Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Ken Saro-Wiwa’S Africana Womanist Vision Of Environmental Justice, Julie Iromuanya

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

My paper examines the feminist poetics of Ken Saro-Wiwa’s methodology of protest. Utilizing a gendered pathos, Saro-Wiwa evoked the female body as a metaphor, signaling a connection between the colonization of the land, indigenous peoples, and women in his speech. In the organization of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), he also utilized traditional West African systems that valued a complementary Africana womanist vision of community. In addition, the demonstration he is most remembered for is distinctly patterned after traditional West African female methods of protest. During the 1990’s, already as an established writer, Saro-Wiwa honed his …

“Hired Hands From Abroad”: The Populist Producer’S Ethic, Immigrant Workers, And Nativism In Montana’S 1894 State Capital Election, Brian Leech

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

Although many scholars study state history and most states have long-running history magazines, few write explicitly about state identity. This is surprising, given that many people identify with their state as often as they identify with their region or nation. This presentation will encourage research into this area with an investigation of how Montanans used the 1894 election for the state capital to describe who and what they felt best represented their state. Based on research into newspapers and political propaganda for both towns competing in the election for the state capital, this presentation investigates Montanans’ ideas about immigration, labor, …

War And Memory: The Creation Of The American Memory Of The Atomic Bombings And The End Of The War In The Pacific, Michael Mishler

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

Much has been written about the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, however, an element often overlooked in the history of these events is the way in which an official narrative of them was created in the minds of the American public. This paper examines how this official narrative and consequently memory of the bombings was formed. To do this newspaper articles were analyzed from the first published reports of the bombings in the American press up to recent stories regarding the bombings. Through the analysis of these reports it becomes clear that American memory of the bombings have three …

Indians, “Esquimaux,” And Race: Identity And Community In The Lands West Of Hudson’S Bay In The Eighteenth Century, Strother Roberts

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

This paper proposes that a cross-tribal sense of belonging, similar to modern conceptions of racism, facilitated the formation of multi-ethnic communities among the Indian populations living to the west of Hudson’s Bay in the eighteenth century.

Based upon observations made over the course of a century by employees of the Hudson’s Bay Company regarding the attitudes held by their Native American trading partners towards the region’s Inuit populations, this paper concludes that Indians living to the west of Hudson’s Bay in the eighteenth century constructed an inclusive trans-Indian sense of identity based, at least in part, on the exclusion of …

The Historical Community And The Digital Future, Brent M. Rogers

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

The historical community is undergoing change. Computers, digital tools, the Web, and online resource repositories have created a revolution in teaching, research, scholarship, outreach, and thought. How the digital age impacts history remains a looming concern. This paper will explore the digital age and the serious myriad questions facing the historical community now and in the future. With unfettered access to countless historical resources via online archives and databases, the Web provides an exceptional space for historians to research, discover teaching aides, and develop new thought. Fluid in content and form, the dynamic digital media changes the way we teach, …

Newsworthy: Implications Of Gender And Class In The January 12, 1888, Blizzard, Heather Stauffer

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

In January of 1888, the residents of Nebraska, Dakota Territory, Montana, Kansas, Wyoming, and even Iowa, Minnesota, and Texas were faced with a snowstorm unlike any they had seen before. Striking the majority of the region at the time school was dismissed, many students and teachers were caught long distances from home as the temperature dropped well below zero and visibility diminished. Striking the majority of the region at the time school was dismissed, it has become known as The Schoolchildren’s Blizzard. The disaster was forever ingrained in the minds of those who lived through it. By exploring different perspectives, …

Americanization Versus Open Society: Answering The Challenge Of Multicultural Education, Svetlana Rasmussen

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

American education theory in the twentieth century is characterized by a split between proponents of assimilation, Americanization, and conformity, on the one hand, and proponents of diversity, cultural pluralism, and open society, on the other. The Progressive movement of the turn of the twentieth century espoused an American cosmopolitanism built on the basis of Anglo-American culture, yet ironically its simultaneous support for the equality of the cultures of immigrants made possible the further development of pluralist ideas. Horace M. Kallen in the 1920s introduced the idea of preservation of differences, a pluralism of cultures as opposed to cosmopolitanism, that presumed …

