Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper develops a theoretical framework for tracing and explaining the transformation of official national ideologies against the backdrop of Peronist Argentina. The central argument is that full-blown transformations of nationalism were driven by the conjuncture of (1) the formation of political movements that successfully advanced alternative ideas about the nation, (2) the emergence of alliances between the central state and mobilized subordinate sectors, which provided an incentive for the incorporation of alternative narratives into official national discourses, and (3) the quality of “state ideological infrastructure,” facilitating the institutionalization of these modified state ideologies. The subsequent empirical sections explore the explanatory power and limitations of this framework through a historical case study, trajectories of nationalism in Argentina from 1930 to 1955. With Perón coming to power, new alliance structures with organized labor and political Catholics emerged, and the state selectively employed alternative national narratives propelled by these movements. An analysis of primary school textbooks indicates that official ideologies began to advance the idea of Argentina as a nation of the working masses, and simultaneously emphasized the Catholic roots of national identity. At the same time, state ideological infrastructure was marked by repressive control of ideological production and diffusion, and a strained relationship between state authorities and key cultural producers. In the domain of education, a well-organized magistrate opposed the intents of educational authorities to modify curricular products and teaching practices. Thus, in comparison to other Latin American cases, Peronist Argentina represents a contained rather than a full-blown transformation of nationalism.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This project explores the role that organized religion played in lynching prevalence in the American South, 1900-1930. Building from Tolnay and Beck, we ask whether religion, as a social institution, reinforced or challenged the prevailing racial caste system. We investigate the influence of religious composition on racial violence, especially religious pluralism, religious segregation, and religious organization. Two theoretical hypotheses are used to assess the relationship between the local religious economy and lynching: Durkheim’s theory of moral community -- that religious homogeneity supports prevailing norms – which predicts a negative relationship between lynching and religious pluralism; and Olzak’s theory of ethnic conflict, which predicts increased conflict with greater religious diversity. Our primary unit of analysis is the number of lynching events by county in ten Southern states across three decades. We use negative binomial regression to measure religious influence on county lynching events, controlling for demographic and economic variables. Preliminary results support Olzak’s ethnic conflict theory: greater religious pluralism in a county increases the number of lynching events, and strength of denominations with headquarters outside the South were negative. Religious variables do not affect the significance of economic variables.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The theory behind my work on the history of the law of the sea is a structural-functional theory of human ecology that examines the interdependent relationships among population, organization, environment, and technology. Most of this work was completed using the League of Nations Archives located in the Library of the United Nations Office at Geneva, in the Palais des Nations, Geneva, Switzerland, which is the world repository for international law of the sea materials. For this paper, I have chronicled the changes in ocean law between 1800 and 1930, that were shaped by increasing interest in the seabed and airspace above the ocean, concern with oil pollution of the marine environment, apprehension about whaling, interest in halibut and salmon fisheries, and involvement of the League of Nations in the law of the sea. This study examines the ocean as a source and a sink—a resource for animals, minerals, and vegetables, and a depository for waste. It is an analysis of the determinants of change in the law of the sea over time, focusing on the second billion people added to the planet. With world population increasing at unprecedented rates and technology advancing rapidly, we can expect that these two factors will continue to be the most significant factors in future changes in ocean law.

Publication Type: Internal Paper
Abstract: This paper explores the intellectual collaboration between Agnes Smedley, major US proletarian author, and Lu Xun, arguably the most significant Chinese author of the 20th century, in the 1930s in China. In 1930, Smedley left New York City for war-torn Shanghai and immersed herself in its leftist political community, quickly befriending a number of major Chinese intellectuals. She developed her closest bonds to the writer Lu Xun, leading Shanghai political agitator and writer, whereby the two initiated a short-lived but energetic period of intellectual collaboration. This paper examines the outcome of this trans-Pacific friendship: a series of bilingual essays, co-written stories, and translations. These writings, which sought to transcend cultural, national, and linguistic differences, enabled powerful links between leftist politics in the US and China; the NYC-based Cultural Front and the Shanghai League of Leftist Writers, in particular. I argue that this collaboration staged a brief yet important form of a global, distinctly East-West, leftist politics that powerfully challenges current conceptions of the “radical 1930s” in the West. This paper offers a close analysis of the imagined terms of such “trans-Pacific” writing, and moreover, asks the question: why has the field of American Studies so egregiously overlooked this vital cultural history? And how can it be used to conceptualize a future “trans-Pacific” cultural studies in the US?

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper is based in part on primary accounts by those who survived and witnessed the fire. It will examine the impact of this tragic fire in which more than 300 prisoners perished in their cell in Columbus, Ohio in 1930. The researcher is currently working on a book on this topic. This presentation will place the disaster within the context of America's penitentiary systm, circa 1930, especially riots, overcrowding, lack of fire fighting equipment etc. More importantly will be an analysis of the reforms that came out of this tragedy (similar to the impact of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire on immigrant working conditions).