THE SEMIANNUAL NEWSLETTER OF THE ROBERT PENN WARREN CENTER FOR THE HUMANITIES VOL. 17, NO. 2 • SPRING 2009 •

From the Past Imperfect: Towards a Critical Trauma Theory by Maurice Stevens

“no one wishes to be plunged head first into the rose, as they often do, buoyed on the thermals things one does not remember and does not wish of emergent technologies. to remember.”—James Baldwin Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), the y current manuscript project From diagnostic category used to describe sympto- the Past Imperfect: Towards a Criti- matic responses to trauma in relation to men- cal Trauma Theory examines insti- tal health, and the clinical object that ascribed M evidentiary value to the idea that an event tutional and discursive practices that depend upon and reproduce concepts of trauma criti- actually took place, has itself existed as a dis- cally restricted by classifications based on race, tinct clinical disorder for more than 40 years class, gender, sexuality and religion. It con- and has seen the development of an extensive tributes to both humanities and social sci- body of research and multiple clusters of ences scholarship as it takes shape in the investigation grow up around it. There are tension between trauma studies, medical multiple professional societies and journals anthropology, cultural studies, psychoanalysis, committed to the exploration and under- critical legal studies, critical race theory, and standing of PTSD, for example. Literally performance studies. thousands of scholarly and professional arti- cles have been written on the topic and hun- Why Critical Trauma Theory? dreds of symposia dedicated to discussing As a concept, trauma has been around in one trauma and PTSD in disciplinary contexts Maurice Stevens form or another since the late nineteenth cen- from literature to social work and ethnic stud- chically overwhelming, or from merely physi- tury and from the start, its meanings, subject ies to psychiatry. I am interested in how this cally trying to life-threatening. This is to say to ideological and fiduciary struggle, have research has both provided frameworks that that while, in some ways, these terms appear shifted and transformed. As one might expect, allow us to operate with very specific defini- to have become generally evacuated of their trauma has also been racialized, sexualized, tions of trauma, and has simultaneously specific meanings, most of us believe, at base gendered and classed from its inception. In presented a universal notion of trauma pur- and instantly, that we know exactly what to fact, from its first applications in the explana- porting to describe a very broad range of tion of symptoms deriving from railway acci- experiences. dents, trauma has really never functioned Like many ideas having their roots in psy- transparently or equitably and has never been chology and medicine that have made their an unencumbered descriptive term. For as way into popular exchange, we find ourselves Inside soon as victims began making claims on their using the language of trauma easily; and often From the Past Imperfect: injuries, as soon, that is, as the harm attend- with a very powerful and felt sense that we Towards a Critical Trauma Theory ...... 1-5 ing this particular form of industrial move- know what we mean when we do so. The use Lecture Series Explores Election ...... 5 ment had its place in the lexicon of litigation, of this nomenclature also performs cultural Putting It Together: Creative Humanities...... 6 insurance agents working in the service of work by identifying those of us who use it as New Directions in Trauma Studies ...... 7-8 railway companies, and the physicians and psychologically savvy, as empathetic and as The State of the Humanities...... 9-11 psychiatric specialists in their employ, began modern sentimental subjects. Surrounded as Graduate Student Research Symposium ...... 11 defining who could and who could not be we are by mediated uses of signifiers like What We Are Writing...... 12 understood as having been traumatized. These “trauma,” “traumatic,” “traumatizing” and External Grants and Fellowships ...... 13 were scientific determinations that fell then, “PTSD,” we have come to learn that they 2008-2009 Faculty Fellows...... 14 as they do now, along axes marked by cultural relate to experiences that traverse the spec- 2008-2009 Graduate Fellows ...... 14 categories of social differentiation; and that trum from simply anxiety-provoking to psy-

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look for when cued by these troubling signs. nize traumatogenic institutions like enslave- nates (necessarily past and completed) makes Neither indexical nor symbolic signifiers, ment, genocidal cultural contact, or the sim- it particularly powerful in the clinical or diag- trauma has taken on the logics of the icon. ple ubiquity of non-spectacular racial violence nostic setting. The traumatic event possesses When we imagine we are “seeing” trauma or and micro-aggressions; or transnational critics specificity, there is an agent and victim of the signs of its passage, we know immediately might decry the European and American injury, a place and time of occurrence, and a that something spectacular and catastrophic impulse to force diverse peoples into the cul- blooming narrative of accountability or inno- has transpired and we fear, also with a sense of turally specific rubric of trauma, casting aside cence. On the other hand, its unknowability, immediacy, that normal systems for under- the authority of local knowledges. These are that is, the degree to which trauma exceeds standing the event and any of its survivors will all important and truly useful critiques, to signification or eludes description, makes it be overwhelmed and rendered incapable of which any serious consideration of trauma particularly susceptible to becoming some- adequately capturing its immensity or the sub- theory must respond. However, they stop thing else as well. The event is also enigmatic. tlety of its sublime pervasiveness. short of interrogating the concept of trauma This presents us with a kind of dilemma: However, the simultaneous sense of “know- itself, from submitting it to the analysis we trauma is both specific and enigmatic, both ing” something has transpired, and the utter might apply to other cultural objects. discursive and material. Similarly, the broad frustration of having our understanding over- set of neurobiological responses to traumatic come by trauma—of not being able to render Trauma: From What it “Describes” to events (the psycho-physiological threat that experience legible through representa- What it “Makes” responses that seem, again, universally evi- tion—has made its clinical and theoretical Like most examples of “socially constructed” dent), and the multiple variations in the phe- application particularly vulnerable to the objects of knowledge, trauma’s force can be nomenological or expressive response to forces of social emplotment imbedded in the measured in the material effects it produces in trauma across groups defined in terms of gen- concept of “trauma” itself. Trauma, as a kind social relations, institutional practices, and der, race, ethnicity, class and even sexuality, of situated knowledge that emerges from the public policy. Here From the Past Imperfect also obtain a tension. While we may all specificities of the moment in which it is extends current theorizing. While critics have develop “startle” responses in the aftermath of invoked as an appropriate or obvious label, called attention to the limitations of trauma trauma, for example, the intensity of those bears, in rather remarkable ways, traces that theory, they have not closely examined responses can be shown to vary dramatically reveal its cultural work. This level of vulnera- how these limitations prove problematic in in correspondence to differences in one’s cul- bility and its ramifications poses the central specific institutional locations that build tural or social positioning. The fact that point of departure in From the Past Imperfect specialized sets of practice around troubling trauma has been a highly racialized and sexu- as it considers how racialization, sexualization ideas of trauma. alized concept dependent on visual metaphors and the tyranny of the visual shape what As a concept formed out of injury related to for its description and models of the spectacu- trauma can be, which subjects its signification railway accidents, wartime wounding, or over- lar for its rendering, strains claims on its uni- hails, and which institutional practices it whelming natural catastrophe, notions of versal applicability. As a result, various underwrites because they are understood as class, race, gender and sex have all been cen- traumatic experiences are not adequately adequate to its amelioration. Indeed, my pro- tral to the formation of popular ideas about addressed in clinical settings working with a ject does this by tracing how notions of whose sensibilities can be disturbed by near- PTSD model. trauma emerge as often very complex “sets of death experiences, whose civility can be upset The basically arbitrary and, in some ways, practice” in several cultural institutions: the by the horrific, and who can be overwhelmed theoretically counterintuitive requirement that clinic, academe, legal discourse, cyberspace by fear; who, in short, can be traumatized. the traumatic event have specific spatial and and popular culture. And as an increasing number of theorists temporal coordinates, has primarily to do with At stake in my concern that the concept of growing critical of trauma (as it is traditionally the fact that limits to its application typically trauma developed around injury related to figured) have been arguing, not all social emerge in relation to where or when the railway accidents, wartime wounding, or over- actors are adequately understood within its “trauma” actually emerged. For example, the whelming natural catastrophe, is the centrality boundaries. Trauma and even PTSD do not location of trauma’s origin can make it inac- classifying systems have had in the formation simply describe subjects and/or their experi- cessible to the PTSD model. This is apparent of ideas about whose sensibilities can be dis- ences, they also, and perhaps more accurately, in the case of acute traumatic episodes origi- turbed by near-death experiences, whose civil- create them. nating in sociocultural structures where the ity can be upset by the horrific, and who can At the same time that increasingly specific traumatogenic agent is not readily discernable. be overwhelmed by fear; who, in short, can be and rigidly defined parameters have defined Critical race and critical legal theorists in the traumatized. Indeed, I concur with the its technical (and institutionally legible) and Europe have usefully ana- increasing number of theorists growing critical boundaries, the idea that trauma is somehow lyzed the specific damages produced in rela- of trauma, who have been arguing that many universal seems ubiquitous. Daily we see it tion to the law, prison industry and social actors are inadequately understood used to describe a very wide range of experi- immigration policy, for example. Likewise, the within its boundaries. For example, psychoan- ences. Trauma, it turns out, is quite flexible case of trauma that exceeds individual experi- alysts might argue against the application of and adroit, and can pass from one context of ence is also difficult to localize and thereby trauma theory in cultural study because of its expertise to another, slipping across borders to normalize. Categories like ongoing or repeated misappropriation of Freud’s or Janet’s ideas be readily recruited to new discourses and new trauma, multigenerational institutional about how traumatic memory works; or eth- contexts of explanation. On one hand, the relations, or even the sense of impending nic or cultural studies theorists may take ability to pinpoint the traumatic event or trauma that can produce PTSD symptoms, trauma theory to task for its inability to recog- symptom with spatial and temporal coordi- are all types of trauma that fall outside Letters • Spring 2009 • 3

