All this week (11/7 through 11/10) I'm going to be responding to standout conference moments on my own blog: http://americanstudier.blogspot.com/. Please feel free to head over there, see some of my takeaways from the amazing weekend, and add your own voice there (or here, or both).
Thanks,
Ben
Monday, November 7, 2011
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Post-Conference Conversations: Cathy Stanton's Responses
The conference has come and gone, with absolutely amazing and inspiring turnout and voices and conversations, but this blog remains; while it might turn into other American Studies dialogues in the months to come, right now it's going to be the host to some conference follow ups.
The first ones come from plenary speaker Cathy Stanton. Cathy has provided an e-version of her plenary talk here:
http://www.cathystanton.net/neasa-talk-2011.html
and has also responded to another Plymouth experience in a blog post here:
http://historyonwheels.blogspot.com/2011/11/living-history-at-motor-court.html
More to come! (And please of course continue to revisit or visit for the first time the many great pre-conference conversations present here.)
Ben Railton
The first ones come from plenary speaker Cathy Stanton. Cathy has provided an e-version of her plenary talk here:
http://www.cathystanton.net/neasa-talk-2011.html
and has also responded to another Plymouth experience in a blog post here:
http://historyonwheels.blogspot.com/2011/11/living-history-at-motor-court.html
More to come! (And please of course continue to revisit or visit for the first time the many great pre-conference conversations present here.)
Ben Railton
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Notes from Day 1
So much fun on the first day!
I was struck as I always am by the diversity of approaches at an American studies conference. As I was remarking to another participant, some panels you learn about things you didn't know (or refine ideas you already did) and other times you learn approaches.
The four panels or events I was able to attend give a good example of the discipline's intradisciplinary approaches. The plimoth/plymouth panel looked at both the town and the site from a visual standpoint in Holly Markovitz Goldstein's talk about the visual components of Plymouth, through an experiential and theoretical idea in Michael Millner's explication of the experience of bringing his college class to Plimoth Plantation, and Karyn Goldstein's talk on the way plymouth has been invoked over time. The discipline often does well when it explores a common text through multiple disciplines, and the audience was engaged by the panel as they were by the plenary speakers. The speakers all approached Plimoth/Plymouth from different disciplines or perspectives--from members of the Wampanoag tribe, Joan Tavares Avant and Linda Coombs, historian Joseph Contori, Archeologist Kevin McBride, and anthropologist Cathy Stanton.
The panel I chaired was one was tied together by the world's relationship to American culture. And the showcase of Native American artists last night at Pilgrim Hall emphasized in many ways the same point as the plenary speakers about the diversity of perspectives both in terms of Plymouth and in American Studies.
--Jonathan Silverman
I was struck as I always am by the diversity of approaches at an American studies conference. As I was remarking to another participant, some panels you learn about things you didn't know (or refine ideas you already did) and other times you learn approaches.
The four panels or events I was able to attend give a good example of the discipline's intradisciplinary approaches. The plimoth/plymouth panel looked at both the town and the site from a visual standpoint in Holly Markovitz Goldstein's talk about the visual components of Plymouth, through an experiential and theoretical idea in Michael Millner's explication of the experience of bringing his college class to Plimoth Plantation, and Karyn Goldstein's talk on the way plymouth has been invoked over time. The discipline often does well when it explores a common text through multiple disciplines, and the audience was engaged by the panel as they were by the plenary speakers. The speakers all approached Plimoth/Plymouth from different disciplines or perspectives--from members of the Wampanoag tribe, Joan Tavares Avant and Linda Coombs, historian Joseph Contori, Archeologist Kevin McBride, and anthropologist Cathy Stanton.
The panel I chaired was one was tied together by the world's relationship to American culture. And the showcase of Native American artists last night at Pilgrim Hall emphasized in many ways the same point as the plenary speakers about the diversity of perspectives both in terms of Plymouth and in American Studies.
--Jonathan Silverman
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Special Session: International Indigenous Video Conference
**Transnationalism and American Studies**
Video Conference with Indigenous Activist Organization from Oaxaca, Mexico
Please join us for a discussion with an organization that struggles for the cultural and social rights of indigenous people who inhabit a transnational local economy increasingly defined by the circulation of tourists, commodities, and culture. The Committee of Defense of the Citizenry (CODECI) was founded in 1996 to organize and advocate for indigenous Chinanteca/os who were displaced by the construction of the Cerro del Oro dam. It is now a multiethnic, multi-state, and transborder organization that works to support peasants, refugees, and migrants. For its efforts it faces constant repression.
Please join us!
Saturday, Nov.5 11- 12:15
Special Session 6D
Shakespeare Theater
New England American Studies Conference
Plimoth Plantation
137 Warren Avenue
Plymouth, Mass. 02360
Please contact Eric Larson with any questions. (larson@fas.harvard.edu)
Video Conference with Indigenous Activist Organization from Oaxaca, Mexico
Please join us for a discussion with an organization that struggles for the cultural and social rights of indigenous people who inhabit a transnational local economy increasingly defined by the circulation of tourists, commodities, and culture. The Committee of Defense of the Citizenry (CODECI) was founded in 1996 to organize and advocate for indigenous Chinanteca/os who were displaced by the construction of the Cerro del Oro dam. It is now a multiethnic, multi-state, and transborder organization that works to support peasants, refugees, and migrants. For its efforts it faces constant repression.
Please join us!
Saturday, Nov.5 11- 12:15
Special Session 6D
Shakespeare Theater
New England American Studies Conference
Plimoth Plantation
137 Warren Avenue
Plymouth, Mass. 02360
Please contact Eric Larson with any questions. (larson@fas.harvard.edu)
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Week 13 Recap and Open Thread
With the conference only days away now, presenters from both the Regional Indigenous Canon panel and the Friday evening reading shared their voices and ideas here. They make, through the very presence and even more through all that they have to say and offer, a more compelling case than I ever could for why you should find your way to Plimoth Plantation this Friday and Saturday.
This week, as we gear up for the conference, we'll hear from the Images of Plimoth and Plymouth panel, one of many that will focus on elements of our amazing site and space.
But please feel very free to keep digging back into the earlier weeks and posts on this blog, to add your thoughts to any prior post, to share your perspectives on American mythologies in this open thread, and generally to join our e-community even if you can't do so in person this weekend. Thanks!
This week, as we gear up for the conference, we'll hear from the Images of Plimoth and Plymouth panel, one of many that will focus on elements of our amazing site and space.
But please feel very free to keep digging back into the earlier weeks and posts on this blog, to add your thoughts to any prior post, to share your perspectives on American mythologies in this open thread, and generally to join our e-community even if you can't do so in person this weekend. Thanks!
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Friday: Indigenous New England Literature
How many Native American authors can you name from New England? BESIDES Samson Occom and William Apess. At Plimoth, you'll be able to learn about a rich regional indigenous literary history, going at least as far back as Mi'kmaq hieroglyphics and as far forward as Narragansett children's poetry. Even better, you get to meet some talented contemporary local Native authors, hear them read, and buy their books.
On Friday afternoon (Session 3A at 2:15) we will have a roundtable discussion with editors of Dawnland Voices: Writing from Indigenous New England. This anthology, years in the making and about 600 pages in manuscript form, is under contract with the University of Nebraska Press; if we're lucky, we should see it sometime next year.
The book is organized by nation, and each nation has a community editor--a tribal elder and/or historian who selected and introduced the texts. Three of these editors will be on hand to discuss the project: Joan Tavares Avant (Mashpee Wampanoag), Dawn Dove (Narragansett), and Stephanie Fielding (Mohegan). It's awe-inspiring to hear how much they know about tribal writing, how they located and chose texts for publication, and how they presented them. This is grass-roots canon-building!
Friday evening, Joan will read from her book, People of the First Light; along with Larry Spotted Crow Mann (Nipmuc), who has published a book of stories called Tales from the Whispering Basket; Mihku Paul (Maliseet), who has a forthcoming poetry chapbook; and Mohegan Medicine Woman Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel, who has a new Victorian Gothic, Fire Hollow.
