond Eh

Publications and Research

Cross-cultural comparisons face several methodological challenges. In an attempt at resolving some such challenges, Nathan Sivin has developed the framework of “cultural manifolds.” This framework includes all the pertinent dimensions of a complex phenomenon and the interactions that make all of these aspects into a single whole. In engaging with this framework, Anna Akasoy illustrates that the phenomena used in comparative approaches to cultural and intellectual history need to be subjected to a continuous change of perspectives. Writing about comparative history, Warwick Anderson directs attention to an articulation between synchronic and diachronic modes of inquiry. In addition, he asks: If …

'Civil Wars: A History In Ideas' By David Armitage (Review), Zachary C. Shirkey

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Rethinking Greece: Despina Lalaki On Hellenism, State-Building, Archaeology And The "Democratic West", Despina Lalaki

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Western Classics In Modern Japan (German), Frank Jacob

Publications and Research

A presentation paper (invited guest lecture) delivered at the Institute of Ancient History at Marburg University, Germany, July 12, 2016.

Feral And Isolated Children From Herodotus To Akbar To Hesse: Heroes, Thinkers, And Friends Of Wolves, Karl Steel

Publications and Research

"In 1304, a small child of Hesse was taken by wolves, and lived with them for a while, eating well, learning to run on all fours, perhaps joining them in their raids on sheep and humans, until he was taken by hunters and forced to live, unhappily, in human society, compelled to learn to walk upright, and exhibited as a spectacle. This account, almost certainly legendary, belongs to a small set of similar stories of feral children from roughly the same time, which, unlike so many modern accounts of wild children, are not about isolation, deprivation, or a catastrophic separation …

Disciplines, Institutions—And Desires, Will Stockton, Mario Digangi, Ruth Mazo Karras, Melissa E. Sanchez

Publications and Research

Will Stockton: I would like to begin by asking you to consider the chiasmus under which we gather: “Desiring History and Historicizing Desire.” The chiasmus focuses our attention on the crossing of two terms, each with noun and verb forms their grammatical flexibility indexed, perhaps, to the methodological flexibility of the fields in which most of us work: early modern (here both Renaissance and late-medieval) queer and/or sexuality studies. Talk a bit about the definitions of desir/e/ing and histor/y/icizing, and the relation of these terms to the periodization and thematization of your and our work. Is defining these words more …

La Lengua Como Lugar De Memoria (Y Olvido). Reflexión Glotopolítica Sobre El Español Y Su Historia, José Del Valle

Publications and Research

The history of Spanish as a discipline has played a political role in Spain´s historical development. What is the relation between memory and forgetting, on one hand, and language history writing on the other?

Studies In The History Of Anthropology In The United States, Jay H. Bernstein

Publications and Research

I will talk about a study I did on the first persons to do Ph.D.s in anthropology and how the project led to my leaving the anthropology profession and becoming a librarian. The project began in a biographical study of a little-known anthropologist that involved archival work. As a librarian who has left the profession of anthropology (not without trauma), I remain keenly interested in the history and bibliography of anthropology and view dissertation projects as crucial to understanding the biographies of scholars and trends in academic professions.

Roger Mcdonough: Nj State Librarian And Master Politician, Robin Brown

Publications and Research

Roger McDonough became New Jersey State Librarian in 1947, the first professional librarian to fill that role and at the head of a newly amalgamated agency. He was a consummate politician. During his tenure he not only managed to get a new State Library built next to the State Capitol, but he worked hard to upgrade library services in New Jersey, to create networks of library cooperation, and to bring state aid up to par. He was a gifted lobbyist, and spent a significant amount of time working with the ALA Washington office to get national programs of library aid …

On The Origin And Future Of Poetry: Notes Towards An Investigation, Carlos Aguasaco

Publications and Research

An exploration on the historical and material conditions that allowed the emergence of metaphors and poetry alongside language. This article analyzes the historical relation between poetry and technology across history. It discusses the so-called ontological crisis of poetry and opens the conversation on its future.

Printing, Fundraising, And Jewish Patronage In Eighteenth-Century Livorno, Francesca Bregoli

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Language, Politics, And History: An Introductory Essay, José Del Valle

Publications and Research

This book chapter examines different articulations of language and history and introduces a new configuration that focuses on the political dimension of language.