temporal parameters of conventionally applied management takes place while historicity is always, with memory, a trace remains. A trace PTSD models. conferred by the archive and through its remains, defiantly, sometimes hinting, some- Rather than thinking of trauma as an iden- objects. While they are posed in opposition, times pressing, sometimes roaring, but always tifiable and discrete event that must have both memory and history contribute to a insisting in its ubiquitous return. History, occurred at some specific point in time and regime of remembrance whose logics and which requires sifting through remnants place, it can be more usefully understood as a functions are familiar and, in some ways, instead of traces, speaks the past differently. Events captured in history are located in the mythos of temporal progressions, in the rela- A trace remains, defiantly, sometimes hinting, tive relation between moments and events; the distance imagined between here/now and sometimes pressing, sometimes roaring, but always there/then is history’s necessary condition. Indeed, history, as a trope with rhetorical insisting in its ubiquitous return. force, is memory’s nemesis, pushing it ever flatter, out of the flesh of bodies, gestures, objects and spaces, and into the amber of dominant signs and symbols, or the architec- cultural object whose meanings far exceed the comforting. Its logics, the arcs of its move- ture of archives, or the ash or bones carefully boundaries of any particular shock or disrup- ment, are those of the photograph or the gene catalogued there; in history, the past becomes tion; rather than being restricted by the com- or the eyewitness testimony; its functions con- an imaginary occupant of the symbolic, and mon sense ideas we possess that allow us to verge to convey truth, to represent the Real provenance its genomic real. And yet history is think of trauma as authentic evidence of and to reproduce the Same. Thus, one need haunted by stories that have gone un-included something “having happened there,” a snap- not accept the opposition between history and in the realm of historiography, history grows shot whose silver plate and photon are ana- memory to appreciate the effects produced by gaunt and distracted in its confrontation with logues to the psyche and impressions fixed in the solidification of their polar relation. His- events that test its ability to represent, to embodied symptoms, the real force of trauma tory posed against memory works. It works inscribe with any accuracy at all. Hunched flowers in disparate and unexpected places. like science against culture or data against over and squinting, it worries at the frayed And, like most cultural objects, trauma, too, interpretation, its cultural work deriving not ends of incomplete narratives and hidden circulates among various social contexts that simply from their binary opposition, but from transcripts. Still, we see that when and where give it differing meanings and co-produce its the meanings ascribed to those oppositions history struggles, when and where it collapses multiple social effects. Like most cultural and the material relations those meanings jus- in the face of the absolute truth of having pain objects, trauma’s component memes, those tify, the ideology they reproduce and the or being harmed, and the inexorable suspicion pivotal conceptualizations that tailor its func- incommensurability they convey. that accompanies documenting it, we see, in tion, have origins that can be traced to coordi- The science of memory has shifted from fact, the memory sciences providing support. nates that vary in time, space and semiosis; conceiving of its object, memory, as an evolv- The variously institutionalized science of coordinates whose ideological concerns come ing entity open to processes of contestation, memory smoothes over history’s lacunae, its to refract or anchor trauma’s meanings simply reframing, appropriation, diffraction or simple impotencies, by abjecting the possibility that by occupying the same temporo-spatio-semi- dissolution, and has moved, again, with seem- specifically racialized violence endured by otic location. ing inexorability, toward a focus on history as racialized communities might also be under- the fraught and always problematic recording stood within the rubric of trauma; or that History & Memory: A Tale for Times of what has “gone on,” as the recitation of the rubric of trauma may secret within its of Trauma actions and events contained within the past- necessary logics. Like trauma and memory itself, the study of perfect grammar of description. There and Just as the invisible genome vouches for the memory and the formation of the memory then was an event, it occurred in a place and validity of phenotype, or the effaced technolo- sciences have a milieu, and have taken their at a time that are, by definition, distanced gies of the photo argue the “fact” of its real shape and cue from social contexts that, over from here, from now; and the historian hero- representation, the past and completed un- the course of modern industrialization’s inex- ically does the work of salvage, approaching representable trauma supports claims about orable cultural speedup, have come to privi- the event through documents, artifacts, and the coherent subject of history. It says, “You lege the production of history over the corroborating testimony believed to shed evi- see, there once was a whole, seamless and production of memory. Spaces of history like dentiary light on the always-already past modern subject. Our effort to repair it, by the archive, the memorial or the “official event, to link it through an ideal provenance making legible its injury, is proof enough of story,” are often figured in binary opposition of its traces to the present. The historian’s its having been there at one time, whole (read: to spaces considered the purview of memory: labor, and the measure of his agency or ability, vulnerable), pure (read: violable) and mature. the performance, the repertoire or the lies in determining what should be memorial- Trauma has rendered this particular example ephemera of public culture and spaces. More- ized in objects of historical inscription. Unlike of proper subjectivity damaged, where once, over, through the rhetorics of provenance, history, as the story goes, memory exists con- in a moment of innocent possibility, it was authenticity, and the originality of the record, tinually, inscribed in the ongoing production not…” Of course, the wholeness, purity, and institutions that manage memory increasingly of a narrativized self or community of practice propriety of this subject have been built on wear the robes of truth’s arbiters. Repositories or affiliation. The muscle remembers, the the very particular ways it has always-already of facts, conglomerates of evidence, memory space is haunted, the landscape is scarred, been gendered, sexed, and, of course, raced. Letters • Spring 2009 • 4