If you want to learn a little more about these and other regional Native writers, you can follow the blog, Indigenous New England Literature . We also have an "Indigenous New England Literature" book discussion group on Goodreads.com. And hopefully, before too long, students at UNH will be launching an online archive of regional indigenous literature. Stay tuned, and come on Friday!
Siobhan Senier
University of New Hampshire
On Friday afternoon (Session 3A at 2:15) we will have a roundtable discussion with editors of Dawnland Voices: Writing from Indigenous New England. This anthology, years in the making and about 600 pages in manuscript form, is under contract with the University of Nebraska Press; if we're lucky, we should see it sometime next year.
The book is organized by nation, and each nation has a community editor--a tribal elder and/or historian who selected and introduced the texts. Three of these editors will be on hand to discuss the project: Joan Tavares Avant (Mashpee Wampanoag), Dawn Dove (Narragansett), and Stephanie Fielding (Mohegan). It's awe-inspiring to hear how much they know about tribal writing, how they located and chose texts for publication, and how they presented them. This is grass-roots canon-building!
Friday evening, Joan will read from her book, People of the First Light; along with Larry Spotted Crow Mann (Nipmuc), who has published a book of stories called Tales from the Whispering Basket; Mihku Paul (Maliseet), who has a forthcoming poetry chapbook; and Mohegan Medicine Woman Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel, who has a new Victorian Gothic, Fire Hollow.
If you want to learn a little more about these and other regional Native writers, you can follow the blog, Indigenous New England Literature . We also have an "Indigenous New England Literature" book discussion group on Goodreads.com. And hopefully, before too long, students at UNH will be launching an online archive of regional indigenous literature. Stay tuned, and come on Friday!
Siobhan Senier
University of New Hampshire
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Week 12 Recap and Open Thread
Less than two weeks until the conference! (Revised and updated program now available at http://www.neasa.org under the Conference tab.)
This week the presenters from the "Whispers, Screams, and Echoes: Creating, Recreating, and Challenging Archaeological Narratives" panel highlighted both their individual emphases and ideas and the panel's underlying questions and arguments here; presenter Russ Handsman of the Mashantucket Pequot Museum added some further questions and thoughts in a comment on that post. Please check out this panel's really interesting and important ideas, and add your own in comments too!
This week presenters from a panel on the regional indigenous canon--presenters who have worked to assemble an anthology of those writings--will share their voices here. Keep an eye out for that, but feel free as well to use this post as an open thread to highlight your building excitement for the conference!
This week the presenters from the "Whispers, Screams, and Echoes: Creating, Recreating, and Challenging Archaeological Narratives" panel highlighted both their individual emphases and ideas and the panel's underlying questions and arguments here; presenter Russ Handsman of the Mashantucket Pequot Museum added some further questions and thoughts in a comment on that post. Please check out this panel's really interesting and important ideas, and add your own in comments too!
This week presenters from a panel on the regional indigenous canon--presenters who have worked to assemble an anthology of those writings--will share their voices here. Keep an eye out for that, but feel free as well to use this post as an open thread to highlight your building excitement for the conference!
Monday, October 17, 2011
Archaeological narratives
The contributors to “Whispers, screams and echoes: creating, recreating and challenging archaeological narratives” draw on research and experiences with archaeological narratives grounded in Native homelands of northern New England (Roberts Moody), coastal and interior southern New England (Herbster, Loren et al., Kirakosian, Harris & Robinson, Handsman), and central New York (Rossen).
The ideas in these papers intersect and overlap in interesting ways. The common thread woven through all papers is a questioning of stable, normative, and unmarked categories in archaeological narratives and an exploration of the slipperiness of thematic binaries and emplotments. Some emphasize materiality and raise issues of analytic scale (Loren et al., Handsman, Herbster). Others focus our attention on the subject(s) of analysis (Loren et al., Harris & Robinson, Kirakosian), shifting our focus from long unquestioned themes and one-sided stories, such as the educating and civilizing of Indians in a colonial “wilderness”, powerful individuals making decisions that change historical trajectories, and archaeological expertise. Others offer directions for changing and replacing outmoded narratives, drawing on powerful interconnections and relations that come from Indigenous knowledge and traditions, post-colonial theory and cross-cultural engagement (Roberts Moody, Loren et al., Harris & Robinson, Handsman, Herbster, Rossen).
In developing an organizational scheme for the session (and recognizing the pitfalls of imposing our own thematic framework) we see the papers falling into two broad categories that will structure the order of the papers:
Theme 1: Analyzing and Challenging Narratives
(1) Katie Kirakosian provides a discussion of the inherent narrative structure of archaeological publications and offers a discourse analysis of 19th-21st century narratives focused on shell midden sites in southern New England. She lays out a series of framing ideas, drawn from literary analysis. Her preliminary analyses show how archaeological narratives are operationalized in different ways through time.
(2) Donna Roberts Moody asks: “Why is there a gulf between archaeology and Native people in Northern New England?” To address this question, she provides a critique of mainstream archaeological practice and raises three important issues: (1) how archaeological narratives become entrenched; (2) the limitations of interpretations that de-privilege context; and (3) the potential benefits of collaboration. Roberts Moody provides insights into current debates in New England archaeology surrounding stone chambers and stone piles that challenge positions staked on existing archaeological narratives.
(3) Jack Rossen offers direct engagement with four archaeological narratives that shape popular understandings of Native history in Cayuga territory. Rossen traces the production of these narratives and the archaeological evidence marshaled in support. He outlines the ways that they are deployed to reinforce efforts to undermine Native land claims and support racist attitudes towards Native revitalization. Rossen counters each narrative with empirically-based alternatives that draw on the transformative potential of Indigenous archaeology.
Theme 2: Resisting, Accommodating, and Changing Narratives
(4) Holly Herbster provides an example of collaborative archaeology from southern New England, tracing the changes in archaeological concerns on the island of Martha’s Vineyard from early-mid 20th century preoccupations with culture history and environmental adaptations, to present-day collaborative approaches towards Wampanoag heritage preservation. The case study offers insights on the issue of trust, long-term commitment, shared goals, “mutual education,” communication, and shared knowledge production. One of the critical issues raised relates to narrative control and the potential conflicts and compromises necessary in collaborative, compliance-based contexts.
(5) Doug Harris and Paul Robinson chart a course for changing entrenched historical narratives through a critique of explanations for the beginning of King Philip’s War. They problematize the notion that a stable peace existed prior to the war, citing archaeological evidence of pronounced stress on Native communities in Narragansett territory. They argue that labeling the pre-war era as a “time of peace” ignores both the suffering of Native people and the strategies they employed for consensus building and avoiding conflict in the face of provocation. They suggest an alternative interpretation based on analysis of the motivations and intentions of Native people who recognized potential consequences of their actions.
(6) Diana Loren, Christina Hodge, and Patricia Capone examine conversion and Native American literacy at Harvard College, demonstrating that the Puritan logic of colonialism based on regulated cultural categories (wilderness/civilization; English/Native) were subverted by the cultural nearness and inherent messiness of colonial encounters. They argue that English see themselves in their view of Native peoples, informing us more about Puritan habitus than Native peoples themselves. They draw on the notion of hybridity—that colonial encounters result in something new and substantially different—which is engaged as a means of understanding the materiality of the Harvard Indian College.
(7) Russell Handsman explores why “disappearance” narrative are so difficult to dislodge. He examines the unintended silences and contradictions of the earliest exhibit installations at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center and the recent efforts to re-orient the narratives communicated in exhibits by “inserting Pequot experiences into unexpected places”: urban environments, the military, and other off-reservation contexts. He wonders at the impotence of such narratives for tribal members and concludes that the various narratives that co-exist at the museum—loss, continuity, change, survivance--all undercut the disappearance myth.
Questions for reflection:
(1) The contributors to this session describe, problematize, and/or challenge thematic dichotomies that pervade archaeological narratives. Why are the thematic binaries that structure colonialist and archaeological narratives so pervasive and perduring?
Examples:
• continuity/loss (e.g., Handsman)
• presence (or homeland)/absence (or empty) (e.g., Handsman, Rossen, Loren et al.)
