GSHA 2012 Annual Conference

“The Politics of Unrest: A Transdisciplinary Conference”

The Graduate Student History Association of Claremont Graduate University is pleased to announce its fourth annual spring conference: “The Politics of Unrest: A Transdisciplinary Conference.”

This conference will explore both political protests and nonviolent resistance in countries and cultures around the world. States have used political violence to intimidate and maintain authority, while protestors have resorted to rebellions, terrorism or sit-ins to demand changes in policy, regime, or political structure. Coverage of recent political uprisings, such as Occupy Wall Street and the Arab Spring movements, are prominent in the news media and signal the ongoing importance of this topic. While this conference assumes a historical vantage point for understanding the ongoing role of unrest in society, we welcome papers from multiple disciplinary perspectives on a wide-range of topics including but are not limited to: the interrelationship(s) between political change, violence, non-violence, the state, theory, terrorism, civil rights movements, genocide, the media, and memory.

The conference will be held on the campus of Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, California, between April 13-14, 2012. Proposals for papers should be made in the form of abstracts of no more than 250 words and submitted to gsha@cgu.edu by Tuesday, January 31, 2012.

8:00 – 9:00 am

Registration in Burkle Building Lobby

Session 1: 9:00 – 10:30 am

Panel 1: Contextualizing 2011 Uprisings: The Arab Spring and Occupy Movements

Panel Chair: Joshua Goode, Associate Professor of Cultural Studies & History and Chair of the History Department, Claremont Graduate University
Location: Burkle 12
Presenters:

James Bartoli, “Where the Western Breakers Beat: Repression and Impunity Culture During Occupy San Diego and the San Diego Free Speech Fight, 1912-15,” University of San Diego, California

Priscilla Kilili, “The Occupy Movement and 1848: a Period of Almost Change,” San Jose State University, California

Panel 2: Reimaging Identity in Art and the Public Sphere

Panel Chair: Angela Cardinale Bartlett, Associate Professor of English, Chaffey College
Location: Burkle 26
Presenters:

Molly Hatay, “Poetry as Protest: Rejecting the Myth of the Special Jewish Woman,” San Diego State University, California

Daniel McClure, “Neoliberal: Popular Culture Born in Flames,” University of California, Irvine

Kai Green, “Looking for U & Longing for Us: How Black Queer Los Angeles Re-members itself,” University of Southern California

Session 2: 10:45am – 12:00 pm

Panel 3: Theorizing Order and Uprising

Panel Chair: Marlene Daut, Assistant Professor of Cultural Studies & English, Claremont Graduate University
Location: Burkle 12
Presenters:

Roberto Sirvent, “Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Arrogance, and the Problem of Christian Pacifism,” Hope International University

Caleb Miller, “Michael Oakeshott and the Question of Substantive State Orientation,” University of California, Santa Barbara

Panel 4: Understanding American Protests for Latin American Solidarity

Panel Chair: Andrew Harrington, Ph.D. Candidate in Cultural Studies, Claremont Graduate University
Location: Burkle 26
Presenters:

Stephanie Gonzalez, “Under Pressure: The Evolution of the Movement Against the United States Army School of the Americas,” California State University, Long Beach

Teishan Latner, “Complex Personhood’ and ‘Complicated’ Political Protest in 1960s U.S.: The Case of Airline Hijackings to Cuba, 1968-1973,” University of California, Irvine

12:00 – 1:00 pm

Lunch in Jenkins Courtyard, Burkle Building

1:30 – 2:30 pm

Keynote Address

“’Wartime’ as a Concept in History” by Mary L. Dudziak, Judge Edward J. and Ruey L. Guirado Professor of Law, History and Political Science, USC Gould School of Law

Session 3: 2:45 – 4:15 pm

Panel 5: Formations of National Identity

Panel Chair: Adam Guerin, Adjunct Professor of History, Claremont Graduate University
Location: Burkle 12
Presenters:

Thomas Patrick Carey. “On the King’s Threshold”: Irish Hunger Strikes and the Struggle for Legitimacy within the Penal Systems of the United Kingdom and Ireland, 1916-1946,” San Francisco State University, California

Daman Navas Howard “The Creation of a New Iraqi Kurdish Nationalist Politics: Gorran and the 2009 Parliamentary Elections,” San Francisco State University, California

Panel 6: Art and Literature as Spaces for Social Protest

Panel Chair: Dan O’Sullivan, Ph.D. Candidate in History, Claremont Graduate University
Location: Burkle 26
Presenters:

Michael Veremans, “Art and Social Responsibility,” San Francisco State University, California

Jennifer Wolf, “Radical Intentions: M.T. Anderson’s Feed and the Socio-Political Potential of the Young Adult Dystopia in the Twenty-First Century,” San Diego State University, California

Thomas W. Yanni, “You ultimately have to look:” The Multiple Voices of ACT UP Graphics,” University of California, Riverside