Soldiers Of Science--Agents Of Culture: American Archaeologists In The Office Of Strategic Services (Oss), Despina Lalaki

Publications and Research

"Scientificity" and appeals to political independence are invaluable tools when institutions such as the American School of Classical Studies at Athens attempt to maintain professional autonomy. Nonetheless, the cooperation of scientists and scholars with the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), among them archaeologists affiliated with the American School, suggests a constitutive affinity between political and cultural leadership. This relationship is here mapped in historical terms, while, at the same time, sociological categorizations of knowledge and its employment are used in order to situate archaeologists in their broader social and political context and to evaluate their work not merely as agents …

Where From Here? Ideological Perspectives On The Future Of The Civil Rights Movement, 1964-1966, Kristopher B. Burrell

Publications and Research

Many civil rights movement activist-intellectuals declared that the movement was in a state of "crisis" by the mid-1960s. This article discusses how four black intellectuals--Kenneth Clark, Bayard Rustin, George Schuyler, and Malcolm X--from different ideological perspectives responded to the perception that the movement was in crisis and examines how their ideological underpinnings affected their policy proposals for achieving black equality in the United States. These leaders also wanted to ensure the continued relevance of the movement for racial equality in the United States.

Rousseau, The Anticosmopolitan?, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

Rousseau's repeated criticisms of the Enlightenment's ideal of cosmopolitanism has led to his thought being characterized as 'anticosmopolitan'. His work abounds in denunciations of the ideals of equality of treatment and universal rights supported by his contemporaries. Moreover, his liking of solitude, introspection and socialization in small circles and his preference for patriotism over equity among all men seem to set him up as the counterpoint of the universalism his contemporaries defended. However, a deeper insight into the work of the author of The Reveries of the Solitary Walker shows that, far from being incompatible with true cosmopolitanism, the moral …

Madame De Staël, The Protestant Reformation And The History Of ‘Private Judgement’, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

It is a well-known fact that Madame de Staël held the Protestant Reformation in high regard and preferred Protestantism to all other religions. To her, Protestantism was the most moral and the most enlightened religion available; it was the the religion most compatible with, and even conductive to, progress.

But why was this so, and what exactly did Madame de Staël mean by Protestantism? It is an important question, because answering it will shed light on the nature of her liberalism and, more particularly, on the interconnectedness of her religious and her political views.

On The Intellectual Sources Of Laïcité: Rousseau, Constant, And The Debates About A National Religion, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

That French Protestants gave strong support to laïcité is by now well established. In recent work, Patrick Cabanel has even made a compelling case for the Protestant sources of laïcité, placing particular emphasis on the Protestant entourage of Jules Ferry (1832-1893) and stressing the inspiration provided by the pro-Protestant intellectual, Edgar Quinet (1803-1875.)

This article suggests that we look even earlier in time for the intellectual sources of laïcité. Seminal ideas can be found in the writings of two liberal Protestants, Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) and Benjamin Constant (1767-1830.) Rousseau is usually counted among the opponents, and not the …

Edward Said And The Study Of Music, Kofi Agawu

Publications and Research

My first encounter with Edward Said’s work was in the 1980s with the book, Beginnings: Intention and Method (1975). I was exploring a semiotic approach to late 18^th-century music, specifically, a beginning-middle-ending paradigm (an Aristotelian paradigm) that seemed to me to capture the rhetorical intentions of Classic composers. Said’s wide-ranging reflections and ruminations on beginnings – as inaugural moments, as sites for the establishment of difference, as authorially privileged moments, and as "first steps in the intentional production of meaning" – proved inspiring. My enduring impression of him at the time was that he was a very good …

Rousseau's Gift To Geneva, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

People often seem to forget that Rousseau dedicated his Second Discourse to “The Republic of Geneva.” This is a shame because, in doing so, they miss precious clues not only about the meaning of the Discourse itself, but also about its place in Rousseau’s political thought as a whole.