• peace/war (e.g., Harris & Robinson)
• powerful/disempowered (e.g., Harris & Robinson)
• past/future (e.g., Handsman)
• economy/heritage (e.g., Herbster, Handsman)
• site of scientific research/sacred site (e.g., Herbster)
• civilization/wilderness (e.g., Loren et al., Rossen)
• English (Puritan, Christian)/Indian (e.g., Loren et al.)
• hybridity/homogeneity (e.g., Loren et al.)
• scientific knowledge/Indigenous knowledge (e.g., Roberts Moody, Rossen)
• material/oral (e.g., Roberts Moody, Rossen)
• oldtimers (ancient)/newcomers (e.g., Rossen)
(2) Whom do particular archaeological narratives serve? What is at stake in challenging archaeological narratives?
(3) How do we move beyond critique of archaeological narratives? Is it a matter of re-focusing the subject/scale of analyses or research questions, how archaeological evidence is marshaled, or engaging with different forms of knowledge?
(4) What has, or is, changing/unchanged in archaeological narratives as a result of collaboration, regulation, and/or heightened attention to ethics?
(5) As Loren et al. and Handsman point out, a pervasive assumption throughout the Northeast is that Native Americans disappeared through assimilation, dislocation, and death and “that for something to be Native American, it must seem Native American; that is, is must not seem English”/Euroamerican (Loren et al.). How can archaeological narratives challenge historical erasures on the one hand, and resist reifying these categories, especially in a contemporary sociopolitical contexts where such categories matter in the material conditions that stem from identity politics?
(6) Several contributors refer to current debates in New England/Northeastern archaeology that question established archaeological narratives, knowledge and interpretations (e.g., stone piles in New England, antiquity of Haudenausaunee Confederacy). Are there certain times that are riper for new narratives to take hold? Or less so? What do these alternative narratives (archaeological and otherwise) offer that was lacking before?
(7) How are narratives about the past simultaneously narratives about the discipline of archaeology and present day social relations or preoccupations?
(8) Are certain narratives deep-rooted in the identity of the nation, the region and us?
(9) Are there instances where we have an ethical obligation to speak out against some narratives?
(10) Are narratives the most powerful when they have tangible elements? Does this privilege or empower archaeologists as producers (or “contesters”) of narratives based on the nature of the discipline? What about intangible aspects of narratives?
(11) Can and should oppositional narratives occupy the same space?
Session organizers: Siobhan Hart, SUNY Binghamton, and Katie Kirakosian, UMass Amherst
The ideas in these papers intersect and overlap in interesting ways. The common thread woven through all papers is a questioning of stable, normative, and unmarked categories in archaeological narratives and an exploration of the slipperiness of thematic binaries and emplotments. Some emphasize materiality and raise issues of analytic scale (Loren et al., Handsman, Herbster). Others focus our attention on the subject(s) of analysis (Loren et al., Harris & Robinson, Kirakosian), shifting our focus from long unquestioned themes and one-sided stories, such as the educating and civilizing of Indians in a colonial “wilderness”, powerful individuals making decisions that change historical trajectories, and archaeological expertise. Others offer directions for changing and replacing outmoded narratives, drawing on powerful interconnections and relations that come from Indigenous knowledge and traditions, post-colonial theory and cross-cultural engagement (Roberts Moody, Loren et al., Harris & Robinson, Handsman, Herbster, Rossen).
In developing an organizational scheme for the session (and recognizing the pitfalls of imposing our own thematic framework) we see the papers falling into two broad categories that will structure the order of the papers:
Theme 1: Analyzing and Challenging Narratives
(1) Katie Kirakosian provides a discussion of the inherent narrative structure of archaeological publications and offers a discourse analysis of 19th-21st century narratives focused on shell midden sites in southern New England. She lays out a series of framing ideas, drawn from literary analysis. Her preliminary analyses show how archaeological narratives are operationalized in different ways through time.
(2) Donna Roberts Moody asks: “Why is there a gulf between archaeology and Native people in Northern New England?” To address this question, she provides a critique of mainstream archaeological practice and raises three important issues: (1) how archaeological narratives become entrenched; (2) the limitations of interpretations that de-privilege context; and (3) the potential benefits of collaboration. Roberts Moody provides insights into current debates in New England archaeology surrounding stone chambers and stone piles that challenge positions staked on existing archaeological narratives.
(3) Jack Rossen offers direct engagement with four archaeological narratives that shape popular understandings of Native history in Cayuga territory. Rossen traces the production of these narratives and the archaeological evidence marshaled in support. He outlines the ways that they are deployed to reinforce efforts to undermine Native land claims and support racist attitudes towards Native revitalization. Rossen counters each narrative with empirically-based alternatives that draw on the transformative potential of Indigenous archaeology.
Theme 2: Resisting, Accommodating, and Changing Narratives
(4) Holly Herbster provides an example of collaborative archaeology from southern New England, tracing the changes in archaeological concerns on the island of Martha’s Vineyard from early-mid 20th century preoccupations with culture history and environmental adaptations, to present-day collaborative approaches towards Wampanoag heritage preservation. The case study offers insights on the issue of trust, long-term commitment, shared goals, “mutual education,” communication, and shared knowledge production. One of the critical issues raised relates to narrative control and the potential conflicts and compromises necessary in collaborative, compliance-based contexts.
(5) Doug Harris and Paul Robinson chart a course for changing entrenched historical narratives through a critique of explanations for the beginning of King Philip’s War. They problematize the notion that a stable peace existed prior to the war, citing archaeological evidence of pronounced stress on Native communities in Narragansett territory. They argue that labeling the pre-war era as a “time of peace” ignores both the suffering of Native people and the strategies they employed for consensus building and avoiding conflict in the face of provocation. They suggest an alternative interpretation based on analysis of the motivations and intentions of Native people who recognized potential consequences of their actions.
(6) Diana Loren, Christina Hodge, and Patricia Capone examine conversion and Native American literacy at Harvard College, demonstrating that the Puritan logic of colonialism based on regulated cultural categories (wilderness/civilization; English/Native) were subverted by the cultural nearness and inherent messiness of colonial encounters. They argue that English see themselves in their view of Native peoples, informing us more about Puritan habitus than Native peoples themselves. They draw on the notion of hybridity—that colonial encounters result in something new and substantially different—which is engaged as a means of understanding the materiality of the Harvard Indian College.
(7) Russell Handsman explores why “disappearance” narrative are so difficult to dislodge. He examines the unintended silences and contradictions of the earliest exhibit installations at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center and the recent efforts to re-orient the narratives communicated in exhibits by “inserting Pequot experiences into unexpected places”: urban environments, the military, and other off-reservation contexts. He wonders at the impotence of such narratives for tribal members and concludes that the various narratives that co-exist at the museum—loss, continuity, change, survivance--all undercut the disappearance myth.
Questions for reflection:
(1) The contributors to this session describe, problematize, and/or challenge thematic dichotomies that pervade archaeological narratives. Why are the thematic binaries that structure colonialist and archaeological narratives so pervasive and perduring?
Examples:
• continuity/loss (e.g., Handsman)
• presence (or homeland)/absence (or empty) (e.g., Handsman, Rossen, Loren et al.)
• peace/war (e.g., Harris & Robinson)
• powerful/disempowered (e.g., Harris & Robinson)
• past/future (e.g., Handsman)
• economy/heritage (e.g., Herbster, Handsman)
• site of scientific research/sacred site (e.g., Herbster)
• civilization/wilderness (e.g., Loren et al., Rossen)
• English (Puritan, Christian)/Indian (e.g., Loren et al.)
• hybridity/homogeneity (e.g., Loren et al.)
• scientific knowledge/Indigenous knowledge (e.g., Roberts Moody, Rossen)
• material/oral (e.g., Roberts Moody, Rossen)
• oldtimers (ancient)/newcomers (e.g., Rossen)
(2) Whom do particular archaeological narratives serve? What is at stake in challenging archaeological narratives?
(3) How do we move beyond critique of archaeological narratives? Is it a matter of re-focusing the subject/scale of analyses or research questions, how archaeological evidence is marshaled, or engaging with different forms of knowledge?
(4) What has, or is, changing/unchanged in archaeological narratives as a result of collaboration, regulation, and/or heightened attention to ethics?
