“We have never been anti-exceptionalists”
A Gilbert Lecture hosted by SMU's Department of English and featuring Professor Dana D. Nelson of Vanderbilt University.
| What: | Professor Dana D. Nelson of Vanderbilt University will present a lecture titled “We have never been anti-exceptionalists” The project of repudiating the exceptionalism associated with the Cold War era founders of American Studies came at the same academic moment as the canon debates — they both started in the mid-1980s.
In the twenty-first century, we’ve thoroughly repudiated American exceptionalism but we’re still glued to the old fashioned canon. And here’s what Prof. Nelson said she started to wonder: Does our inability to let go of the white male canon give the lie to our vaunted anti-exceptionalism? |
| Who: | Professor Nelson is the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English. She is the author of Commons Democracy: Reading the Politics of Participation in the Early United States (Fordham UP, 2016) and Bad for Democracy: How the President Undermines the Power of the People (U Minnesota P, 2008) |
| When: | April 6, 2017 6 p.m. Reception 6:30 p.m. Lecture |
| Where: | McCord Auditorium of Dallas Hall, Room 0306 |
| Cost: | Free and open to the public |
| More Info: | and |
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