It is no accident that Rousseau dedicated the Discourse on Inequality, his most radical work of all, to his hometown of Geneva; but it requires some research into the historical context to understand why. In Geneva a patrician ruling elite was using social contract theory to subvert the democratic principles …

Two Liberals On Religion: Constant And Tocqueville Compared, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

As founding fathers of modern liberalism, Benjamin Constant and Alexis de Tocqueville shared a common sensibility as well as a number of key concerns. Of central importance to both men was the need to protect individual rights and freedoms against what they saw as an encroaching social power. Having learned the lessons of the French Revolution, they knew that power, whether concentrated in the hands of one man, or executed in the name of the "people", was a dangerous thing. Thus they worked throughout their lives to establish and defend a representative system with constitutional guarantees that would protect fundamental …

Why Constant? A Critical Overview Of The Constant Revival, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

Recent years have seen a remarkable renewal of interest in the thought of Benjamin Constant (1767–1830). For long recognized as the author of the literary masterpiece Adolphe, Constant is now receiving increasing attention for his political writings. Paperback editions of his major works are presently available in both French and English, helping to establish his growing reputation as a founding father of modern liberalism. Constant's stature as a seminal liberal thinker has benefited from the recent climate of opinion in the Western world and, in particular, from the return to fashion of liberalism as a social and political doctrine. …

First Recipients Of Anthropological Doctorates In The United States, 1891-1930, Jay H. Bernstein

Publications and Research

This article seeks to show the origins of the professionalization of anthropology by examining early doctoral dissertations in this field and their authors. The bibliography consists of citations with biographical details of the authors, when known, of doctoral dissertations in anthropology from United States educational institutions up to 1930. One hundred twenty-four citations are given in all, representing 18 institutions. Forty-one of the dissertations were not written for degrees in anthropology. Besides documenting the existence of anthropological work outside recognized graduate programs of anthropology, the bibliography provides a demographic profile of anthropology and shows the distribution of subdiscipline concentrations and …

On The ‘‘Misogyny’’ Of Jean-Jacques Rousseau: The Letter To D’Alembert In Historical Context, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

Evidence suggests that the feminist consensus on Jean-Jacques Rousseau “misogyny” is breaking down.New studies are emerging that bring to light the many sympathetic portrayals of women in Rousseau’s works and the important role he ascribed to women within the family. Some modern feminists are even finding ways of reading Rousseau that speak to women’s concerns today. Overturning the notion that Rousseau was an arch-misogynist will be an uphill battle, however, given how very widespread it has become. Moreover, before we can arrive at a coherent and convincing appraisal of Rousseau’s views on women, a curious paradox needs to be addressed: …

Nouvelles Perspectives Sur De La Religion: Benjamin Constant Et La Franc-Maçonnerie, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

Dès la fin du Directoire, pendant le Consulat, puis sous l'Empire, la maçonnerie française connait une période d'expansion. Les historiens s'accordent à dire qu'elle devient alors "le conservatoire des idées de 1789", "l'officine du libéralisme politique et social". Ainsi n'est-il pas surprenant de constater que plusieurs des amis, collègues et alliés de Constant sont franc-maçons.La franc-maçonnerie de 1789 est fortement anti-"ultra", ce qui explique pourquoi, dès 1820, des "ultras" s'adressent à la justice ou à la Chambre des Pairs pour obtenir l'interdiction de l'ordre. Cela étant, et vu que De la religion est un ouvrage anti-"ultra" écrit par un libéral …

Le Contrat Social, Une Œuvre Genevoise? L’École Du Droit Naturel Et Le Débat Politique À Genève. La Réponse De Rousseau, Helena Rosenblatt

Publications and Research

La question de l'influence de Genève sur les idées politiques et religieuses de Jean-Jacques Rousseau est discutée depuis plus de deux cents ans. Cependant, au cours des années, les suppositions méthodologiques sous-jacentes au débat sont restées fondamentalement les mêmes, et elles ont besoin d'être modifiées. C'est pourquoi il est encore nécéssaire de réexaminer un vieux sujet selon une nouvelle approche. Au lieu de voir Genève simplement en tant que source d'idées que Rousseau a pu adopter, il faudrait voir Genève comme fournissant des problèmes concrets et intellectuels que Rousseau a tâché de résoudre.

The Perils Of Laura Watson Benedict: A Forgotten Pioneer In Anthropology, Jay H. Bernstein

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.