(5) As Loren et al. and Handsman point out, a pervasive assumption throughout the Northeast is that Native Americans disappeared through assimilation, dislocation, and death and “that for something to be Native American, it must seem Native American; that is, is must not seem English”/Euroamerican (Loren et al.). How can archaeological narratives challenge historical erasures on the one hand, and resist reifying these categories, especially in a contemporary sociopolitical contexts where such categories matter in the material conditions that stem from identity politics?
(6) Several contributors refer to current debates in New England/Northeastern archaeology that question established archaeological narratives, knowledge and interpretations (e.g., stone piles in New England, antiquity of Haudenausaunee Confederacy). Are there certain times that are riper for new narratives to take hold? Or less so? What do these alternative narratives (archaeological and otherwise) offer that was lacking before?
(7) How are narratives about the past simultaneously narratives about the discipline of archaeology and present day social relations or preoccupations?
(8) Are certain narratives deep-rooted in the identity of the nation, the region and us?
(9) Are there instances where we have an ethical obligation to speak out against some narratives?
(10) Are narratives the most powerful when they have tangible elements? Does this privilege or empower archaeologists as producers (or “contesters”) of narratives based on the nature of the discipline? What about intangible aspects of narratives?
(11) Can and should oppositional narratives occupy the same space?
Session organizers: Siobhan Hart, SUNY Binghamton, and Katie Kirakosian, UMass Amherst
Week 11 Recap and Open Thread
This week featured Craig Perrier of the Native Americans panel, blogging about collective and educational memories and histories of the Pequot War here.
Please continue to read and comment on Craig's post and all those that have come before in this space, and please feel free to use this post as an open thread for any thoughts and conversations about or toward our conference (less than three weeks away--the program has been added to once more and is still available at our www.neasa.org site).
This week we hear from presenting on the "Creating, Recreating, and Challenging Archaeological Narratives" panel. See you soon!
Please continue to read and comment on Craig's post and all those that have come before in this space, and please feel free to use this post as an open thread for any thoughts and conversations about or toward our conference (less than three weeks away--the program has been added to once more and is still available at our www.neasa.org site).
This week we hear from presenting on the "Creating, Recreating, and Challenging Archaeological Narratives" panel. See you soon!
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Craig Perrier's (Native Americans) Post
My paper, ““Confronting American Genocide: United States History and the Pequot War” is part of the “Native Americans” panel on Saturday at 2:15 p.m. Below is an excerpt from my piece.
"Emblazoned upon the white backdrop and blue shield prominently displayed in the center of Massachusetts’ state flag stands the golden figure of a Native American. Massachusetts general law Chapter 2, section 1, identifies the form simply as an “Indian”. Inference suggests, however, the character is a representative of the Algonquian language family. Specific references typically identify him as a member of the tribe, subsequently immortalized in the state’s moniker, “Massachusetts”. Both labels regarding the Native American’s identity make geo-historical sense. Algonquian societies, including the Pequot, populated greater New England and were among the first people to encounter English colonists in North America. What’s more, the decision to include an “Indian” on the Commonwealth’s banner seems celebratory, a tribute to the indigenous people of the New World. There are, however, two other elements on the state standard which invite alternate interpretations of native-colonial relationships. The first feature, an unraveled ribbon flowing around the blue shield framing the centerpiece, is inscribed in Latin, “Ense petit placidam sub libertate quietem.” (By the sword we seek peace, but peace only under liberty). The quote directly references the second image; a bent, sword-wielding arm hovering above the Algonquian’s head akin to Damocles’ fateful blade. Taken together, this iconography conjures up a variety of historically contextualized imaginaries. Among them are incidents of war, paternalism, and scalping. In this light, the celebratory “Indian” mentioned earlier, can be just as justifiably understood as a memorial over a conquered, decimated foe.
Central to this paper’s inquiry is the relationship between the concept “genocide” and its existence in American historical memory. Furthermore, the interplay between narrative and education are subsequently formalized in institutionalized conceptualizations of the American identity.Commenting on the influence of historical memory construction, Harvard educational psychologist Howard Gardner, details that ”over time and cultures, the most robust and most effective form of communication is the creation of a powerful narrative. Any one person or agent or institution that has the capacity to decide which story is operative, to sideline or minimize rival stories and to prepare for the next generation’s stories, is in a very powerful position.”The implications surrounding “genocide” and its relation to national identities are especially sensitive and nuanced. A principle contested theme of interpretation is the marking of the war as an example of genocide. Since Raphael Lemkin’s creation of the term in 1943, “genocide” labels have been applied to events which predate the mid-twentieth century. The Pequot War is fertile ground for arguments over such branding.
This paper supports the claim that the Pequot War was a case of genocide. Paramount to this rationale is a definitive understanding of genocide’s formalized terminology and its relevant application to an event three centuries before its codification in the 1948 United Nations Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Furthermore, the functions of education and memory are considered crucial elements in the relationship among national narratives, identity, and acts of genocides. The ultimate goal of this paper is to make a case for high school history curriculum standards to identify and teach the Pequot War as a genocidal act. Furthermore, memory and education are considered essential elements for prevention of future genocide. Altering existing high school content, and teaching genocide in the U.S. national narrative, works to greater understanding and deterrence of genocide."
"Emblazoned upon the white backdrop and blue shield prominently displayed in the center of Massachusetts’ state flag stands the golden figure of a Native American. Massachusetts general law Chapter 2, section 1, identifies the form simply as an “Indian”. Inference suggests, however, the character is a representative of the Algonquian language family. Specific references typically identify him as a member of the tribe, subsequently immortalized in the state’s moniker, “Massachusetts”. Both labels regarding the Native American’s identity make geo-historical sense. Algonquian societies, including the Pequot, populated greater New England and were among the first people to encounter English colonists in North America. What’s more, the decision to include an “Indian” on the Commonwealth’s banner seems celebratory, a tribute to the indigenous people of the New World. There are, however, two other elements on the state standard which invite alternate interpretations of native-colonial relationships. The first feature, an unraveled ribbon flowing around the blue shield framing the centerpiece, is inscribed in Latin, “Ense petit placidam sub libertate quietem.” (By the sword we seek peace, but peace only under liberty). The quote directly references the second image; a bent, sword-wielding arm hovering above the Algonquian’s head akin to Damocles’ fateful blade. Taken together, this iconography conjures up a variety of historically contextualized imaginaries. Among them are incidents of war, paternalism, and scalping. In this light, the celebratory “Indian” mentioned earlier, can be just as justifiably understood as a memorial over a conquered, decimated foe.
Central to this paper’s inquiry is the relationship between the concept “genocide” and its existence in American historical memory. Furthermore, the interplay between narrative and education are subsequently formalized in institutionalized conceptualizations of the American identity.Commenting on the influence of historical memory construction, Harvard educational psychologist Howard Gardner, details that ”over time and cultures, the most robust and most effective form of communication is the creation of a powerful narrative. Any one person or agent or institution that has the capacity to decide which story is operative, to sideline or minimize rival stories and to prepare for the next generation’s stories, is in a very powerful position.”The implications surrounding “genocide” and its relation to national identities are especially sensitive and nuanced. A principle contested theme of interpretation is the marking of the war as an example of genocide. Since Raphael Lemkin’s creation of the term in 1943, “genocide” labels have been applied to events which predate the mid-twentieth century. The Pequot War is fertile ground for arguments over such branding.
This paper supports the claim that the Pequot War was a case of genocide. Paramount to this rationale is a definitive understanding of genocide’s formalized terminology and its relevant application to an event three centuries before its codification in the 1948 United Nations Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Furthermore, the functions of education and memory are considered crucial elements in the relationship among national narratives, identity, and acts of genocides. The ultimate goal of this paper is to make a case for high school history curriculum standards to identify and teach the Pequot War as a genocidal act. Furthermore, memory and education are considered essential elements for prevention of future genocide. Altering existing high school content, and teaching genocide in the U.S. national narrative, works to greater understanding and deterrence of genocide."
Monday, October 10, 2011
Week 10 Recap and Open Thread
This week the presenters from the "National Identity and Ethnic Counter-Narratives" panel--Katie Daily, Diane Hotten-Somers, and Paul Schmitz--shared their paper and panel ideas here.