Race: The Repudiated Mote literacy. The privileging of memory, on the formations in their work; intellectual forma- Through its enigmatic signification, race has other hand, came to be constructed as tions along which the memory/history binary played a pivotal role in the formation of con- inversely related to civilized culture and intel- was also mapped. Ultimately, the convergence temporary notions of memory, identity, and ligence. The 1860s, 70s and 80s also saw the of these ideas conspired to exclude the experi- trauma that are based on interior experiences instantiation of the memory sciences in educa- ences of racialized ethnic communities from of overwhelming exterior events. From Freud, tional institutions. It was in Paris in 1870 that the category of catastrophe that could be Darwin, and the scientific racisms of the nine- Ebbinghaus established the “memory labora- called traumatogenic, the typology of experi- teenth and twentieth centuries, to the post- tory” in 1879 and planted the roots of psycho- ence that could be called history, and from the pleasurable traumas of WWII and the metric approaches to memory measurement practices of its collection and discipline neces- recuperative practices of American clinical that are today central in cognitive models of sary to narrating and archiving the nation. psychology and neurobiology, psychoanalytic memory processing. Moreover, four years Because the traumatized subject has been theories and psychotherapeutic practices have later, in 1883 Ribot wrote the first text on one constructed through medical, psychologi- been unable to take up racialization as a social memory problems and soon became the first cal, legal, academic and cultural institutions process that produces some subjects as vulner- psychology professor at the College of Paris. that are themselves based on racially able to traumatogenic injury, and others as In his Diseases of Memory: An Essay in the Posi- unmarked subjects (that is, racialized as essen- not. Indeed, the “Others” to this village of the tive Psychology Ribot posits his conception of tially and putatively white), it makes sense to traumatizable, because they are the ultimate the two features of self. Le moi has a loosely understand both the subject of trauma and source of phobia and, therefore, cannot be held together synchronic aspect that is formed trauma itself to be similarly unmarked and overwhelmed by it, are not imagined to pos- by the constant process of memory and essentially white. The question is, how does sess the psychic interiority necessary for iden- impressions at the center of consciousness this marking mean in spatio-temporal-semi- tification and institutional legibility. Indeed, being replaced by more fresh memories, with otic locations that produce constellations of as phobic object, the Other portends both the the older ones being pushed to the periphery practice like PTSD and its enabling agents need and possibility for cathexis. Ironically, and de-privileged. The center of attention and (clinics, clinicians, psychotropics, therapies, the racialization of these others both produces recent memory material becomes that ongoing institutional recognitions, etc.)? If we accept and is reinscribed by the fact that the subject piece of le moi that constitutes the diachronic that PTSD is a bundle of social practices that of psychoanalysis and recuperative treatment ego formation of the self as the subject of its reflect how trauma is invoked in the clini- remains a de-racialized, thoroughly modern own history (Ribot, 108-112). There are reso- cal/medical institution, and that that institu- subject, imagined through universal (read: nances here with Freud’s notion of the psychic tional formation produces legible subjects – identical) mechanisms and structures under- systems Conscious, Preconscious, and Uncon- that is, he or she who has been traumatized stood to work within particular psyches. In scious. There is also the implication (repro- and is exhibiting symptoms which warrant the this way, the Other stands in as the constitu- duced in Freud as well) that forgetting is a diagnostic categorization of PTSD and the tive outside that vouches for the uniformity of necessary part of ego formation, which Freud disciplinary practices that spring into action in a self that possesses an unconscious composed considers a kind of adaptive amnesia. the application of the diagnosis – then the of properly repressed drives, and a social pre- This period also saw the emergence of a what and how of this marking’s meaning is sentation replete with appropriately subli- widespread acceptance of biologistic notions reflected in the subjectivity produced by the mated libidinal urges. of race and difference buttressed in the United diagnosis. The injured/traumatized subject is Various theorists have traced how ideas States and Europe with scientific theories and both the constitutive inside and outside by about memory and its technologies changed epistemologies informed, at base, by a notion which all proper citizen-subjects can know dramatically from the mid–1800s through the of incommensurable difference. This incom- themselves…whole, coherent, seamless, healed early twentieth century, when memory shifted mensurability or failure of recognition derived and modern. These are the ephemeral traces from being primarily an activity useful in oral from and reproduced racial logics that found to which we must attend, these ideal and religious traditions, to an art to be culti- easy expression through the visual technolo- imaginings of ourselves as whole, wounded, vated through specific practices and training; gies associated with eugenics, criminology and or mended. from the archival location of culture, to the psychoanalysis. As a result, the convergence of The enigmatic signifier, Laplanche tells us, engine of its production. Once a notion Social Darwinism, emerging photographic wishes to be translated. That is, its signifiance standing in for the soul in an increasingly sec- technologies, and a fledgling psychoanalysis is driven by the desire to be exposed, refash- ular world described by science, memory has naturalized ideas of racialized peoples as lack- ioned, and represented. Because its considera- more recently evolved into a trope often ing the psychic interiority that could make tion of representability is constrained by invoked in the service of identity discourses. psychic trauma, or even basic suffering, a culture, its signifying path always–already pro- Whether read in relation to the supplanting of social possibility. This is particularly signifi- voked by the classifying systems that order the quasi-religious mythologies, or as the inadver- cant because, following Erichsen’s early work differences through which its legibility tent byproduct of a technocratic focus on the with railroad–related traumatic injury—what emerges, because the systems of classification future, the valuation of what was once called he called “railway spine”—theorists of non- already possess a symbolic valence and are the “art of memory” has altered dramatically. physical “hysterical” trauma like Charcot, already related one to another; because of The production of history (marked by selec- Janet, and Freud were building their para- these factors the enigmatic signifier speaks in tive forgetting through the erection of monu- digms on these epistemologies of difference. names that are familiar: gender, sexuality, race. ments and disciplined remembering inherent As a result, the taxonomies they developed, While reconfiguring our understanding of to archival practice or historical preservation) because informed by racialized notions of the trauma and the logics that inform memory became the sign of civilized advancement and other and the self, could only reproduce those cannot remove the repudiated mote from the Letters • Spring 2009 • 5

eye of the memory sciences, that which trauma’s manifestation in clinical settings by remains its enigmatic yet powerful metaphori- focusing on PTSD as a set of practices that Lecture Series zor; a trauma differently understood, and a include service utilization, diagnosis, psy- memory whose racial logics are acknowledged chotropic medicating, hospitalization and Explores Election can certainly render its material effects trans- revisioning of the Diagnostic and Statistical parent even if its signification remains opaque. Manual. At base, From the Past Imperfect traces he Warren Center, in conjunction with how limited conceptions of trauma have From the Past Imperfect to. . . the Communication Studies Depart- shaped the basic assumptions and material Examining institutions of practice like clinical ment, has organized a lecture series activities attending notions of harm, injury, T service provision, legal language and action, designed to provide depth and context to discus- and their subjects in significant social professional training pedagogy, cyberspace sions of the historic 2008 presidential campaign. institutions while proposing alternative memorializing, and popular media representa- The series is entitled “Realities and Represen- approaches to assessing and responding to our tion of terrorism and catastrophe, my work tations: The 2008 U.S. Presidential Campaign” social suffering. considers what it means that experiences of and it explores the dynamics of race and gender, trauma, diagnoses of PTSD, easy memorializ- as well as the effects of media and technology on Works Cited ing, social instruction, and even legal framings recent events. of unacceptable harm are not, even now, avail- Baldwin, James. The Evidence of Things Not At noon on January 28, 2009, Dhavan Shah, able to, or inclusive of, everyone. From the Seen. : Holt, 1985. the Louis A. and Mary E. Maier-Bascom Profes- Past Imperfect shows how the work of trauma sor of Journalism and Mass Communication at Darwin, Charles. The Descent of Man, and in one institutional location feeds into and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, will dis- Selection in Relation to Sex. New York: Hurst draws upon its iterations in other institutions. cuss “Network Nation: How Campaign Ads and and company, 1874. How, for example, legal definitions of the tor- the Internet Shape Participation.” The cam- tured body rely on limiting concepts of physi- Eng, David. Racial Castration: Managing Mas- paigns’ use of technology such as text messaging cal and mental traumatic injury, which in culinity in Asian America. Durham: Duke and social networking has been credited with turn, supply the logics and just cause to train- University Press, 2001. drawing younger voters into the process. Shah ing institutions, cyberspatial sites of memori- will explore how the medium expanded upon alization, and representations of terrorism and Erichsen, John Eric. On Concussion of the the candidates’ messages. its effects. It examines the links between con- Spine: Nervous Shock and Other Obscure John M. Murphy, Associate Professor of temporary representations of terrorism and Injuries of the Nervous System. London: Long- Speech Communication at the University of Illi- the temporality of trauma, suggesting that mans, Green & Co., 1882. nois, will participate in the series on February even the democratizing of suffering that con- Freud, Sigmund. Totem and Taboo: Some 16, 2009 (details will be posted on the Warren temporary terrorism discourse offers, might Points of Agreement Between the Mental Lives Center website). function to ameliorate the requirement that of Savages and Neurotics. Ed. James Strachey. Susan J. Carroll, Professor of Political Science traumatic events be restricted to a spatially New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1989, at Rutgers University and an authority on and temporally distant location. The project c.1950. women in politics, delivered the first lecture on also argues that rather than mere legal cate- September 22, 2008. Entitled “Gender and gories, the peculiar legal objects hate crime Laplanche, Jean. Seduction, Translation, and Hillary Clinton’s Campaign: The Good, the and genocide in domestic and international the Drives. eds. John Fletcher & Martin Stan- Bad, and the Misogynic,” Carroll discussed gen- law are actually complicated sets of practice ton. Psychoanalytic Forum London: Institute der issues and politics. that reflect struggles over the status of the of Contemporary Arts, 1992. Peter Applebome, writer and editor for The legal subject in the context of harm. This Leys, Ruth. Trauma: A Genealogy. Chicago: New York Times, discussed the pros and cons of predicament, I argue, finds its most recent and University of Chicago Press, 2000. the campaign coverage on newspapers, televi- alarming manifestation in the jurisprudential sion, and blogs in his lecture “All the News resurrection of the tortured body. In addition Ribot, Théodule A. Diseases of Memory: An That’s Fit to Blog: Old Media, New Media, and to exploring traumatic iconography and repre- Essay in the Positive Psychology. London: Kegan the Brave New World of Election 2008” on sentations of terrorism, torture-related Paul, Trench. c. 1885-1887. October 13, 2008. jurisprudence, and contestations over the defi- The Warren Center website links to video- nition of genocide as sets of practice that Maurice Stevens is the 2008-2009 William casts of the talks after each event: exceed the parameters we might normally S. Vaughn Visiting Fellow and is an associate www.vanderbilt.edu/rpw_center/podcasts.htm. expect in investigations of the law or the professor of comparative studies at Ohio media, From the Past Imperfect analyzes State University. Letters • Spring 2009 • 6

