Ten Years On

Issue 105 Autumn 2011 www.baas.ac.uk ISSN 1465-9956 American Studies in Britain Newsletter of the British Association for American Studies 9/11: Ten Years On CFP: The 57th BAAS Coverage of the Annual Conference BAAS AGM, 2011 The Chair’s BAAS Notices Report, 2011 and Requests Contents Editorial 2 CFP: The 57th BAAS Annual Conference 3 The Chair’s Report 2011 4 Minutes of the BAAS AGM 2011 7 BAAS Notices and Requests 11 Travel Award Reports 12 Funding Reports 18 Reports from Eccles Centre Fellows 20 New Members 23 Members’ News 28 Members’ Publications 28 Awards Opportunities 29 Publication Opportunities 29 BAAS Membership of Committees 29 BAAS Chairs 32 ASIB – American Studies in Britain Newsletter of the British Association for American Studies Editor: Kal Ashraf [email protected] ASIB is the newsletter of the British Association for American Studies, but the opinions expressed in its pages are those of the contributors alone and do not necessarily reflect the policies or beliefs of the Association. Issue 105 Autumn 2011 1 Editorial Ten years on and the imagery of 9/11 remains speculate about the effects for American Studies no less powerful, tragic and complicated. Indeed and cognate disciplines. Whatever the case, the revisiting photos from that day and its immediate even-temperament and energy of BAAS Executive aftermath, as I have done these past weeks, has Committee and Subcommittee members was stirred a range of reactions. There is shock still, once again clear at our most recent meeting this for the airliners colliding with the towers. There is September (warmly hosted by Nigel Bowles of the sorrow, for the anguish amidst the smoke and the Rothermere American Institute, Oxford). rubble. There is dark curiosity for the ‘Falling Man’. Work by the Publications subcommittee, for There is a little suspicion too, about ‘heroic’ Rudy example, continues at pace. The new editorial dashing about with his little dust mask on (was this team of the Journal of American Studies led by not the start of a decade-long media career spent Scott Lucas, Celeste-Marie Bernier and Bevan ‘concentrating on 9/11’?). And all of this before one Sewell now plan one special edition per year, digests the images of the ‘9/11 Decade’ – images starting this year with ‘9/11’. Members might not from 9/11 itself but certainly a part of the fabric also have noticed that the Journal is now neatly of that day. One of the many pitiful frames of Bin integrated with Facebook and Twitter, just one Laden in the mountains, for example, machine gun part of a wider effort to maintain and enhance the at elbow, expounding fanatical religious dogma. journal’s international visibility. Here at ASIB, Or the one portrait of Jean Charles de Menezes, my own plans when taking over its editorship last who was killed somewhere beneath London. Or the Autumn involved a visual revamp which retained image of President George W. Bush – Commander- the accessible format of the newsletter that was in-Chief of the ‘War on Terror’ – walking into a extended so well by my predecessors Alison Kelly fake door. In commemorating the human loss of and Catherine Morley respectively. New work this 9/11 and the ‘9/11 Decade’, I hope that it is all the year includes the addition of an interview segment more significant then, that the cover of this tenth with members of the BAAS community, with a view anniversary issue of ASIB carries no image at all. to making this a regular feature. To this end I am A disruption to its confusing imagery, perhaps the pleased to report that an interview with the the ‘visual silence’ of a black page more respectfully 2011 BAAS Fellow, Helen Taylor, will appear in the honours the families of both the victims of the Spring issue of ASIB in early March, 2012. In other day, who continue to live amidst the wreckage of BAAS news, changes to the Executive are noted in loss, and the victims of the ‘9/11 Decade’, in which the minutes of the BAAS AGM 2011 (reprinted in military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq have full in this issue) and readers may like to note that taken countless more lives. George Lewis earlier this year took over as Chair of What then, is the impact of the legacy of 9/11 the BAAS Publications Subcommittee from Mark for American Studies in Britain? Certainly, the Whalan, and Jo Gill as Secretary of the Association question is almost parochial in light of the epic from Catherine Morley. imagery of the decade, but still it has an intellectual My deadline for receipt of contributions for the seriousness that researchers and writers about next issue of ASIB is 13 January 2012. If you ‘America’ can hardly ignore within the context of have feedback about the publication, please feel wider changes in Higher Education. (In his Annual free to contact me with the details on the contents Report to the membership–reprinted fully in this page. issue–our Chair Martin Halliwell describes the past year as the most “turbulent” of his time spent This issue of ASIB is dedicated to the victims of in HE). Indeed next year’s rise