The conference is less than four weeks away, and we'd love to have you join us there--see http://www.neasa.org for all the info, including a full program. But in the meantime, please keep reading and commenting on the earlier posts here, use this post as an open thread for any other ideas or conversations, and look for posts from the Native Americans panel this coming week!
The conference is less than four weeks away, and we'd love to have you join us there--see http://www.neasa.org for all the info, including a full program. But in the meantime, please keep reading and commenting on the earlier posts here, use this post as an open thread for any other ideas or conversations, and look for posts from the Native Americans panel this coming week!
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Re-Envisioning, Re-Staging, and Retailing: National Identity and Ethnic Counter-Narratives
European immigrants and ethnic Americans are often viewed as exemplars of the American Dream. In the commonly told story, Jewish, Irish, and Italian immigrants arrive in America and struggle to find employment, but after much hard work and perseverance, finally achieve success and, in the process, exchange their native identities for normative, bourgeois American ones. Through the papers proposed for this panel, Daily, Hotten-Somers, and Schmitz will challenge this narrative in three different forums: business and immigration history, the theatre, and the novel. In each of these papers, the scholars engage in a re-telling of a master narrative of what it means to become and be American.
Katie Daily’s paper, “(re)Envisioning Jewish America: Counterfactual History in The Yiddish Policemen’s Union and The Plot Against America,” considers Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America alongside Michael Chabon’s The Yiddish Policemen’s Union to understand the ways in which these two contemporary American Jewish writers employ counterfactual strategies to explore questions of American and ethnic identity. In pushing the bounds of history, asking readers to consider how we read the past, Roth and Chabon uncover the fracturing of identity that occurs as racial and ethnic minorities search for a place in the nation. Daily argues that such rewritings of history in the form of the postmodern novel offer ethnic counter-narratives that challenge conventional understandings of immigration and assimilation.
Diane Hotten-Somers’ paper, "Jewish America Awakes and Sings the Irish Blues: Sean O'Casey, Clifford Odets, and Working-Class Identities,” engages similar ideas as Daily’s in that it considers how Jewish-American immigrants constructed themselves in the face of an Anglo-American Protestant normative cultural identity. Through comparatively analyzing Sean O’Casey’s tenement drama Juno and the Paycock with Clifford Odets’ Awake and Sing!, this paper explores the ways in which Odets redraws the stage Jew by employing O’Casey’s prior strategies of rewriting the stage Irishman. Through their re-stagings, Hotten-Somers argues, both O’Casey and Odets provided not only more complicated theatrical representations of the Irish and Jewish-Americans, but also exposed the complex cultural-historical experiences of the early 20th-century urban, working-class in Ireland and America.
Paul Schmitz’s paper, “Urban Pastorals and American Dreams: Narratives of Business and Identity in New York’s Italian Community,” shifts the focus to another group of white ethnic Americans and their urban environs. Schmitz analyzes the ways in which Italian immigrants negotiated their identities through ethnic commerce, demonstrating that food retailing provided a crucial avenue of upward mobility for New York’s immigrant community. Schmitz argues that the retail food business—from pushcarts to corner groceries—played a fundamental role in the immigrants’ cultural conversion from an alien underclass to symbols of American enterprise. This paper is especially attentive to the tensions between the popular narrative of New York’s Italian grocers as a kind of “Old World,” urban underclass and the immigrant merchants’ own desires to master the narrative of the American Dream and the free-market system to serve their own aspirations for social mobility and assimilation.
These three papers individually address how white ethnic Americans negotiated, indeed reconstructed, their identities in the face of a normative, non-ethnic American cultural identity. At the same time, in positioning the stories of Jews, Irish, and Italians alongside each other, the panel as a whole highlights the advantages of a interdisciplinary comparative ethnic methodology, illustrating how attention to the similarities and differences between immigrant representations, histories, and experiences compels a rewriting of the myth of the American Dream.
Diane Hotten-Somers, Boston College
Katie Daily’s paper, “(re)Envisioning Jewish America: Counterfactual History in The Yiddish Policemen’s Union and The Plot Against America,” considers Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America alongside Michael Chabon’s The Yiddish Policemen’s Union to understand the ways in which these two contemporary American Jewish writers employ counterfactual strategies to explore questions of American and ethnic identity. In pushing the bounds of history, asking readers to consider how we read the past, Roth and Chabon uncover the fracturing of identity that occurs as racial and ethnic minorities search for a place in the nation. Daily argues that such rewritings of history in the form of the postmodern novel offer ethnic counter-narratives that challenge conventional understandings of immigration and assimilation.
Diane Hotten-Somers’ paper, "Jewish America Awakes and Sings the Irish Blues: Sean O'Casey, Clifford Odets, and Working-Class Identities,” engages similar ideas as Daily’s in that it considers how Jewish-American immigrants constructed themselves in the face of an Anglo-American Protestant normative cultural identity. Through comparatively analyzing Sean O’Casey’s tenement drama Juno and the Paycock with Clifford Odets’ Awake and Sing!, this paper explores the ways in which Odets redraws the stage Jew by employing O’Casey’s prior strategies of rewriting the stage Irishman. Through their re-stagings, Hotten-Somers argues, both O’Casey and Odets provided not only more complicated theatrical representations of the Irish and Jewish-Americans, but also exposed the complex cultural-historical experiences of the early 20th-century urban, working-class in Ireland and America.
Paul Schmitz’s paper, “Urban Pastorals and American Dreams: Narratives of Business and Identity in New York’s Italian Community,” shifts the focus to another group of white ethnic Americans and their urban environs. Schmitz analyzes the ways in which Italian immigrants negotiated their identities through ethnic commerce, demonstrating that food retailing provided a crucial avenue of upward mobility for New York’s immigrant community. Schmitz argues that the retail food business—from pushcarts to corner groceries—played a fundamental role in the immigrants’ cultural conversion from an alien underclass to symbols of American enterprise. This paper is especially attentive to the tensions between the popular narrative of New York’s Italian grocers as a kind of “Old World,” urban underclass and the immigrant merchants’ own desires to master the narrative of the American Dream and the free-market system to serve their own aspirations for social mobility and assimilation.
These three papers individually address how white ethnic Americans negotiated, indeed reconstructed, their identities in the face of a normative, non-ethnic American cultural identity. At the same time, in positioning the stories of Jews, Irish, and Italians alongside each other, the panel as a whole highlights the advantages of a interdisciplinary comparative ethnic methodology, illustrating how attention to the similarities and differences between immigrant representations, histories, and experiences compels a rewriting of the myth of the American Dream.
Diane Hotten-Somers, Boston College
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Week 9 Recap and Open Thread
This week we featured three posts from the "Activating Public Memory" proposed panel and one from the Slavery panel:
--From the latter, Vanessa Varin blogged about slavery, capital punishment, and narratives of race, justice, and identity here;
--And from the "Public Memory" panel, we heard from Elena Gonzales on the National Museum of the American Indian; from Robyn Schroeder on memory and Obama's presidential campaign; and from Amy Johnson on the legacies of Japanese internment.
Really great stuff, and I hope you'll get a chance to read and respond to these provocative and important posts and ideas. With the conference exactly a month away, I can't think of a better way to get excited for our full and rich two days of panels and voices than by checking out the first 8 weeks of this blog as well; see the Recaps category at right to get a quick sense of all of our posts to date. And please check out the full conference program draft and much more at www.neasa.org (Conference tab) for all the info on the conference.
Five more weeks of great voices here too--and next week we feature presenters from the Ethnic Counter-Narratives panel. Come check back in!
--From the latter, Vanessa Varin blogged about slavery, capital punishment, and narratives of race, justice, and identity here;
--And from the "Public Memory" panel, we heard from Elena Gonzales on the National Museum of the American Indian; from Robyn Schroeder on memory and Obama's presidential campaign; and from Amy Johnson on the legacies of Japanese internment.
Really great stuff, and I hope you'll get a chance to read and respond to these provocative and important posts and ideas. With the conference exactly a month away, I can't think of a better way to get excited for our full and rich two days of panels and voices than by checking out the first 8 weeks of this blog as well; see the Recaps category at right to get a quick sense of all of our posts to date. And please check out the full conference program draft and much more at www.neasa.org (Conference tab) for all the info on the conference.