Putting It Together: Creative Humanities Edward H. Friedman “A man only learns in two ways, one by When he delivered a Chancellor’s Lecture at we are in the business of encouraging analyti- reading, and the other by association with Vanderbilt on September 5, 2008, Bruce Cole, cal thinking. We are not so much deconstruct- smarter people.” — Will Rogers chairman of the National Endowment for the ing the operating premises of our disciplines as Humanities, addressed the role—and the demonstrating that the acquisition of knowl- rom the mid-1960s forward, an excit- fate—of the humanities in colleges and uni- edge is an ongoing process, constantly subject ing trend began to influence literary versities. Dr. Cole recognized the need to pro- to reassessment and change. While the boom F studies: the rise of theory. Literary the- mote the humanities curriculum and in theory may have served to shake the foun- ory is, of course, hardly new. The concept of a humanities programs, which have faced some dations of the humanities, the results have poetics, which could be both prescriptive and decline, but he also noted, if not exactly in been strikingly positive, pushing us to seek descriptive, dates from classical antiquity. Aris- these words, that the humanities are alive and greater depth and breadth in our academic totle’s Poetics, for example, uses audience reac- well at Vanderbilt. We are fortunate that this endeavors. We can let students in on our tion to Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex and other is the case; it is not just good luck, but hard uncertainties as we impart our discoveries and plays to formulate the basis of catharsis, the work on the part of faculty, students, and our hypotheses. In turn, classes can focus purging of the emotions of fear and pity pro- administrators, that has allowed the humani- simultaneously on a specific topic and on the duced by tragic drama. At the same time, one ties to thrive. The wide-ranging and diverse broader implications of a particular approach. can go back to classical antiquity for the foun- interests of the faculty and a willingness to This phenomenon also affects the ways in dations of rhetoric, initially the art of persua- cross, or elide, traditional disciplinary bound- which we describe our work to scholars in sion. Orators developed certain skills and aries assure that students have an exceptional other disciplines and helps to bring us strategies for emphasizing their major range of offerings. By the same token, Vander- together intellectually and in a comfortable points—for influencing their listeners—and bilt students at all levels opt to explore multi- space. The Warren Center faculty seminars these elements evolved into the tropes and fig- ple areas of the sciences, social sciences, and have done precisely that for many years, as do ures of poetry. Rhetoric becomes the base for humanities. Our undergraduates often select formal and informal study groups for faculty argumentation and for linguistic embellish- double, and even triple, majors, and the com- and graduate students, conferences, invited ment, for language that can be stirring, binations can be most impressive. I take speakers, and other Center-sponsored activi- enlightening, forceful, and beautiful, at the delight in knowing that future doctors, ties. Now in its third year, the Graduate Stu- service of poets and of spin doctors. The inter- lawyers, social workers, and entrepreneurs who dent Fellows Program builds on the Center’s play of poetics and rhetoric serves to unite old have taken Spanish literature courses with me role in facilitating individual development and theory with new, and similitude with differ- will approach their careers with a knowledge partnerships in research. ence. Equally significant, a shared commit- of language and culture and with an eye on The Warren Center has celebrated twenty ment to theory, which in its most recent diversity. The more students branch out, and years of serving Vanderbilt University, and the manifestations has dropped the adjective liter- the more critical and theoretical models to welcome mat at the Vaughn Home in the ary, can unite disciplines. which they have been exposed, the more pre- heart of the campus has seen considerable traf- Theory has become a type of lingua franca pared they will be for their professional and fic over that period of time. The Center has among academic fields, so that, for example, personal lives. become—and wants to continue to be—a historians have been able to interact more In the last three or four decades, theory has comfort zone for the humanities at Vanderbilt, fruitfully, and less territorially, with specialists taught us to be more self-conscious, to and a site for lively discussion and debate. The in literature, or anthropologists with acknowledge the models that we use and the executive director Mona Frederick, staff mem- researchers of popular culture, and the list strengths and limits of our work. This shift bers Sarah Harper Nobles and Polly Case, and could go on and on. Theory fosters interdisci- generally makes its way into the classroom, I extend an invitation to the university com- plinarity, and, as would follow, interdiscipli- where we may be more inclined to share with munity and to our neighbors to visit the Cen- narity encourages dialogue among scholars students our objectives and the tools of our ter and to become involved in its programs, to whose paths have not regularly converged. trade, as it were. We can be unapologetic for partake in a tradition of excellence, and to The first decade of the twenty-first century is not having all the answers or for not providing contribute to new projects and to traditions- a good moment for the humanities, because it “definitive” solutions to the problems raised in-the making. is a good moment for the exchange of ideas by our inquiries, but the ceding of authority and ideologies, for collaborative ventures. can be paradoxically empowering, given that Letters • Spring 2009 • 7 New Directions in Trauma Studies An Interview with Vivien Green Fryd

