This book delves into the inadequately explored, liberative side of Humanism during the late Renaissance. While some long-sixteenth-century thinking anticipates twentieth-century Liberation Theology, a broader description is simply “liberation thinking,” which embraces its diverse, timeless, and sometimes nontheological aspects.

Two moments fra…[Read more]

Western observers often attribute Chinese suppression of undesirable information to state crackdowns on dissidents, pervasive censorship apparatus, and even self-censorship. For contemporary Chinese citizens under a certain age, Tiananmen Square protests allegedly did not happen. The PRC leadership’s private lives are shrouded in secrecies, m…[Read more]

Born poor, the material and ideological networks that propelled Peter Abrahams to literacy in 1930s South Africa lay bare how white liberalism, Pan-Africanism, and Marxism all overlapped as well as contradicted one another in the global 1930s. The confluences and contradictions of these currents of thought, artistic production, and political…[Read more]

Born poor, the material and ideological networks that propelled Peter Abrahams to literacy in 1930s South Africa lay bare how white liberalism, Pan-Africanism, and Marxism all overlapped as well as contradicted one another in the global 1930s. The confluences and contradictions of these currents of thought, artistic production, and political…[Read more]

Born poor, the material and ideological networks that propelled Peter Abrahams to literacy in 1930s South Africa lay bare how white liberalism, Pan-Africanism, and Marxism all overlapped as well as contradicted one another in the global 1930s. The confluences and contradictions of these currents of thought, artistic production, and political…[Read more]

This essay decodes how Marlon James’s A Brief History of Seven Killings uses the history of Jamaican music, culminating in the conflict between roots reggae and dancehall, to chart the Cold War’s conflicts over time, temporality, and futurity. A Brief History of Seven Killings points readers to a jaded, subaltern temporality encoded in a dan…[Read more]

This essay decodes how Marlon James’s A Brief History of Seven Killings uses the history of Jamaican music, culminating in the conflict between roots reggae and dancehall, to chart the Cold War’s conflicts over time, temporality, and futurity. A Brief History of Seven Killings points readers to a jaded, subaltern temporality encoded in a dan…[Read more]

The world needs good question askers as much as it needs good problem solvers. Before solving problems, we need to first identify the problems. Great stories are often strangers at home. The best of them defamiliarize banal experiences and everyday utterances while offering something recognizable through a new language and form.…[Read more]

Since the nineteenth century, stage and film directors have mounted hundreds of adaptations of Shakespeare drawn on East Asian motifs, and by the late twentieth century, Shakespeare had become one of the most frequently performed playwrights in East Asia. There are five striking themes surrounding cultural, racial, and gender dynamics. Gender…[Read more]

The idea that Shakespeare is a global author has taken many forms since the building of the Globe playhouse in London in 1599. Performances of Shakespeare not only create channels between geographic spaces but also connect different time periods. Divided into two major sections, Shakespeare and World Cultures and Shakespeare and Genres, the…[Read more]

In this article, I examine how Sissieretta Jones (frequently described as America’s first Black superstar, among other superlatives) strategically leveraged her European performance reviews in order to increase her listenership and wages in the United States. Jones toured Europe for the first (and only) time from February until November in 1895. A…[Read more]

The syllabus for science fiction course offered Spring 2021 in the English Department at Davidson College.

The syllabus for science fiction course offered Spring 2021 in the English Department at Davidson College.

Syllabus for spring 2021 graduate seminar, “Approaches to the Material Text.” Readings survey in history of the book and related fields. Includes prose introductions synthesizing each week’s readings.