Five more weeks of great voices here too--and next week we feature presenters from the Ethnic Counter-Narratives panel. Come check back in!
Friday, September 30, 2011
Vanessa Varin's (Slavery) Post
Reports from the Gallows: Southern Capital Punishment, 1776-1820
On March 28, 1820, Jordan- a Virginia slave convicted of the murder of his overseer- was ushered before a sizeable crowd eager to witness his death. Slaves convicted of capital crimes faced swift justice, for southern legal norms dictated an expedited trial and punishment. Often, large gangs of slaves were brought in to witness the spectacle. Their inclusion was a political move by the slaveholders to deter future slave resistance. Before climbing to the top of the ladder, Jordan murmured a short prayer- a public act of contrition expected of criminals. Finally, a spectator reported, “…he was turned off; his struggles lasted three to four minutes.” His body presumably remained before the public’s view for the rest of the day, a symbolic representation of white supremacy in the South.
Jordan’s case tested the boundaries of plantation justice. His body reminded the public of the swift and merciless nature of southern justice. Executions were harsh, theatrical, and purposeful. The southern imagination on the subject of capital punishment was closely tied to race and protection of the social order. Southerners embraced capital punishment as a prescription to the ills of society-either civic or theological deviance. Instead of viewing the gallows as a symbol of the wrongs of society, southerners romanticized and mythologized death sentences, imagining the gallows to be a mechanism to produce conformity and order. Moreover, southerners constructed myths that legitimized their support of the institution, including: the guiding hand of god at the gallows, the belief of crime as a contagion, and the threat of slave revolts. Myths served to underpin the existing social order, and planter authority.
Vanessa Varin, Louisiana State University
On March 28, 1820, Jordan- a Virginia slave convicted of the murder of his overseer- was ushered before a sizeable crowd eager to witness his death. Slaves convicted of capital crimes faced swift justice, for southern legal norms dictated an expedited trial and punishment. Often, large gangs of slaves were brought in to witness the spectacle. Their inclusion was a political move by the slaveholders to deter future slave resistance. Before climbing to the top of the ladder, Jordan murmured a short prayer- a public act of contrition expected of criminals. Finally, a spectator reported, “…he was turned off; his struggles lasted three to four minutes.” His body presumably remained before the public’s view for the rest of the day, a symbolic representation of white supremacy in the South.
Jordan’s case tested the boundaries of plantation justice. His body reminded the public of the swift and merciless nature of southern justice. Executions were harsh, theatrical, and purposeful. The southern imagination on the subject of capital punishment was closely tied to race and protection of the social order. Southerners embraced capital punishment as a prescription to the ills of society-either civic or theological deviance. Instead of viewing the gallows as a symbol of the wrongs of society, southerners romanticized and mythologized death sentences, imagining the gallows to be a mechanism to produce conformity and order. Moreover, southerners constructed myths that legitimized their support of the institution, including: the guiding hand of god at the gallows, the belief of crime as a contagion, and the threat of slave revolts. Myths served to underpin the existing social order, and planter authority.
Vanessa Varin, Louisiana State University
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Activating Public Memory: Amy Johnson's Post
[Panel's overall statement: As a panel, we're interested in the many ways in which history and memory have influenced the construction, dissemination, and reception of racialized national mythologies. In each case, the central question revolves around how national mythologies and narratives at the core of an American collective memory have be activated to challenge, bolster, or erase certain issues concerning race and social justice.]
“We are setting a standard for the rest of the world for the treatment of people who may have loyalties to an enemy nation. We are protecting ourselves without violating the principles of Christian decency. And we won’t change that fundamental decency no matter what our enemies do. But of course, we hope most earnestly that our example will influence the Axis power’s treatment of Americans who fall into their hands.”
On February 19, 1942, two months after the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japanese forces, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 authorizing the Secretary of War to designate certain areas in the United States as military zones. On March 18, 1942, Roosevelt established the War Relocation Authority (WRA) and appointed Milton Eisenhower, brother of General Dwight D. Eisenhower and a New Deal bureaucrat in the Department of Agriculture, to oversee operations.
In 1942, the Office of War Information released "Japanese Relocation," a strategically titled short film produced on behalf of the U.S. government and and the WRA. The film explained the internment of tens of thousands of American citizens of Japanese ancestry and resident aliens from Japan living on the western coast of the United States. Eisenhower not only provides the rationale for the removal of Japanese American citizens but he also claims that the Japanese "cheerfully" participated in the relocation process. According to the film, the process was amicable, with "the military and civilian agencies alike determined to do the job as a democracy should: with real consideration for the people involved."
Framing the newly constructed internment camps in California, Colorado, Idaho, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, and Arkansas as "pioneer communities," the film the features the relocated Japanese acting as they "should" -- smiling and waving to the cameras as they board trains for the camps; making the best of the newly constructed group housing and dining halls; and participating in "Americanization" classes. The Japanese are the cooperating and accommodating "model minority" more than twenty years before the term was coined.
My talk explores on the legacy of the internment experience during the last two decades, focusing specifically on the inscription of this "model minority" mentality on the physical space of the National Japanese American Memorial to Patriotism in World War II. In many ways, the memorial is a rearticulation of the film's main tenets. Situated on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, the memorial is a site of remembering, commemorating, and most importantly, forgetting. While the site should be recognized as a public site of redress and its significance to various Japanese American communities, I'm critical of the invisible but equally important erasures of certain histories in order to promote this story of "patriotism" and the "model minority" myth inscribed both implicitly and explicitly on this space.
Where do draft resisters and "disloyals" fit into the history of Japanese internment in the United States? What does it mean that over one thousand Japanese Americans signed a petition against the inclusion of Mike Masaoka, the leader of the Japanese American Citizens League, on the memorial wall? If this is not a war memorial but a civil rights memorial, how does our understanding reading of this site change when these "absent presences" of dissent are made visible?
Amy Johnson, Brown University
“We are setting a standard for the rest of the world for the treatment of people who may have loyalties to an enemy nation. We are protecting ourselves without violating the principles of Christian decency. And we won’t change that fundamental decency no matter what our enemies do. But of course, we hope most earnestly that our example will influence the Axis power’s treatment of Americans who fall into their hands.”
On February 19, 1942, two months after the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japanese forces, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 authorizing the Secretary of War to designate certain areas in the United States as military zones. On March 18, 1942, Roosevelt established the War Relocation Authority (WRA) and appointed Milton Eisenhower, brother of General Dwight D. Eisenhower and a New Deal bureaucrat in the Department of Agriculture, to oversee operations.
In 1942, the Office of War Information released "Japanese Relocation," a strategically titled short film produced on behalf of the U.S. government and and the WRA. The film explained the internment of tens of thousands of American citizens of Japanese ancestry and resident aliens from Japan living on the western coast of the United States. Eisenhower not only provides the rationale for the removal of Japanese American citizens but he also claims that the Japanese "cheerfully" participated in the relocation process. According to the film, the process was amicable, with "the military and civilian agencies alike determined to do the job as a democracy should: with real consideration for the people involved."
Framing the newly constructed internment camps in California, Colorado, Idaho, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, and Arkansas as "pioneer communities," the film the features the relocated Japanese acting as they "should" -- smiling and waving to the cameras as they board trains for the camps; making the best of the newly constructed group housing and dining halls; and participating in "Americanization" classes. The Japanese are the cooperating and accommodating "model minority" more than twenty years before the term was coined.
My talk explores on the legacy of the internment experience during the last two decades, focusing specifically on the inscription of this "model minority" mentality on the physical space of the National Japanese American Memorial to Patriotism in World War II. In many ways, the memorial is a rearticulation of the film's main tenets. Situated on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, the memorial is a site of remembering, commemorating, and most importantly, forgetting. While the site should be recognized as a public site of redress and its significance to various Japanese American communities, I'm critical of the invisible but equally important erasures of certain histories in order to promote this story of "patriotism" and the "model minority" myth inscribed both implicitly and explicitly on this space.