he 2008-2009 Warren Tennessee and have posttrau- the very famous case of children in the Center Fellows’ Pro- matic stress experiences about McMartin Preschool who had reported abuse; T gram, “New Directions being afraid to fly. Sometimes I the False Memory Association argued that in Trauma Studies,” will exam- get on a subway somewhere, and therapists had planted false memories. It’s a ine the emerging field of I will think, “boy, this would be contentious issue, and some people have prob- trauma studies and will work to a great place for somebody to lems accepting the fact that trauma can, in define its boundaries and bomb”; that would be an exam- fact, occur. enhance the field through inter- ple of cultural trauma. Then disciplinary discussion. The there are generational examples LETTERS: What do current scientific studies Fellows believe that by address- where trauma gets passed down say about trauma and how do you approach that ing the lived experiences of from one generation to the information from your discipline? trauma through an interdiscipli- Vivien Green Fryd next—and it can also be trans- FRYD: The way in which my brain functions nary humanistic lens, their work will augment generational, in particular among African is to look at how trauma and representation the theoretical understanding of individual Americans having to do with the residue of intersect—visual intersections in high art and and collective experiences of trauma, will slavery and how it affects their current lives. popular culture, in movies and pornography, intervene in the suffering that results from in comic books or in literature—and I’m LETTERS: What issues do you hope this semi- trauma, and will assist in trauma prevention. interested in the ways in which works of art nar will develop or seek to answer? The program’s director is Vivien Green Fryd, can act as testimonies giving voice to that professor of history of art. Letters recently FRYD: When I was talking about PTSD first which is silenced. I’m interested in how joined Professor Fryd at the Vaughn Home to being defined, I left out the Holocaust. But it trauma is silenced. The Holocaust is a great discuss the ongoing seminar. was the Holocaust and the Vietnam War that example in a family with Holocaust sur- were the two big events that led to the Psychi- vivors—I talk about this having read about it LETTERS: In your proposal, you assert that atric Association defining it as a disorder. It and having lived it because my mother was a we’re living in “an age of trauma that […] was in 1980 that feminists came on board, Holocaust survivor herself. Anytime the Holo- deserves further attention.” For the purposes of and in the 1970s that the rape crisis move- caust came up when I was a child, it was “shh, your study, what constitutes trauma? ment came about with Susan Brownmiller’s don’t talk about it.” And the same thing hap- FRYD: In 1980, the American Psychiatric book Against Our Will and with feminists in pens, I think, with incest in a lot of families. Medical Association had come up with the the arts and literature ending the silence about I’m interested in how viewers and readers bear term Posttraumatic Stress Disorder for the rape and sexual violence in American culture, witness and acknowledge the reality of such first time. It was a result of people returning raising questions about rape as an exercise of traumas. from the Vietnam War and experiencing what power and domination rather than sex. they identified as PTSD—which involves anx- Trauma studies began with Freud, who was LETTERS: Are there any specific results you iety, disassociation, depression, and flashbacks. the first one to talk about trauma, although he hope the group’s work will produce? The list of symptoms goes on. At the same initially talked about it as female hysteria— FRYD: I’m really interested in whether trauma time, feminists began to argue that women and he saw it in a number of his female can be healed. Is it possible for psychotherapy who had experienced sexual trauma were also patients. What’s interesting is that so many to heal trauma? I believe that it can, but heal- experiencing PTSD. Thus, trauma is a clini- people have problems with his talking about ing doesn’t mean you’re free of it. Trauma cal, psychological problem that individuals female hysteria—which today we now identify stays with you—it always comes back. But is experience when there’s an extreme incident as trauma—which usually is linked to sexual it possible for a work of art to heal a trauma— and rupture in their lives that creates so many abuse—incest, rape, things linked with child- or to stimulate a trauma? Can it work as a problems that they have difficulty engaging in hood events—but he then came up with his visual cue that can resurrect a past trauma? I normal day-to-day activities. Today, 9/11 is a theory of the Oedipal complex that replaced have been reading about ways in which neuro- perfect example, as are the earthquake in hysteria as a “woman’s problem.” It wasn’t psychologists have studied the brain to under- China and the cyclone in Myanmar. These are until World War I that he returned to accept- stand trauma-effects, then I met with a all examples of people who’ve had an extreme ing the idea of trauma—men returning from colleague, David Zald, from the psychology experience that causes these various symp- war with trauma, which he saw in relation to department; it turns out that he does studies toms—and it’s something that can still go the trauma of his female patients. He was the on the brain and he talked about how the unrecognized as a clinical problem. Watching first to talk about it; again, though, a lot of amygdala—which modulates memory and the news yesterday, I heard that the Veterans’ people were rejecting what he was saying. One controls responses linked to fear—is triggered Administration is talking about the fact that of his students even delivered a paper rejecting during experiences of trauma. It enhances Iraqi vets need additional help, and it seems everything that Freud said about trauma. So memory and coding, and trauma affects the like a no-brainer; hadn’t they already figured it’s very contentious. There’s actually an orga- cortex so that you can’t access those memories. this out with the Vietnam War? It’s an issue nization—which started in the 1992—called Clearly it’s more complex than this. I’m fasci- that keeps recurring. Trauma can be individ- the False Memory Association, which emerged nated by the fact that scientists are using ual or it can be collective—that is, that more from two particular cases. One involved a MRIs and other equipment to look at the than one person experiences it at the same grown woman who had memories of her brain and are realizing that PTSD literally time. You do not have to have lived in New father committing incest. Her mother, Pamela codes itself within brain activity. Someone’s York during 9/11; you can live in Nashville, Freyd, started the association. The other was inability to remember—a survivor of Viet- Letters • Spring 2009 • 8

nam, the Holocaust, incest—emerges out of their memories of their trauma. What happens so are men. The issue of gender becomes inter- an extreme experience that causes a rupture to the people who’ve had continuous trau- esting. Trauma studies is a very difficult topic; that prevents access to what particularly hap- matic experiences like these and have moved how do you deal with trauma studies when pened. And one may never be able to remem- to the U.S. to begin what we consider a nor- you’ve experienced trauma, and how do you ber it again. It’s fascinating. I’m a little mal life? The Lost Boys, Vietnam and Iraqi approach it from an intellectual, detached disappointed that we don’t have a participant vets, incest and Holocaust survivors—how are point of view—and does it have to be a in the sciences who’s doing this kind of work, they affected upon entering into normal life? detached point of view if it’s personal? When but I’m hoping to bring in outside speakers on Survivors of trauma always have that residue is it personal? It’s fascinating. I’m writing a the issue. that affects them emotionally and physically. book titled Representing Sexual Trauma in Con- temporary American Art. The number of peo- LETTERS: You mentioned war and its effects on LETTERS: You mention in your proposal that ple who respond to this topic is amazing; I PTSD. You also mentioned the effects of natural this seminar differs from other trauma theory wish I had a video. Because most people show disasters in China and Myanmar as factors groups in that it takes an interdisciplinary incredible surprise and shock, and I get the affecting trauma. Are there clear differences approach. How do you see the field benefiting question, “what got you interested in that?” It between the trauma civilians experience and the from the contributions not only from medicine puzzles them. Other work I’ve done, people type that soldiers experience? Is it a difference of and law, but also the humanities and want to hear more—but with trauma studies, degree rather than kind? social sciences? people can’t understand why you work on this and they can only joke, “oh, a light topic, FRYD: It makes me think of [Hurricane] Kat- FRYD: The strength of anything that takes haha.” Why would you choose something so rina and something my daughter said yester- place at the humanities center is that you have difficult? There are a group of us who do it, day. I was invited to present a paper at a people coming together to talk about the issue. and we own up that it’s difficult. conference in New Orleans, and I asked her if Trauma studies is not usually discussed from she’d like to come down with me and look at an interdisciplinary point of view. There are LETTERS: You mentioned before that trauma is schools like Tulane. And her response was, many, many wonderful books on trauma stud- a timely issue. At what point did you begin to “Mom, I wouldn’t want to live down there ies—some on Holocaust survivors, some on work on trauma, and what inspired you to pro- because there’s going to be another Katrina.” Vietnam Vets, some, although fewer, on visual pose this seminar? And I thought, this was her response to representations of trauma—and what we’re trauma, and it reminds me of my own experi- trying to do is bring it all together. What’s fas- FRYD: My interest in trauma studies really ence. Because my mom was a survivor of the cinating is that it turns out there’s going to be came from my decision to write about the rep- Holocaust, as a child I believed that if I told conference in Australia in December 2008 resentation of rape and sexual violence in people I was Jewish, I could be rounded up that will deal with trauma from an interdisci- American visual art. I wrote a rough draft and and taken off to a concentration camp; so I plinary point of view. It’s fascinating that it sent it to readers; and when I got comments hid my Judaism as a child. It was so alarming takes place at exactly the same time as our back, the readers skirted around the issue that to hear my daughter say that, and I had to seminar, and that we didn’t know about it, and I needed to conceptualize trauma studies. So I acknowledge that this was her response to they didn’t know about us. I think that what realized I wanted to do more reading, and not trauma. I don’t watch the news a lot—I mean we’re proposing to do is really new—and that only would I never turn down a chance to I listen to NPR—but I don’t watch a lot of the people in Australia are on board with us! work at the Warren Center, I also thought it TV, so she wasn’t inundated with it. So this is was right up my alley. What I didn’t realize an example of how trauma becomes culturally LETTERS: How do other factors such as age when I decided to get on board was how ingrained, a social dynamic. Race is also such and gender factor into the group’s work on invested I’d become. Even though my book an issue, and Katrina is your basic example as trauma studies? How essential are they to your manuscript will be done in the fall, I’ll still be far as what happened to minorities who were own work? able to refine my ideas. My next project will living there. also be on a photographer who’s a Holocaust FRYD: That’s something of interest in my survivor—my uncle—so it’s not surprising LETTERS: It seems that a host of socioeconomic work—I’m finding that women and children that I’m engaged in trauma studies right factors come into play in trauma studies. To are not the only victims of rape. Men can be now. It’s timely in my personal life as well follow up on China and Myanmar, does victims in rape, and it doesn’t have to be in as historically. nationality and how certain populations prisons, where we’re familiar with it, or in interact with disasters have a major effect churches—and it doesn’t have to be male-on- LETTERS: Thank you for sharing insight into on trauma? To what extent does a person’s male. It can be female-on-male. There are the discussions that have shaped the seminar so nationality inform how she will deal with some people who’ve written on male rape, but far. The project has great potential not only for her experiences? it’s largely an issue that doesn’t enter into the shaping an important emergent field, but also for larger American culture. This became a topic shaping how we deal with trauma outside of FRYD: It makes me think about the Lost Boys that emerged from the women’s movement, the humanities. [of Sudan] who settled here in Nashville. when some men involved in anti-rape crisis They’ve opened up an art exhibit in town; it approaches in the 1980s uncovered that not would be fascinating to go and talk to them only are women socially constructed, but so about their art and about how they deal with are men, and not only are women raped, but Letters • Spring 2009 • 9

