[Other than a
weeklong series inspired by a visit to Newport’s historic mansion The Breakers, I
hadn’t had the chance to write much in this space about my neighbor to the south.
That all changed this week, leading up to this special post on some of my many
wonderful RI colleagues!]
Highlighting
five of the many wonderful Rhode Island scholars I’m proud to call
AmericanStudying colleagues.
1)
Nancy
Caronia: As that hyperlinked academia.edu page reflects, Nancy has recently
started a job in the West
Virginia University English Department (and they’re very lucky to have
her!). But I met her while she was a graduate student at the University of
Rhode Island, an institution to which she gave a great deal during her time
there, including her vital work in developing the
Diversity Week at which I was honored to give a book talk a few years back.
She’s also one of our best scholars of Italian American literature, as this
Guest Post illustrates. I’m sure she’ll carry a lot of Rhode Island with
her as she brings all those talents and much more to WVU!
2)
Laura Mattoon D’Amore: An
Assistant Professor of American
Studies at Roger Williams University (located in Bristol, RI), Laura has
contributed immensely to the New England American Studies Association,
including helping direct (along with colleague #5 below) our 2014
Conference at RWU. She’s also one of our best scholars of motherhood,
gender, and family (among other topics) in 20th and 21st
century literature and popular culture (especially the crucial contemporary
genre of superhero culture). Can’t wait to see where she takes those profoundly
AmericanStudies interests next!
3)
Beazley
Kanost: Now an adjunct professor of English at Roger Williams and Film/Media at URI,
Beazley joined the New England ASA while still a grad student at URI, when she
proposed a paper for the 2011 conference at Plimoth
Plantation that I directed. That paper was part of her work toward her
phenomenally titled and in-all-ways impressive dissertation, Off the Hip: a Thermodynamics of the Cool.
Her work on James Baldwin (part of this
great collection of essays) taught me a lot about that vital 20th
century figure. And she did great work for years in the thankless but crucial
role of NEASA Treasurer.
4)
Jon
Marcoux: I met Jon, an archaeologist in the Cultural
and Historic Preservation Department at Newport’s Salve Regina University
(one of the most spectacularly
located universities I’ve ever visited), when he joined the NEASA Council
and helped plan our third
annual Colloquium. Along with NEASA colleagues like Akeia
Benard, he helped bring archaeology, cultural anthropology, and their
engagements with Native American Studies to NEASA, as he’s a leading scholarly
voice in all those disciplines. His book Pox,
Empire, Shackles, and Hides: The Townsend Site, 1670-1715 (2010)
contributed immeasurably to all of them, and fundamentally changed my
understanding of the Cherokee and of US-Native American relations.
5)
Jeffrey
Meriwether: A Roger Williams History Professor, Jeffrey served as the 2014
NEASA President and directed that 2014 conference at RWU (along with his
colleague Laura). He also has one of the most interesting hobbies/passions I’ve
ever encountered in an AmericanStudier: he reenacts Revolutionary War battles
from the English side as part of the famous Boston group His Majesty’s Tenth Regiment of Foot,
including taking part in the annual reenactment of the 1775
Lexington conflict on Patriot’s Day. He’s also such a dedicated military
historian that, having started but not completed a Navy ROTC program in college,
he enlisted in the Navy Reserve in order to better understand his discipline.
One more detail that illustrates how great a group of Rhode Island colleagues I’ve
got!
Next series
starts Monday,
Ben
PS. Colleagues
(anywhere) whose work and voices you’d highlight?
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