Where do draft resisters and "disloyals" fit into the history of Japanese internment in the United States? What does it mean that over one thousand Japanese Americans signed a petition against the inclusion of Mike Masaoka, the leader of the Japanese American Citizens League, on the memorial wall? If this is not a war memorial but a civil rights memorial, how does our understanding reading of this site change when these "absent presences" of dissent are made visible?
Amy Johnson, Brown University
Activating Public Memory: Robyn Schroeder's Post
[Panel's overall statement: As a panel, we're interested in the many ways in which history and memory have influenced the construction, dissemination, and reception of racialized national mythologies. In each case, the central question revolves around how national mythologies and narratives at the core of an American collective memory have be activated to challenge, bolster, or erase certain issues concerning race and social justice.]
The time had come, according to Barack Obama in his Inaugural Address, for Americans to “choose [their] better history" (emphasis mine). The line was political memory at its finest, openly marrying selective memory to national destiny, the culminating gesture of a campaign in which exhortations to anticipate, recall, and enact history were de rigueur.
The use of historical memory by Obama’s 2008 political campaign provides a superb case study for an important question in memory studies: how do historians of memory adjudicate distinctions between “chosen”and “imposed” memories? I pick up on a point made by Michael Schudson about the vernacular burden of memory; writing about the ways in which readily available idioms, laws, and political conventions manifested themselves during the Iran-contra affair, Schudson argues, “People did not choose the Watergate frame. It chose them. It imposed itself.”[1]I argue that particular memories—specifically, of race baiting, U.S. political assassinations,and partisan animosities—“imposed themselves” in this way on the otherwise triumphalist, civil religious memories chosen by the Obama campaign. The sense of history which emerged joined anxious nostalgia to confident telos, positing the essential American identity as simultaneously master of destiny and victim of history. That tension in national memory has—at this point almost self-evidently—unsettled a segment of the cultural consciousness.
To wet our appetites for thinking about the historical gestures of Obama and what Barry Schwarz calls the “post-heroic” mode ofmemory, I invite readers of the blog to visit (or revisit) the will.i.am video which riffed on Obama’s speech on the occasion of losing the New Hampshireprimary:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsV2O4fCgjk
This video, I think, might tell us a great deal about the intersection of chosen and imposed memories. What happens when the face of celebrity substitutes for the image of populism and collective action? How does the song’s mournful tone interact, in terms of political effectiveness, with Obama’s “American history”? If memory is a kind of “enchantment” (as Patrick Wright, in Living in An Old Country, suggests)—that is, memory is history plus certainty—then does this song enchantor disenchant the sphere of national memory?
[1] Michael Schudson, “Lives, Laws, and Language: Commemorative vs. Non-commemorative Forms of Effective Public Memory,” The Communication Review, Vol. 2 (1), 1997, p.13.
Robyn Schroeder, Brown University
The time had come, according to Barack Obama in his Inaugural Address, for Americans to “choose [their] better history" (emphasis mine). The line was political memory at its finest, openly marrying selective memory to national destiny, the culminating gesture of a campaign in which exhortations to anticipate, recall, and enact history were de rigueur.
The use of historical memory by Obama’s 2008 political campaign provides a superb case study for an important question in memory studies: how do historians of memory adjudicate distinctions between “chosen”and “imposed” memories? I pick up on a point made by Michael Schudson about the vernacular burden of memory; writing about the ways in which readily available idioms, laws, and political conventions manifested themselves during the Iran-contra affair, Schudson argues, “People did not choose the Watergate frame. It chose them. It imposed itself.”[1]I argue that particular memories—specifically, of race baiting, U.S. political assassinations,and partisan animosities—“imposed themselves” in this way on the otherwise triumphalist, civil religious memories chosen by the Obama campaign. The sense of history which emerged joined anxious nostalgia to confident telos, positing the essential American identity as simultaneously master of destiny and victim of history. That tension in national memory has—at this point almost self-evidently—unsettled a segment of the cultural consciousness.
To wet our appetites for thinking about the historical gestures of Obama and what Barry Schwarz calls the “post-heroic” mode ofmemory, I invite readers of the blog to visit (or revisit) the will.i.am video which riffed on Obama’s speech on the occasion of losing the New Hampshireprimary:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsV2O4fCgjk
This video, I think, might tell us a great deal about the intersection of chosen and imposed memories. What happens when the face of celebrity substitutes for the image of populism and collective action? How does the song’s mournful tone interact, in terms of political effectiveness, with Obama’s “American history”? If memory is a kind of “enchantment” (as Patrick Wright, in Living in An Old Country, suggests)—that is, memory is history plus certainty—then does this song enchantor disenchant the sphere of national memory?
[1] Michael Schudson, “Lives, Laws, and Language: Commemorative vs. Non-commemorative Forms of Effective Public Memory,” The Communication Review, Vol. 2 (1), 1997, p.13.
Robyn Schroeder, Brown University
Activating Public Memory: Elena Gonzales's Post
[Panel's overall statement: As a panel, we're interested in the many ways in which history and memory have influenced the construction, dissemination, and reception of racialized national mythologies. In each case, the central question revolves around how national mythologies and narratives at the core of an American collective memory have be activated to challenge, bolster, or erase certain issues concerning race and social justice.]
Here is a 2.5 minute video from the National Museum of the American Indian: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZpd4V1eqNs. This film takes place on the grounds of NMAI during the summer of 2007 when Nora Naranjo-Morse created Always Becoming, a monumental, yet ephemeral, outdoor family of sculptures. The artist collaborated with a large team of native community members and as many other visitors, staff, and as many local residents as they could recruit in order to construct the piece. (Here's a link to the whole project: http://www.nmai.si.edu/alwaysbecoming/AlwaysBecoming.html)
The film and the Always Becoming project provide an opportunity to think about the position of various national cultural institutions in the national landscape and in the making of national identities and common public memory. I wanted to whet your appetite for the session with thoughts of NMAI because, among the various kinds of museums I'll consider in my presentation - culturally specific museums, museums dedicated to civil rights, federal museums, and museums that deal with atrocities - NMAI is the least bound by these categories. That this museum is neither fish nor fowl should inspire us to further inquiry about the nature of the category of "national" and the role of culturally specific museums.
With that, I leave you with a couple of questions in the hopes of learning from you as I prepare for the conference.
- How does this video cause you to see NMAI as an American institution or as more of a pan-American Indian one? Which nation is the one the museum's name refers to?
- What does it mean about the US that culturally specific institutions are also Smithsonian Museums on the national mall?
- What does NMAI's existence mean about international relations between the US and Native nations?
Can't wait to see you at our session!
Elena Gonzales, Brown University
Here is a 2.5 minute video from the National Museum of the American Indian: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZpd4V1eqNs. This film takes place on the grounds of NMAI during the summer of 2007 when Nora Naranjo-Morse created Always Becoming, a monumental, yet ephemeral, outdoor family of sculptures. The artist collaborated with a large team of native community members and as many other visitors, staff, and as many local residents as they could recruit in order to construct the piece. (Here's a link to the whole project: http://www.nmai.si.edu/alwaysbecoming/AlwaysBecoming.html)
The film and the Always Becoming project provide an opportunity to think about the position of various national cultural institutions in the national landscape and in the making of national identities and common public memory. I wanted to whet your appetite for the session with thoughts of NMAI because, among the various kinds of museums I'll consider in my presentation - culturally specific museums, museums dedicated to civil rights, federal museums, and museums that deal with atrocities - NMAI is the least bound by these categories. That this museum is neither fish nor fowl should inspire us to further inquiry about the nature of the category of "national" and the role of culturally specific museums.
With that, I leave you with a couple of questions in the hopes of learning from you as I prepare for the conference.
- How does this video cause you to see NMAI as an American institution or as more of a pan-American Indian one? Which nation is the one the museum's name refers to?
- What does it mean about the US that culturally specific institutions are also Smithsonian Museums on the national mall?
- What does NMAI's existence mean about international relations between the US and Native nations?
Can't wait to see you at our session!
Elena Gonzales, Brown University
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Week 8 Recap and Open Thread
This week on the blog we featured the "Resisting Narratives of New England Exceptionalism" panel:
--Sarina Isenberg blogged about Henry David Thoreau's Eastern spiritual and philosophical influences here;
--And the panel's proposers blogged about both their overarching goals and their specific paper plans here.