The State of the Humanities by Bruce Cole, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities Chairman Cole spoke at Vanderbilt Univer- or hunching over a desk, writing feverishly. sity on September 5, 2008, as part of the This model has certainly produced much Chancellor’s Lecture Series. His talk was also brilliant scholarship. Many humanities schol- the final in a series of events marking the ars will continue to work this way and the twentieth anniversary of the Robert Penn NEH will continue to support them. Yet a sig- Warren Center for the Humanities. We are nificant part of the humanities’ future lies in grateful to Chairman Cole for allowing us to the type of collaborative scholarship that digi- reprint his remarks in Letters. tal technology makes possible. ood evening. Thank you, Chancellor An imperfect but valuable example of this is GZeppos, for your kind introduction. the “wiki” tool, which demonstrates the I am delighted to be in Nashville at this remarkable results possible when we tap into outstanding university. I am very pleased to the shared knowledge of enthusiastic commu- join the Robert Penn Warren Center for the nities. Wikis are also showing us the future of Humanities in celebrating its twentieth reference works. In the digital age, reference anniversary—and I am proud of the role the works can be “dynamic.” They can be con- National Endowment for the Humanities stantly updated; created and edited in collabo- played in helping to launch the Center two ration with users from around the globe; and Left: Bruce Cole, NEH Chairman, at a luncheon decades ago. remarkably adept at policing themselves to for public humanities leaders in Nashville. In 1989, the NEH awarded the Center a maintain accuracy, balance, and quality. $480,000 Challenge Grant to help establish a The second key change is that “data-driven” digital technology without changing what is permanent endowment for the program. As scholarship will allow humanists to ask new fundamentally meaningful and unique about the current NEH Chairman, I am thrilled to questions and create new knowledge. The the humanities? come here and see the results of that initial “core dataset” for humanities scholars consists At the NEH we are taking a leadership role investment: a thriving center for humanities of objects like books, documents, journals, in exploring these questions, and in promot- learning and research at one of our nation’s paintings, newspapers, film and audio record- ing the application of digital technology to finest universities. I admire the Center’s vari- ings, sculpture—these are the things we humanities scholarship, teaching, and access. ety of excellent programs—and I very much humanists study. In the past, these objects In 2006 we launched our Digital Humanities appreciate your emphasis on promoting inter- were read and searched on a small scale; no Initiative, and this past April, we transformed disciplinary learning and research among Van- one scholar could research or study more than it into a permanent Office of Digital Humani- derbilt’s students and faculty. a subset of the works in his field. ties, or ODH. This Office works with other On this happy anniversary for the Robert But in the digital age, the scale of available NEH staff and scholars, and with other fund- Penn Warren Center, we celebrate the past— materials has exploded. In just the past few ing bodies both in the United States and yet we must also look forward. In the years to years, massive amounts of cultural heritage abroad, to pursue the great opportunities come, the humanities will face exciting oppor- materials have been digitized. Scholars offered by the digital humanities. tunities—and some serious challenges. now have access to millions of digitized Let me give you a few examples of the types I am no seer or prophet, but as NEH books, journals, and recordings. In the of projects we are pursuing through the Office Chairman I do see trends in our grant applica- sciences, the data-driven approach to knowl- of Digital Humanities: One of our goals is to tions, and my job gives me a good overarching edge made possible by supercomputing start a conversation about how supercomput- perspective on what is happening in the has produced incredible breakthroughs like ers can be used for humanities research. This humanities. I want to offer my take on the the Human Genome Project. Now humanities past spring, we announced our new Humani- state of the humanities today, focusing on scholars are exploring how this approach can ties High Performance Computing initia- three major areas. benefit their disciplines. tive—HHPC for short. ODH is working with One development that is having a tremen- The third key change is that digitizing our colleagues at the Department of Energy dous impact on the humanities is the rise of allows us to greatly increase public access and the National Science Foundation to show the digital age. When I arrived at the Endow- to humanities resources. Digital archiving humanities scholars how high–performance ment in 2001, I had no idea that terms like and search tools are making primary computing and data storage might be used “petabytes” and “interoperability” would documents, scholarship, and other humanities for their work. We also recently announced a become part of my everyday vocabulary. But it resources much more portable and more new grant competition with the Department soon became clear to me that digital technol- broadly available. of Energy to award time and training on ogy will revolutionize the humanities in three These changes, while exciting, also raise their supercomputers. key ways. serious questions. How will the digital age Another ODH program is our Digital First, digitization will foster increased col- transform the ways in which we read, write, Humanities Start-up Grants. These grants are laboration in the humanities disciplines. Until think, and learn? Exactly what kinds of new encouraging scholars with bright new ideas, recently, the hard sciences and social sciences knowledge might humanities scholars and providing the “seed money” to help have been far ahead of the humanities in this acquire? What new questions might all this promising digital humanities projects get off regard. Those disciplines embrace collabora- data compel them to ask? What content tools the ground. tive work—yet the humanities disciplines tend do we need to develop to help scholars turn Another program is our Digital Humanities to prize individual scholarship. Our ideal is this tidal wave of information into wisdom? Workshops, which help K-12 educators learn still the lone scholar poring through archives, And how can humanists take advantage of how to use digital resources to strengthen the Letters • Spring 2009 • 10

