Tag: American Studies

“Our core values are incredibly resilient”: An interview with Christopher Pexa

December 15, 2020

This week the Modern Language Association announced that it has awarded The MLA Prize for Studies in Native American Literatures, Cultures, or Languages to University of Minnesota Press author Christopher Pexa. The award will be presented at the Association’s virtual convention on January 9, 2021.  The committee’s citation reads:  Christopher J. Pexa’s Translated Nation: Rewriting … More “Our core values are incredibly resilient”: An interview with Christopher Pexa

Understanding the power behind the prison system

October 16, 2019

BY BRETT STORYAuthor of Prison Land In June, the federal government announced that it will be rescinding funding for a new federal penitentiary in Letcher County, Kentucky, finally putting to rest a project more than fifteen years in the making.  The proposed maximum-security prison was to be built atop a former surface mine, like most … More Understanding the power behind the prison system

Suspects not Citizens: Criminalizing Muslims in the United States

October 2, 2019

BY NICOLE NGUYEN In 2017, James Alex Fields Jr. plowed his silver Dodge Charger into counter-protestors at the “Unite the Right” white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Fields’ reckless yet intentional actions killed thirty-two-year-old Heather Heyer and injured dozens more. Convicted of first-degree murder, aggravated malicious wounding, hate crime acts, and other federal and state … More Suspects not Citizens: Criminalizing Muslims in the United States

This key point in US history urgently calls for peaceful, art-filled protest.

August 7, 2019

Teachers strike in Oakland. Photo credit: Brooke AndersonPhotography. Published on Common Dreams.Used with permission. T. V. REEDBuchanan Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Washington State University As Harvard political scientist Erica Chenoweth has carefully documented, throughout modern history large-scale civil disobedience has been the most effective way to bring about significant social change—including overthrowing authoritarian regimes. If only … More This key point in US history urgently calls for peaceful, art-filled protest.

American xenophobia and the roots of the housing crisis

July 10, 2019

Harris Fine Block, Broome and Orchard Streets, New York (1898 and 1901). Hornberger & Straub, architects. These facades are typical of many immigrant-built tenements of this period. Recently rehabilitated, they command high rents in an increasingly desirable neighborhood. Photograph by Sean Litchfield. BY ZACHARY J. VIOLETTELecturer, Parsons/The New School of Design As I was finishing the … More American xenophobia and the roots of the housing crisis

Governing the countryside: On modernity and progress in rural South Dakota.

June 12, 2018

BY THOMAS BIOLSIUniversity of California, Berkeley How should we make sense of “red states” and “blue states,” and in a way that does not fall victim to the political polarization that seems to have reached a crescendo in the present? My new book, Power and Progress on the Prairie, seeks to uncover the history of … More Governing the countryside: On modernity and progress in rural South Dakota.

On gaming, athletes, and individual glory . . . oh, Mercy!

March 13, 2018

CHRISTOPHER A. PAULAssociate Professor, Seattle University The core argument in my book is that video games are an actualized meritocracy, a realm in which the values of hard work and skill have been pushed to their extremes and the result is a toxic community that focuses more on the celebration of individual glory than on … More On gaming, athletes, and individual glory . . . oh, Mercy!

Posthumous posthumanism: Subverting the relationship between living and dead matter.

January 3, 2018

Evan Rachel Wood in Westworld, created by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy (HBO, 2016). Westworld reconceptualizes lived experience by asking what “counts” as humanand what counts as death. ERIN E. EDWARDS Bring her back online. Westworld opens with a disembodied voice commanding the robotic “host,” Dolores Abernathy, to emerge from “sleep mode.” Dolores awakens into … More Posthumous posthumanism: Subverting the relationship between living and dead matter.

The Coming Storm

September 6, 2017

BY CEDRIC JOHNSON (The Neoliberal Deluge and Revolutionaries to Race Leaders) AND THOMAS JESSEN ADAMS Excerpt from article published in Jacobin: The rains over Corpus Christi and Houston have finally stopped, and floodwaters are beginning to recede. Some residents are still stranded, while others — tens, maybe hundreds, of thousands — won’t be able to … More The Coming Storm