Provost Lecture Series 2007: Challenging the Logics of Empire

Diana Taylor

Double Blind: The Torture Case

Thursday, February 8, 2007 at 7:00pm, 206 Bowen Thompson Student Union (Theatre)
Reception to follow in lounge outside (200D)

How is the use of torture being justified?

Does torture protect "us" from enemies or does it undermine our standing in the world?

Professor Taylor analyzes how the use of torture has been defended in the U.S. since Abu Ghraib scandal. Drawing on her background in Latin American Studies and Performance Studies, she argues that a case study methodology has been used to explain the need for torture. She explores how proponents have used the (exemplary) case study, the limit case, and the scenario in order to bolster their arguments..

Diana Taylor is Professor of Performance Studies and Spanish at New York University and founding Director of the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics. Her most recent book, The Archive and the Repertoire: Performing Cultural Memory in the Americas, won the Outstanding Book award from ATHE and the Kathleen Singer Kovaks Award from the MLA in 2004. She is also the author of Disappearing Acts: Spectacles of Gender and Nationalism in Argentina's 'Dirty War', the award-winning Theatre of Crisis:Drama and Politics in Latin America, and articles that have appeared in TDR, Theatre Journal, PMLA, Signs, Performing Arts Journal, and Gestos, among others. She has directed and participated in staging productions in Mexico and the United States.

Queer Regions: From Fire to The Journey

Tuesday, February 13, 2007 at 6:30pm, 202B Bowen Thompson Student Union (Theatre)
Reception to follow.

How can we think about film and desire in relation to regionality?

What is hidden by dominant narratives of global gayness?

Professor Gopinath asks why the recent film The journey (2004) was received so differently than the acclaimed but controversial Fire (1996) by Deepa Mehta. She explores how shifting our focus from a "global gay" to a "queer regional" subject challenges our understanding of gender and sexuality. She argues that The Journey , directed by Indian American Ligy Pullappally, raises interesting questions about locating lesbian desire and regionalism within global contexts.

Gayatri Gopinath is Associate Professor of Women and Gender Studies at University of California at Davis. She is the author of Impossible Dreams: Queer Diasporas and South Asian Public Cultures. Her articles on the politics of Bollywood, Bhangra music, sexuality, and diaspora have been published in Social Text, positions: east asia cultures critique, Journal of Homosexuality, and Diaspora. She is the recipient of various fellowships including the University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellowship.

American Empire

Thursday, March 29, 2007 at 7 pm, 206 Bowen Thompson Student Union (Theatre)
Reception to follow in lounge outside (200D)

Is the concept of American Empire homegrown or imported?

How do apologists reconcile empire with democracy and popular sovereignty?

While the (imperial) impulse to extend American Power beyond our borders has pervaded U.S. history, it has also remained an ambarrassment even to the most fervid expansionists. Professor Lears contends that a lust for empire flies in the face of republican suspicion of concentrated power, democratic celebration of popular sovereignty, and religious faith. He outlines a powerful countertradition against empire using the works of William James, Randolph Bourne, and J. Wlliam Fulbright.

T.J. Jackson Lears is the Board of Governors Professor of History at Rutgers University and the editor of teh distinguished journal Raritan. Lears' research interests include U.S. cultural and intellectual history, comparative religious history, literature and the visual arts, folklore and folk beliefs. His books include Something for Nothing: Luck in America, Fables of Abundance: A Cultural History of Advertising in America, which won the Los Angeles Times book prize for history, and No Place of Grace: Antimodernism and the Transformation of American Culture, 1880-1920. He writes regularly for The New Republic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Los Angeles Times Book Review and has been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and both the Rockefeller and Guggenheim Foundations.

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