teaching of the humanities in our schools. able to the public for free, and forever. these questions. And our Digital Humanities Challenge Grants In February, the NEH launched the newest Indeed, the humanities today suffer from a are helping endow digital humanities centers element of We the People, an initiative called crisis of confidence—an uncertainty about and other large-scale projects. Picturing America. This initiative brings high- what role they should play on our campuses, Now, let me reassure you: while the NEH quality reproductions of great American art to or in the intellectual life of our nation as a is embracing a digital future for the humani- classrooms and public libraries nationwide, whole. Humanities scholars and teachers ties, this does not mean that we will end our where they can help citizens of all ages con- know their disciplines are important—but support for print projects and other tradi- nect to the people, places, and ideas that have they often have trouble making the case to tional forms of scholarship—far from it. shaped our country. Picturing America uses their colleagues or to the larger public. But it does mean that we recognize and art in a unique way to engage students in the There are several reasons for this. First, on welcome the far-reaching potential of this new humanities—including history, literature, many campuses today, a rising tide of voca- frontier in the humanities. As a federal agency, social studies, civics, and much more. tionalism threatens to drown any area of study the Endowment’s mission is to bring the The response to Picturing America has been that does not promise maximum return on humanities to every American—so we seek to amazing. During a short, three-month appli- the dollar. Second, too many humanists have harness the power of digital technology to pre- cation window this past spring, nearly one- succumbed to the temptation of self-marginal- serve humanities resources and scholarship, fifth of all the schools and public libraries in ization in their fields by channeling their work and make the humanities more accessible the United States applied for Picturing Amer- into narrow specialties defined by technical, to everyone. ica awards. Later this month, over 26,000 jargon-filled writing. When taken to an This brings me to another important chal- schools and libraries will receive Picturing extreme, this temptation denies public access lenge we face: the need to democratize the America sets, including 504 recipients in Ten- to scholarly discourse. humanities. The NEH’s founding legislation nessee and 32 here in Nashville. Third, we now have celebrity humanities declares that “democracy demands wisdom Picturing America might not seem immedi- professors claiming that, unlike the natural and vision in its citizens.” The Endowment ately relevant to the concerns of most humani- and social sciences, the humanities have no fosters this wisdom and vision by bringing the ties scholars. But I hope you see how real positive effect on the world beyond the insights of the humanities to as many citizens effectively this initiative will promote public pleasure they give to those who enjoy them. as possible. engagement with the humanities, and raise To this way of thinking, the humanities have We are pursuing this goal in several ways. awareness of the NEH and its activities among no broader public role to play; instead, the Through our We the People program, now our citizens. Picturing America is extending most they can offer us is an insular, self-satis- almost six years old, the NEH supports pro- the Endowment’s reach exponentially—and I fied feeling, similar to the pleasure we might jects that promote the teaching, study, and think you will agree that is a good thing. get from playing sports, or solving a puzzle. In understanding of American history and cul- Through We the People, Picturing Amer- this view, the humanities are at best a sort of ture. These include documentary films, ica, and many other programs, the NEH highfalutin version of sudoku. museum and library exhibitions and other ensures that the humanities continue to make As scholars and teachers, we have an obliga- public programs, and workshops for teachers a vital contribution to our civic life. But the tion not merely to claim, but to demonstrate, at American historic sites such as Ellis Island, Endowment cannot do it all alone. Those of that the humanities are not merely a play- Mount Vernon, and Pearl Harbor. Since its you who teach and research in the humanities ground for nihilism, or barnacles clinging for inception, We the People has received $66 must also make the argument for the impor- survival on the supposedly more “practical” million in funding from Congress and the tance of your disciplines. areas of study at our universities. Nor are the President, and has used that funding to sup- That brings me to the final challenge that I humanities mere luxuries, or amusements port over 1,500 projects in every state of want to discuss: the need to restore the for idle moments. They are ever-renewing the Union. humanities to a central place in higher educa- gifts that enlighten and enrich the lives of One We the People project that takes tion and in public discourse. every citizen. advantage of digital technology is our At their best, the humanities help us carry At the Endowment, we are working to National Digital Newspaper Program. With on the rich traditions of our civilization, and address valid concerns about the state of the our partners at the Library of Congress, we are help us seek answers to the enduring questions humanities on our campuses. For example: the working to make available online, fully search- that we ask as human beings: What is the NEH continues its efforts to improve under- able, digital files of historic newspapers from good life? What is justice? Is there a human graduate education. There is an old saying I every American state and territory—the first nature, and if so, what is it? What is good am fond of: “Teaching is to research like sin is great draft of our history. government? Is there such a thing as right to confession—without one, you do not have Last year we unveiled the first results of our and wrong, good and evil? the other.” I love that line, because I happen labors—the Chronicling America page on the Most serious students begin college excited to believe it is true. Library of Congress’s Web site. This site now about the possibility of exploring such ques- So I am very excited about a new grant contains over 600,000 pages of public domain tions. Yet too often these days, humanities category the NEH is now offering, called newspapers. Students, teachers, scholars, and teachers and departments avoid them—either Teaching Development Fellowships. These history buffs can now, at the click of a mouse, because there is simply no room for them in fellowships will support college and university get immediate and searchable access to this the curriculum; or because humanities teach- teachers pursuing research aimed specifically incredible resource. Ultimately, Chronicling ers have greater interest in more specialized at deepening their core knowledge in the America will make more than 30 million topics or problems; or because they humanities, in order to improve their under- pages of historic American newspapers avail- do not believe it is even possible to answer graduate teaching. Letters • Spring 2009 • 11

We are also working on another new grant age the scholars in this audience to use simple, of the humanities spreads wider and sinks program, one that I think will excite all those clear language, and to think about how you deeper into the fabric of American thought. who believe that undergraduate humanities can address the broader public, and not just Not every scholar should address a broader courses should help students and scholars your colleagues in a particular sub-field. I am public, but more of us can do so, and we tackle the enduring questions I mentioned not advocating the “dumbing down” of pro- should welcome that opportunity. a moment ago. The NEH will soon announce fessional articles and books. Rather, I am Humanities teachers and scholars should the guidelines for this grant program, so encouraging humanities scholars to make a not be content with just talking to each other. stay tuned. sincere effort to make complex ideas under- Let us show our students and our fellow citi- As scholars and teachers, you also have a standable to the intelligent and curious lay zens that the humanities have something vital part to play in restoring the humanities reader. vital to add to our national life, to our quest to their rightful place on campus and in our By making academic thought more accessi- for truth, and to the great conversation of intellectual life. So let me once again encour- ble to the public, we ensure that the wisdom our civilization.

Graduate Student Research Symposium

n Monday, March 30, the Graduate the symposium. Engineering), Kathryn Schwarz (English), John School and the Graduate Student Coun- The Warren Center serves as a partner to Thatamanil (Divinity), Terri Urbano (Pediatrics, Ocil will present the annual Graduate Stu- the Graduate Student Research Symposium Kennedy Center), and Donna Webb dent Research Symposium, co-sponsored by the planning committee, and in that role has helped (Biological Sciences). The president of the Gradu- Warren Center. This day-long interdisciplinary to create and host a new faculty advisory panel ate Student Council, Jon Ahlbin, and the conference—featuring public lectures, panels, and for the yearly event. The advisory panel will sup- chair of the Graduate Student Research Sympo- poster sessions by Vanderbilt’s diverse graduate port the planning and increase awareness of the sium committee, Molly Brown, represent student body—ends with a keynote address at symposium across campus. The advisory panel the GSC on the panel. More information 4:10 p.m. by Susan Basalla, author with Maggie members for the 2008-2009 academic year are: about the symposium and the keynote Debelius of “So What Are You Going to Do with Yi Cui (Electrical Engineering/Computer Sci- address by Susan Basalla can be found at That?”: Finding Careers Outside Academia. Gradu- ence), Mona Frederick (Warren Center), Marc the Graduate Student Council website: ate students from all departments of the university Hetherington (Political Science/A&S Dean’s http://studentorgs.vanderbilt.edu/gsc/researchsym are encouraged to submit presentations and attend Office), Anita Mahadevan-Jansen (Biomedical posium/

Left: Senator Lamar Alexander, B.A., VU’62. Right: 2008 Howard lecture Roy Blount Jr., B.A., VU’63, following Blount’s talk on October 30, 2008. Letters • Spring 2009 • 12