Duncan Hines’ Consumption Community And The Geography Of American Gastronomy, 1936-1956, Damon Talbott

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

Food historian Harvey Levenstein has argued that in the early 20th century “the sorry state of American gastronomy was best typified by Duncan Hines,” then the first restaurant critic of national stature. While Hines’ bestselling guidebook of the 1930s–1950s, Adventures in Good Eating, was not adventurous by contemporary culinary standards, it nevertheless encouraged a self-identified community to articulate its tastes, as subsequent listings were compiled and revised mostly by Hines’ readers. This “freemasonry of motorists” constructed a gastronomic geography of America in an era when cars, roads, and the spatial reorganization of work and leisure developed roadside dining into a …

Enticing The Iron Horse: The Unexpected Effects Of Railroads On Town-Building In The Great Plains, Robert Voss

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

Town building in the Great Plains during the 19th century centered on railroads. Railroads were promoted as the means for fiscal success through direct and ancillary sources. When railroads did not transpire in the manners expected, towns sometimes resorted to drastic measures to lure railroads. These drastic measures could, and did, backfire as in the case of Brownville, Nebraska.

Located in southeastern Nebraska, Brownville offers an interesting study in the manner railroads affected town development. Planning, attempting and ultimately failing to entice railroads proved devastating to the town. The actions taken to get an effective railroad eventually led to lawsuits, …

Soliloquies And Dances: An Analytical Introduction To The Solo Saxophone Repertoire Of American Composer Elliot Del Borgo, Christopher Barrick

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, Student Creative Work, and Performances

The purpose of this document is to provide an introduction to the solo saxophone repertoire of American composer Elliot Del Borgo (b. 1938). By examining Del Borgo’s relatively unexplored body of works for saxophone, this research aims to encourage further research and performance of this music.

Since its invention in the 1840s, saxophonists have gone to great lengths to expand the instrument’s repertoire. Most of these efforts have been focused in one of two areas: the transcription and adaptation of existing music and the commissioning of composers to write new works for the saxophone. A subset of this latter method …

Predictions And Timing In An Olympic Year

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Let’s pretend that, twelve months ago, someone had put me in a room with 20 or so other China specialists, handed us each four slips of paper, and asked us to write on each piece a story with a Chinese theme that we predicted would make headlines in 2008, the year when the Beijing Olympics will start on August 8. It’s quite possible that the following would have happened:

1) One or more of us would have written that a headline-grabbing protest would break out. And going into more detail, some of those who made that forecast would have added …

Tibet, 228, And Ta-Pa-Ni: Some Lessons For Us All

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

As we struggle to make sense of the maelstrom of violent resistance and its suppression, not to mention cope with our own feelings as concerned observers, it might be useful to consider the following:

*Such outbreaks are invariably sparked by a complex combination of socioeconomic, ethnic, and religious factors.

*The violence is never a case of black and white; it is simply red, with aggressors and their victims far outnumbering any heroes. When tensions boil over, the initial targets tend to be symbols of authority (policemen, officials), but can also include men and women who are stigmatized and persecuted as …

Good Girl, Erika C. Navarrete Anderson

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

I have always had a narrative sensibility, drawing from memory, stories, and personal experience. Perhaps it was the abundance of story telling and gossip I absorbed growing up. The dominance of women in my family had a profound influence on how I created narratives in my earlier work. They remain core influences, and through them I have developed further, reaching out past linear narrative and specific story to focus on the psychology of internal and external experience.

When I began my MF A it was the first time in two years I was 'getting intensive feedback on my work. What …

Textile Society Of America Newsletter 20:2 — Spring/Summer 2008, Textile Society Of America

Textile Society of America: Newsletters

TSA 2008 Symposium Speakers: "Hawaii Calls: Announcing Keynote and Plenary Session Speakers, 11th TSA Biennial Symposium, Honolulu, HI, Sep. 24–27"
President's Letter
More Symposium News
TSA Member News
Publications News
In Memoriam: "Ursula Eland McCracken, Former Director, Textile Museum, 1942–2008"
Collections News, Calls for Papers
Book Reviews
Exhibit Reviews
Calendar: Exhibitions
Calendar: Lectures
Calendar: Workshops, Tours, Conferences and Symposia

