Professor Emerita Merle Goldman Reports: on April 1-3 I Participated in a Conference on “Rising China” at Principia Universi
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May 2009 garet Fuller: An American Romantic Life at the Concord Free Public Library. The large audience included descen- dants of some of the principal figures in his book as well as enthusiastic keepers of the Concord Transcenden- talist flame. Graduate student Jolanta Komor- nicka will give a paper at the Interna- tional Congress on Medieval Studies Professor Emerita Merle Goldman Zoryan Institute of Canada. at Kalamazoo (May 7-10) entitled reports: On April 1-3 I participated in In mid-April graduate student “King in Woman’s Clothing.” She has a conference on “Rising China” at Kathryn Brownell presented a paper also had her undergraduate thesis Principia University in southern Illi- at the British Association for Ameri- published by VDM Publishing: nois, on the Mississippi River just can Studies Annual Conference in “Shadowing the Other.” across from St. Louis. It focused on Nottingham, England: “A New Deal Graduate student Scott Marr pre- China’s history and traditions and in Entertainment: Franklin D. Roose- sented a paper on April 18 at the New what they may tell us about what kind velt and the Politicization of Ameri- England Historical Association’s of a power China will become in the can Celebrities.” spring conference, held at the Univer- 21st century. On April 25 I participated While on leave this past academic sity of Southern Maine. The title of in a workshop on “The Media in Chi- year, Professor Brooke Blower fin- the paper was “Religions and Com- nese Politics,” and May 1-3 I will be ished a draft of her book manuscript munity: Catholic-Huguenot Coexis- presenting a paper at a conference at on Americans in interwar Paris. She tence and Christian Morality in the the Fairbank Center for Chinese also presented work from this project Thought of Moise Amyraut.” Studies at Harvard on the “60th Anni- at several Boston University forums, On April 19 in Nottingham, Eng- versary of the People’s Republic of including the interdisciplinary confer- land, graduate student François China” (my paper is on the changing ence on “American Studies in Global Lalonde delivered a paper titled “Re- role of the intellectuals in twentieth- Perspective” in October 2008 and the establishing the Transatlantic Diplo- century China). BU–Cambridge University–Princeton matic Dialogue: The Eisenhower Ad- Professor Simon Payaslian partici- University conference on liberalism in ministration and the Atlantic Com- pated in a panel entitled “Conse- March of this year. She reports that munity, 1957-1960” at the British Asso- quences of the Armenian Genocide she looks forward to returning to her ciation for American Studies annual on History, Literature, and Politics.” regular duties in the fall. conference. His talk covered the Armenian In June visiting faculty member Professor Eugenio Menegon pre- diasporan community in the US and Samuel Deese will deliver a paper at sented his recent research on Euro- the politics of genocide recognition the conference of the World History pean experts at the Manchu imperial both here at home and in bilateral re- Association in Salem on “From hunts at the Annual Meeting of the lations with Turkey. The event took Chipko to Wangari Maathai: Ecology Association for Asian Studies in Chi- place at York University, Toronto, on and Modernity in the Postcolonial cago on March 28, in a panel entitled April 23. The colloquium was co-spon- World.” “Missionaries at Leisure, or Not? sored by a number of Armenian stu- On March 19 Professor Charles Courtly and Transnational Networks dent associations in Ontario and the Capper gave a book talk on his Mar- at the Qing Court.” On April 3, as part of the inaugural conference “The spoke about her book when she was the featured guest on an Internet-based Idea of Asia” organized by the new “Civil War Talk Radio” show in April. BU Center for the Study of Asia, he On April 3 Professor Jon Roberts presented a lecture on “Social Darwinism commented as discussant on papers and Religion in America” at the Boston University School of Theology and the by BU colleagues in Archaeology Boston Theological Institute’s Darwin Anniverary Conference on “The Science (Robert Murowchick), Ethno- and Politics of Improving the Human Species: The Disastrous History of Social musicology (Brita Heimarck), Religion Darwinism and Eugenics.” On April 14 he served as a commentator on Dan (David Eckel), and History (Suzanne McKanan’s “Twin Heirs of the Social Gospel: The Socialist Party and the Fed- O’Brien), in a panel on “Cultural eral Council of Churches” at the North American Religion Colloquium at Har- Transmission and the Boundaries of vard. On April 24 he lectured on “Darwin’s Challenge to Religion” at a