What We Are Writing Staff Changes

hat books are our colleagues in Peter Lorge. The Asian Military Revolution: GALYN GLICK MARTIN, the Warren Cen- the College of Arts and Science From Gunpowder to the Bomb. Cambridge ter’s Activities Coordinator since 2002, W writing and editing? Letters has University Press. has accepted the position of Program Coordi- asked Vanderbilt University’s humanities and nator with the Vanderbilt Medical Center’s social sciences departments to share their fac- Dana D. Nelson. Bad for Democracy: How the Department of Nursing Education and Devel- ulty members’ 2008 publications. Their Presidency Undermines the Power of the People. opment. We all miss Galyn here at the Warren answers give us a glimpse into an active and University of Minnesota Press. Center, but we are very glad she is with us at diverse scholarly community. Vanderbilt! We are grateful for the many con- tributions Galyn made to the life of the Brooke A. Ackerly. Universal Human Rights Warren Center during the past six years and in a World of Difference. Cambridge University wish her well in her new position. Press. Our new Activities Coordinator at the A. Baker, Jr. Betrayal: How Black Warren Center is POLLY CASE. Polly has Intellectuals Have Abandoned the Ideals of the been in Vanderbilt’s English Department for Civil Rights Era. Columbia University Press. the past two years as assistant to the associate chair and assistant to the director of Paul K. Conkin. A Revolution Down on the undergraduate studies. Prior to her work in Farm: The Transformation of American Agricul- the English Department, she spent eight years ture since 1929. University Press of Kentucky. in the world of corporate banking. Polly earned a B.A. in comparative religion from Leonard Folgarait. Seeing Mexico Pho- Morna O’Neill. “Art and Labour’s Cause is Indiana University and has a deep and abiding tographed: The Work of Horne, Casasola, Mod- One”: Walter Crane and Manchester, 1880- interest in the humanities. We welcome Polly otti, and Alvarez Bravo. Yale University Press. 1915. Whitworth Art Gallery, University of to the Warren Center and look forward to Manchester. working with her in the years ahead.

Helmut Walser Smith. The Continuities of We also say farewell to English department German History: Nation, Religion, and Race graduate student MIRANDA GARNO Across the Long Nineteenth Century. Cam- NESLER, who has been a terrific editor of bridge University Press. Letters since the fall of 2006. Miranda is co- editing this issue of Letters with our new edi- Robert Talisse and Scott Aikin. Pragmatism: tor, JUSTIN HAYNES, who is also a graduate A Guide for the Perplexed. Continuum Interna- student in the English department. We are tional Publishing Group. indeed thankful for the extraordinary skills Miranda brought to the position of newsletter editor, and we wish her all the best as she completes her dissertation and moves ahead in her career. At the same time, we are thrilled to Michael Gamer and Dahlia Porter, editors. have Justin join our staff, and appreciate Samuel Coleridge and William Wordsworth’s greatly his commitment to the Warren Center. Lyrical Ballads 1798 and 1800. Broadview Press. Please drop by the center and welcome our new staff members! Lorraine López. The Gifted Gabaldón Sisters. Grand Central Publishing. Letters • Spring 2009 • 13

External Grants and Fellowships

We extend congratulations to our colleagues in the humanities and social sciences in the College of Arts and Science for receiving the following external grants and fellowships for their scholarly research as a result of applications submitted in the 2007 calendar year. We rely on departments to provide us with this information.

Michael Bess John Janusek John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection Fellowship American Council of Learned Societies Research Fellowship in Pre-Columbian Studies Icarus 2.0: A Historian’s Perspective on Human Biological Enhancement Pre-Columbian Urbanism in Comparative Perspective: Space, Society, and Long-Term Human-Landscape Relations James Bloom Curtiss T. & Mary G. Brennan Foundation Research Grant American Council of Learned Societies Research Fellowship Sunken Basins (Qochas) in the Southern Lake Titicaca Basin: The Birth of the Middle Class and the Rise of Painting in Early An Ethno-archaeological Investigation Modern Flanders Jonathan Lamb Joy Calico Cambridge University Centre for Research in the Social Sciences American Council of Learned Societies Frederick Burkhardt Fellowship and Humanities Research Fellowship A Musical Remigration: Schoenberg’s “A Survivor from Warsaw” in The Evolution of Sympathy Postwar Europe King’s College, Cambridge University Visiting Research Fellowship Laura Carpenter The Things Things Say – A Study of First Person Narratives of Things National Science Foundation in the Eighteenth Century News Media Coverage and the Construction of Public Health Problems Mireille Lee Lauren Clay American Council of Learned Societies Research Fellowship National Endowment for the Humanities Research Fellowship Kalos Kosmos: The Body, Dress and Identity in Early Greece Theatre in France and the Colonies, 1680–1789 Nancy Reisman Anastasia Curwood American Academy in Rome Visiting Artist in Residence Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation Career The James Merrill Writer-in-Residence Program Enhancement Fellowship for Junior Faculty A Catalyst for Change: The Life of Shirley Chisholm Norbert Ross National Science Foundation Katharine Donato Language and Conceptual Development: Role of Language Differences and National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Bilingualism in the Development of Spatial Concepts Among Tzotzil Maya of the National Institutes of Health & Spanish–Speaking Adults and Children Migration and Access to Care: An Innovative Population-Based Sampling Strategy Allison Schachter National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend Leonard Folgarait Geographies of Jewish Culture: Hebrew and Yiddish Modernism Getty Research Institute Scholar Research Grant in New York Pablo Picasso, Henri Bergson, Gertrude Stein, and the Turn to Cubism, 1909 Mitchell Seligson Inter-American Development Bank Lisa Guenther Democratic Indicators Monitoring Surveys in Chile, Venezuela, McGill Centre for Research and Teaching on Women Fellowship and Argentina Singularity and Feminist Philosophy United States Agency for International Development Barbara Hahn Defending Our Understanding of the Effects of U.S. Foreign Assistance John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship on Democracy Building Hannah Arendt’s Literature United States Agency for International Development Rick Hilles Latin American Democratic Indicators Monitoring System American Academy in Rome Visiting Artist in Residence (18 Latin American Nations) The James Merrill Writer-in-Residence Program Larry Isaac National Endowment for the Humanities Research Fellowship Elite Paramilitaries in the Gilded Age: Private Militias in Cleveland, Ohio Letters • Spring 2009 • 14

THE ROBERT PENN WARREN 2008–2009 CENTER FOR THE HUMANITIES Robert Penn Warren Center Faculty Fellows Warren Center Staff Edward H. Friedman, Director Mona C. Frederick, Executive Director Polly Case, Activities Coordinator Sarah Harper Nobles, Administrative Assistant Miranda Garno Nesler, LETTERS co-editor Justin Haynes, LETTERS co-editor

LETTERS is the semiannual newsletter of the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities at Vanderbilt University, VU Station B #351534, Nashville, Tennessee 37235-1534. (615) 343-6060, Fax (615) 343-2248.

For a listing of Warren Center programs and activities, please contact the above address or visit our Web site at www.vanderbilt.edu/rpw_center. Statement of Purpose Established under the sponsorship of the College of Arts and Science in 1987 and renamed the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities in 1989 in honor of Robert Penn Warren, Vanderbilt alumnus class of 1925, the Center promotes interdisciplinary research and study in the humanities, social From left to right: Claire Sisco King, Maurice Stevens, Christina Karageorgou-Bastea, sciences, and, when appropriate, natural sciences. Charlotte Pierce-Baker, Vivien Green Fryd, Jon Ebert, Laura Carpenter. Not pictured: Kate Daniels Members of the Vanderbilt community represent- and Linda Manning ing a wide variety of specializations take part in the Warren Center’s programs, which are designed to intensify and increase interdisciplinary discussion of academic, social, and cultural issues.

2008–2009 Vanderbilt University is committed to principles of equal opportunity and affirmative action. Published by Vanderbilt University Creative Services. Robert Penn Warren Graduate Student Fellows Photos credits: Steve Green and John Russell.

From left to right: Sonalini Sapra, Laura Taylor, David Wheat, Jeffrey Edmonds, Derrick Spires, Donald Jellerson, and Jonathan Wade