Blanket Statements, Issue 91, Spring 2008

Blanket Statements: News Publication of the American Quilt Study Group

Blanket Statements, Issue 91, Spring 2008

Nebraska, New England, New York: Mapping The Foreground Of Willa Cather And Edith Lewis's Creative Partnership, Melissa J. Homestead, Anne L. Kaufman

Department of English: Faculty Publications

Who was the woman who could add local color in the form of kolaches (Czech pastries) to one of Cather's Nebraska stories and who could refine (and correct) the details of Cather's depiction of the home of a legendary New England literary hostess? One could search long in Cather biography and criticism and find no traces of the woman capable of making these carefully considered changes to Cather's prose. One can, of course, find many references to Edith Lewis, the woman with whom Cather shared an apartment in New York City for nearly four decades, but that Edith Lewis is …

On Their Best Behavior: Good Magazine On Contemporary China

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The cover story for the May/June issue of Good Magazine, just hitting newsstands, is “Don’t Be Scared of China.” Living up to their moniker as “media for people who give a damn,” Good’s China issue encourages readers to learn more about China and embrace, not hate, in features like the tongue-in-cheek play on tabloid Us Weekly’s “Stars…They’re Just Like Us” photo spread that declares “They’re Just Like Us…They Like Hip Hop” and “They’re Just Like Us…They Go To Vegas.”

Though this approach at cultural exchange is well-intentioned, it continues a particularly egocentric understanding of China as a recipient of American …

James Miles On Media Coverage Of Tibet

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

James Miles of The Economist was in Tibet when the riots and protests started on March 14. China’s strict limitations on foreign journalists entering Tibet in the following days made Miles one of the few journalists who saw the riots firsthand. With all the attention being now paid to how the international media are covering the events in Tibet, we thought it would be interesting to find out how Miles felt about the questions he got upon returning from the field. Here’s how he answered us via email.

China Beat: Is there any question that you’ve been asked a lot …

Tibet 5: In The Third Week

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

With the crisis in Tibet entering its third week, we continue to sweep the web in search of interesting and/or informative pieces to bring to the attention of our readers. This fifth installment in the series is heavily devoted to retrospective works, which go back in time, either to detail what took place in Tibet in the past or explore historical analogies useful for thinking through the contemporary situation. Still, since the story continues to unfold and take surprising turns, we also include links to pieces that track very recent developments, both on the ground and in the debate over …

The Taelspin On Tibet: The Chinese Response To Foreign Media Coverage Of The 3.14 Unrest

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Foreign media coverage of the demonstrations and riots in Lhasa, Qinghai,Sichuan, and Gansu two weeks ago has sparked a significant backlash here in China. State media continues to release increasingly shrill diatribes against Western media bias as Chinese netizens take to the internet with their own protests sparked by a general perception that coverage of the riots was purposely warped and skewed by anti-China forces in the West. (For a sampling in English, check out the back and forth on this forum hosted by that bastion of journalistic integrity and objectivity: The China Daily.) There’s a whole website devoted to …

Tibet Reading 4

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The coverage and dialogue about the situation in Tibet has continued over the past days, evolving largely (in great part due to foreign media’s lack of access to Tibet and neighboring provinces where unrest has occurred) into a discussion on China’s media clampdown and the way the Tibet riots and subsequent protests are being read in China and abroad. Here are some of the apropos things we’ve been reading in recent days.

1. On Danwei.org, an intriguing short piece on YouTube videos, which asks if this might be “the world’s first international user generated propaganda war?”

2. When the crisis …

Coming Distractions: Wolf Totem, Nicole Barnes

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In just a few days, famed translator Howard Goldblatt’s latest book, Wolf Totem, will be released to eager readers of Chinese literature in English translation. Having proven his mettle as translator of Xiao Hong’s angsty prose and Mo Yan’s morbidly lascivious novels, Goldblatt has now tried his hand at a certain piece of nostalgic drivel that leaked from the pen of Jiang Rong, a newly acclaimed novelist whose original work, Lang Tuteng, appeared in 2004 after more than 30 years of labor and immediately shot to the top of the bestseller lists, selling two million bookstore copies and countless more …

China Travel: Finding The "Real" China, Kate Merkel-Hess

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

I recently received two new travel books (of sorts) in my mailbox, one of which I wrote a few short bits for. Beijing Time by Michael Dutton, with Hsiu-ju Stacy Lo and Dong Dong Wu, (due out in May from Harvard University Press) andUrbanatomy: Shanghai 2008, edited by Nick Land (published by China Intercontinental Press in 2007) fall at opposite ends of a rather loosely envisioned “travel book” spectrum, but both promise an on-the-ground look at “new” China.