sympo- ‘Asia,’” covering the topics of archae- sium on “Darwin’s Impact in the United States” at the Boston Colloquium for ology and politics in China and Viet- the Philosophy of Science. nam, the diffusion of Indian music Professor William Keylor presented a paper at an international conference into Indonesia in medieval times, the in Beijing on April 16-18 (see article on page 4 of this issue). He also gave talks at sacred landscapes of Buddhist Asia, the Beijing University (Beida) and the Chinese People’s University (Renda) on and the conceptions of “Asia” among United States relations with Europe. On May 13-15 he will chair a session and Meiji Japanese intellectuals. On April present a paper at a conference on the French right-wing intellectual movement 18-19 he co-chaired a workshop at the “Action Française” in Metz, France. N Ricci Institute for Chinese-Western Cultural History, University of San A preliminary look at 2009 graduate admissions Francisco, reviewing with a panel of As of mid-April the Graduate Studies Committee had completed the consideration of all five international scholars a forthcom- 193 20 ing manuscript on the history of the applications to the graduate program. The number is down by about from the record number of the previous year. Of those applying for September 2009, approximately 100 were Chinese Rites Controversy, a politico- in the American field, 45 in the European, and 20 in the African, with the remainder in vari- theological battle between the Chi- ous other fields. nese emperor and the Catholic The committee admitted 78 students (40 percent of applicants, slightly higher than in Church in the seventeenth and eigh- most recent years), and to date, ten applicants have said they intend to enroll in September teenth centuries. (four are MA students, six are PhD). Full fellowships have been awarded to three of the in- Professor Houchang Chehabi at- coming students. tended a conference on “Beauty in the Worlds of Islam” at the University of Texas at Austin and presented a pa- per on “Persianate Elements in the Traditional Athletic Cultures of West and South Asia” on April 4. The paperback edition of Professor Andrew Bacevich’s book The Limits of Power: The End of American Exception- alism appeared in April. He also con- tributed an “Afterword” to the fiftieth anniversary edition of The Tragedy of American Diplomacy by William Appleman Williams, also recently published. On April 16 graduate student Robyn Metcalfe headed to Michigan State University to present a paper on “Necessary Cruelty? Meanings of Ani- mal Welfare in the 19th Century Land- scape.” Professor Nina Silber will be lec- turing on her recent book, Gender and the Sectional Conflict, at Western Con- Professor Allison Blakely made a presentation on “Black Civic Participation in Europe: Past and Present” at necticut State University on May 4 the “Black European Summit: Transatlantic Dialogue on Political Inclusion” meeting at the European Parliament in Brussels on April 16. He was part of a delegation from the US Congressional Commission on (and hence committing the unpardon- Security and Cooperation in Europe, led by Congressman Alcee Hastings. The delegation spent the next able sin of missing the Bacon lecture day in Paris in related meetings highlighted by a session (see photo above—Prof. Blakely is the fourth from and department dinner). She also the left) with State Minister for Human Rights Rama Yade. Page 2 NEWS From Professor Jon Roberts: Charles L. Cohen and Paul S. Boyer, eds., Religion and the Culture of Print in Modern America Barry Werth, Banquet at Delmonico’s: Great Minds, the Gilded Age, and the Triumph of Evolution in America Heather D. Curtis, Faith in the Great Phy- sician: Suffering and Divine Healing in Ameri- can Culture, 1860-1900 Allan M. Brandt, The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product that Defined America With summer in view as this newsletter goes to print, we asked department personnel for Constance Areson Clark, God—or Go- some suggestions for reading during the more leisurely months. Here they are: rilla: Images of Evolution in the Jazz Age Bernard Lightman, Victorian Popularizers From Professor Simon Payaslian: of Science: Designing Nature for New Audi- John Beverley, Subalternity and Representation: Arguments in Cultural Theory (Durham, NC: ences Duke University Press, 1999) Ronald L. Numbers, ed., Galileo Goes to Paula Chakravartty and Yuezhi Zhao, eds., Global Communications: Toward a Transcultural Jail and Other Myths about Science and Reli- Political Economy (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2008) gion Iain Chambers, Migrancy, Culture, Identity (London: Routledge, 1994) D. Graham Burnett, Trying Leviathan: Alfred B. Evans, Jr., Laura A. Henry, and Lisa McIntosh Sundstrom, eds., Russian Civil Soci- The Nineteenth-Century New York Court Case