July 7-8, 2012: Two American Studies Requests

As this patriotic week concludes, two different ways in which you can support current American Studies efforts.

1)      Those of you who’ve been reading this blog since last summer might remember the New England American Studies Association (NEASA) Pre-Conference Blog that I organized, where conference presenters and attendees, and other interested American Studiers, had weekly dialogues about different conference (and related) topics and themes. Well I’m no longer NEASA’s Jefe, but the current President Sara Sikes, along with Webmaster Jonathan Silverman, have organized another Pre-Conference Blog, to lead up to this October’s digital humanities-centered conference. Please check it out when you can over the next few months (I’m sure I’ll mention it again!), add your voice and ideas to the mix, and take part in the conference this way, whether you can come to Providence in October or not!

2)      Thanks to an email from last year’s NEASA keynote speaker, Jim Loewen, I’ve learned about a very worthwhile effort, to establish an endowed Civil Rights Chair at Mississippi’s Tougaloo College. Tougaloo’s students and faculty supported the Civil Rights movement in Mississippi as much as any community and organization, often at significant cost (in every sense); it’s the perfect place for such an endowed chair, and the position would allow the college to continue doing great work in the 21^st century as well as to better remember and teach this vital American history. If you’re able to give any money (as I have) in support of the chair, this link tells you how; but even if not, you can still spread the word!

Digital and institutional; forward-looking and historically grounded; conversational and educational; communal and dialogic. Sounds like American Studies to me!

Next series this coming week,

Ben

PS. Any American Studies links, conversations, or efforts you’d highlight? Don’t be shy!

7/7 Memory Day nominee: Margaret Walker, the Alabama-born writer and poet who followed the Great Migration to Chicago, worked there for the Federal Writers Project and with Richard Wright, and published some of the most powerful political and social poetry and fiction of the late 20^th century.

7/8 Memory Day nominee: George Antheil, the Modernist avant garde composer who had a hugely prolific career, was also a talented writer, philosopher, and critic, and with actress Hedy Lamarr helped invent an innovative communications system that’s still in use today.