Beijing Time, by Goldsmiths, University of London Professor of Politics Michael Dutton and independent scholars Hsiu-ju Stacy Lo and Dong Dong Wu …

Tibet: Background On Current Events And Their History

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

A third installment of readings on Tibet.

1) This insightful piece on the economic roots of discontent in Tibet by Pankaj Mishra, an Indian intellectual who wrote an illuminating essay in the New Yorker last year about the impact of the new railroad through the Himalayas and recently was in China.

2) A careful day-to-day reconstruction of events, which highlight violence done by both sides on dramatic individual days such as March 14.

3) A fascinating look at the life and thought of the Dalai Lama by Pico Iyer, who has just published a book based on many years of …

It’S Still The Economy, Stupid

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Ma Ying-jeou’s convincing victory in Taiwan’s presidential election shows that the politics of fear are no match for the politics of the pocketbook. While the sight of four KMT legislators trying to force their way into the DPP campaign headquarters raised the specter of a return to the dreaded days of the White Terror, a majority of voters seem to have been convinced by the slew of apologies that followed, and assumed that Ma’s victory would end eight years of government gridlock that had contributed to Taiwan’s economic slowdown. While Ma’s hesitancy to explain whether he had formally renounced his …

The Election In Taiwan: The View From And Implications For The United States, Yong Chen

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

As American attention is captivated by the war in Iraq and, more recently, our own upcoming national election, another important event is about to take place on the other side of the Pacific Ocean: the presidential election of Taiwan on March 21 (March 22 local time). This event is of great importance to the United States for a number of reasons. First, there is the economic significance of Taiwan, which has emerged in recent decades as an important player in the global economy, especially in the IT sector. For instance, over 90% of the world’s OEM notebook PCs comes out …

Tibet: Further Reading

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

A few days ago, we published a handful of links to websites providing good or unique coverage of events or history related to the situation in Tibet. Here are six more.

1) A very timely joint review of two new books (one by noted travel writer Pico Iyer) that place Tibetan history and the Dalai Lama’s life into perspective have just appeared on the Economist‘s website.

2) An interesting extended look at how the current unrest compares with and is linked to events of the 1950s and 1980s, written by an adviser to the Tibetan government in exile.

3) If …

In Case You Missed It: China Road, Maura Elizabeth Cunningham

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

So many authors and pundits today attempt to predict China’s future by looking at the numbers: GDP, population, military spending, trade surplus, environmental measurements. Taking any combination of these figures, it is easy to declare that China is either a rising superpower, destined for world domination, or a teetering giant, bound only for disaster. The fact that both perspectives can—and have—been argued indicates the complexity of China’s situation and the inability of statistics to predict much of anything.

Rob Gifford, former Beijing correspondent for National Public Radio, took a three thousand mile-long journey along China’s Route 312, from Shanghai to …

Information On The Tibet Situation

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Many of us here at China Beat have been following very closely the story on the recent uprisings in Tibet and neighboring provinces. These are the sources we’ve been reading; if you have other recommendations for solid reporting and commentary on this developing situation, please post them in the comments section.

1. James Miles (Beijing bureau chief for the Economist and the author of The Legacy of Tiananmen: China in Disarray, on China in the aftermath of 1989) is apparently the only Western journalist who is or was in Lhasa. He’s published good reports like this one on the Economist‘s …

Blogging From The China Book Festivals

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

For the past week, all over China, writers have been bumping into each other at hotel check-ins, or at breakfast, in taxi queues. They have waved/hugged/air kissed, and asked: “Are you doing Beijing? Shanghai? Suzhou? Chengdu? Hong Kong….?” (In terms of one-upmanship a simple ‘yes’ to each can’t be beaten.)

Who’d have thought it? Book festivals – originally the cultural preserve of western cities – are popping up in several of China’s big urban centers. With one major difference, of course – they are run and largely attended by a rapidly growing population of expatriates. Much of the content is …