in undergraduate 9/11 and the ‘9/11 Decade’. tuition fees will likely have implications for - Kal Ashraf degree choice, but amidst revitalised popular interest in 9/11 and its implications in the wake of the tenth anniversary, not to mention next year’s election campaign season, one can only 2 American Studies in Britain The 57th BAAS Annual Conference University of Manchester 12-15 April 2012 2nd place in the 2008 audit, while the American Studies programme has been the only unit at the university to feature in the “Top 5” of all Plenary Speakers three league tables (The Times, The Guardian, • Joyce Chaplin, James Duncan Phillips The Complete University Guide) for three years Professor of Early American History at Harvard running from 2009. The interests of the team University range from blaxploitation culture to British musical influence upon the South, from Civil War history • Thomas Doherty, Professor of American to Truman Capote, and from cultures of the market Studies at Brandeis University to the culture of political movies. Manchester’s • Peter Coates, Professor of American and own links across the Atlantic stretch far and wide Environmental History at Bristol University and recognition of the connections and affinity the city has with North America abound, from public Call for Papers statues to musical culture, from football to finance. The 57th annual conference of the British Association for American Studies will be hosted by Submission the Department of English and American Studies Proposals for 20-minute presentations should at the University of Manchester from 12-15 April, be a maximum of 250 words and include at least 2012. While there is no over-arching theme to the a provisional if not actual title. These will be conference, and papers and panel proposals are arranged into panel groups. Proposals by two or welcomed on any subject related to the United more people sharing a common theme are warmly States and early America, we do look forward to invited and the conference organisers this year are receiving approaches from those with interests in keen to have a number of interdisciplinary panels Sino-American and Canadian-American relations that cross the boundaries of literary, historical, especially this year. In addition we’re very keen political, cinematic, cultural and theoretical work. to see proposed panels from many associations All proposals should be submitted by Friday 4th linked, or with close ties, to BAAS, including the November 2011 to: APG, HOTCUS, BRANCH and many more. We Dr Ian Scott ian.scott@manchester. intend to feature work from as diverse a range ac.uk, Department of English and American of disciplines, departments, institutions and Studies, School of Arts, Histories and Cultures, individuals as we can and we want to reiterate University of Manchester, Manchester M13 BAAS’s wish to encourage innovation and initiative 9PL. For further information, please visit www. in constructing panels, roundtable discussions, and arts.manchester.ac.uk/subjectareas/ specially scheduled sessions. englishamericanstudies/newsevents/ The University of Manchester was the first baas2012/ or http://baas.ac.uk/ American Studies programme in the UK administration/baasconf.asp. beginning in September 1947. Since then, it has had a pioneering role in the development of the discipline in this country. In the 2000s, as part of a revamped department and playing an integral role in the newly amalgamated University after 2004, the programme has gone from strength-to- strength. The RAE saw the department achieve Issue 105 Autumn 2011 3 The Chair’s Report Professor Martin Halliwell spoke at the Annual General Meeting, held at the 56th BAAS Annual Conference, University of Central Lancashire, 15 April 2011. The last 8 months have been the most turbulent and geography of the United States’; the focus of during my – and many colleagues’ – time in BAAS should be ‘the holding of conferences; the Higher Education. Attacks on the foundation of periodical publication of papers; the establishment higher and further education in the UK have gone of a centre of record for research materials in the on at such speed that it has been hard to catch UK, including microfilm; and the investigation and breath or to examine alternatives to the HEFCE encouragement of the means of travel and study cuts that we all face this autumn, before higher for British scholars in the US.’ fees start in Autumn 2012. The government have As you will hear from Chairs of our four claimed that their decision to cut state support for subcommittees – Publications, Development, undergraduate fees is blind to any subject area, but Awards and Conferences – and from the range of it is clear that 100% cuts to arts and social science awards we will announce at tomorrow’s banquet, subjects – those underpinning our American our work is broader and more inclusive than 56 Studies community – is not the equivalent to years ago, but also remains close to the original smaller percentage cuts to STEM subjects.

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