Please keep checking those posts (and all our earlier ones) out and adding your voice in comments! Come back this upcoming week for posts from the "Activating Public Memory" panel. And remember to check out a full conference program draft and register for the conference at www.neasa.org. Thanks!
--Sarina Isenberg blogged about Henry David Thoreau's Eastern spiritual and philosophical influences here;
--And the panel's proposers blogged about both their overarching goals and their specific paper plans here.
Please keep checking those posts (and all our earlier ones) out and adding your voice in comments! Come back this upcoming week for posts from the "Activating Public Memory" panel. And remember to check out a full conference program draft and register for the conference at www.neasa.org. Thanks!
Friday, September 23, 2011
Resisting Narratives of New England’s Historical Exceptionalism
New England has always played a prominent role in the construction of U.S.-American historical myths. This prominence is not only reflected in U.S.-origin narratives which view New England as the cradle of American democracy, but also in cultural origin narratives, in which New England is the center of literary and cultural production from the 1600s to the late 1900s. However, as scholars in the last 30 years have pointed out, the overemphasis on New England’s historical exceptionalism has ignored the cultural complexity and diversity of New England since colonial times. Consequently, the moments of protest and resistance against hegemonic narratives of the past continues to be in need of exploration.
Our panel focuses on three such moments, ranging from 1724 to the present day, thus exposing a historical narrative centered on protest and resistance. However, our panel also highlights the geographical diversity of New England culture as it brings into focus moments of resistance originating in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Maine.
Hayden Golden’s paper will discuss William Apess’s “Eulogy on King Philip,” performed at the Odeon Theater in Boston twice in 1836. Golden argues that “Eulogy” constitutes one of the most visible acts of Native resistance in the eastern United States during the nineteenth century. Employing a combination rhetorical devices and theatrical-performative methods, Apess deconstructed the Jacksonian narrative of American history and rewrote it through a Native lens. I will lay the foundation for considering Apess’s “Eulogy,” not as a text to be interpreted, but as a performance to be understood within the larger frame of theater culture.
Michelle Kew challenges the myth that American women were nothing but downtrodden and oppressed before they got the vote. Contrary to the impression that many modern Americans may have of pre-1920 America, women played an ever-increasing role in public life during the 19th century and had in fact been speaking for themselves and publishing their arguments for equality in newspapers and magazines for decades. Using examples from contemporary literature of the day, ranging from literary magazines and conduct books to William Dean Howells’ novel The Rise of Silas Lapham, she argues that “the woman question,” as it was then known, was a highly debated one for a long time, and in fact women’s voices and calls for greater equality were more often heard than many people realize.
Sabine Klein will discuss the historical and contemporary contestations of the battle of Norridgewock (1724). This understudied massacre resulted in the exodus of the Abenaki nation from their homeland in Western Maine, the killing of a French missionary, and the beginning of English predominance in the reason. While this event has never played an important role in the history of the U.S., on the ground in Maine it has been contested continuously both in literary and material culture. Focusing primarily on the multiple ways in which the event is commemorated at a memorial site in Madison, Maine, Klein argues that the creation, recreation, and resistance are ongoing processes that attest to the contested nature of national narratives.
Hayden Golden, Michelle Kew, and Sabine Klein, University of Maine at Farmington
Our panel focuses on three such moments, ranging from 1724 to the present day, thus exposing a historical narrative centered on protest and resistance. However, our panel also highlights the geographical diversity of New England culture as it brings into focus moments of resistance originating in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Maine.
Hayden Golden’s paper will discuss William Apess’s “Eulogy on King Philip,” performed at the Odeon Theater in Boston twice in 1836. Golden argues that “Eulogy” constitutes one of the most visible acts of Native resistance in the eastern United States during the nineteenth century. Employing a combination rhetorical devices and theatrical-performative methods, Apess deconstructed the Jacksonian narrative of American history and rewrote it through a Native lens. I will lay the foundation for considering Apess’s “Eulogy,” not as a text to be interpreted, but as a performance to be understood within the larger frame of theater culture.
Michelle Kew challenges the myth that American women were nothing but downtrodden and oppressed before they got the vote. Contrary to the impression that many modern Americans may have of pre-1920 America, women played an ever-increasing role in public life during the 19th century and had in fact been speaking for themselves and publishing their arguments for equality in newspapers and magazines for decades. Using examples from contemporary literature of the day, ranging from literary magazines and conduct books to William Dean Howells’ novel The Rise of Silas Lapham, she argues that “the woman question,” as it was then known, was a highly debated one for a long time, and in fact women’s voices and calls for greater equality were more often heard than many people realize.
Sabine Klein will discuss the historical and contemporary contestations of the battle of Norridgewock (1724). This understudied massacre resulted in the exodus of the Abenaki nation from their homeland in Western Maine, the killing of a French missionary, and the beginning of English predominance in the reason. While this event has never played an important role in the history of the U.S., on the ground in Maine it has been contested continuously both in literary and material culture. Focusing primarily on the multiple ways in which the event is commemorated at a memorial site in Madison, Maine, Klein argues that the creation, recreation, and resistance are ongoing processes that attest to the contested nature of national narratives.
Hayden Golden, Michelle Kew, and Sabine Klein, University of Maine at Farmington
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
“A Very Yankee Sort of Oriental”: Cosmopolitanism and Orientalism in Henry David Thoreau’s Engagements with Eastern Religions
Until quite recently, due to the prevalence of the myth of American literary autonomy during the early national period, few studies have addressed the international influences upon American works. Following the work of Wai Chee Dimock, Paul Giles, Susan Manning, and Andrew Taylor which positions American literature as a form of world literature, this paper explores the interactions between American Transcendentalism and Eastern religions in the writings of Henry David Thoreau.
Segments of Eastern texts appear in Walden, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, and his journals, and Thoreau translated Eastern texts into English (from French and German translations) in the “Ethnical Scriptures” column in The Dial. Thoreau’s writings on the East can be conceived in two ways. First, they reflect an emerging cosmopolitan American identity that features a positive opening to the richness of foreign cultures. For example, in the Artist of Kouroo parable, Thoreau combines Eastern and Western perspectives to create a culturally harmonious work. Conversely, Thoreau’s writing is as a continuation of a conventional Western Orientalist perspective that essentializes the East and uses its representation as a means of defining the West. In Walden Thoreau portrays the East as backward, mythologizes different religions and cultures, defines the East with a Western lens, and commodifies religious practice. Thoreau’s writings are therefore cosmopolitan and Orientalist and, this conflicted state of being reaffirms Laura Dassow Walls’ argument that the two identities frequently overlap.
While there has been a lull of scholarly interest in Thoreau’s connection to Eastern religions, my research paper aims to spark the debate by demonstrating the theoretically problematic nature of this relationship. Furthermore, given Thoreau’s foundational role in American literature, his works suggest that the early American canon was an international product that permeated borders.
Sarina Isenberg, Queen's University
Segments of Eastern texts appear in Walden, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, and his journals, and Thoreau translated Eastern texts into English (from French and German translations) in the “Ethnical Scriptures” column in The Dial. Thoreau’s writings on the East can be conceived in two ways. First, they reflect an emerging cosmopolitan American identity that features a positive opening to the richness of foreign cultures. For example, in the Artist of Kouroo parable, Thoreau combines Eastern and Western perspectives to create a culturally harmonious work. Conversely, Thoreau’s writing is as a continuation of a conventional Western Orientalist perspective that essentializes the East and uses its representation as a means of defining the West. In Walden Thoreau portrays the East as backward, mythologizes different religions and cultures, defines the East with a Western lens, and commodifies religious practice. Thoreau’s writings are therefore cosmopolitan and Orientalist and, this conflicted state of being reaffirms Laura Dassow Walls’ argument that the two identities frequently overlap.
While there has been a lull of scholarly interest in Thoreau’s connection to Eastern religions, my research paper aims to spark the debate by demonstrating the theoretically problematic nature of this relationship. Furthermore, given Thoreau’s foundational role in American literature, his works suggest that the early American canon was an international product that permeated borders.
Sarina Isenberg, Queen's University
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