Security/Insecurity in the News, Oct. 11 - 25

Hey everybody. Here's what's been going on in the news in the past two weeks re: security/insecurity.Our forward-charging culture sees regret as a sign of weakness and failure. But how else can we learn from our past? (Aeon Magazine)Were brutalist buildings on college campuses really designed to thwart student riots? (Slate)Are we alone? The search for life among the stars (The Atlantic)Think you can live offline without being tracked? Here's what it takes. (Fast Company)The image of Bruce McCandless' spacewalk two decades ago still amazes. It was the first untethered walk ever—and was among the last. (Smithsonian Magazine)Antibiotics can't keep up with 'nightmare' superbugs (NPR)24 extraordinary photos of the making of the atomic bomb (Buzzfeed)For more about American Studies at UT, subscribe to our newsletter here.

Announcement: Texas Book Festival This Weekend!

It's that time of year again--time for the Texas Book Festival! Here's a look at a handful of writers to check out during the weekend:AMS alumni Jessica Grogan and Kevin Smokler will both be presenting at this year's festival. Jessica Grogan will present on Sunday from 2:00 to 3:00 in the Capitol Extension Room E2.026. She'll be presenting along with Elena Passarello and looking at ways in which self-identity is shaped. Check out her book, Encountering America: Humanist Psychology, Sixties Culture, and the Shaping of the Modern Self here! Kevin Smokler will also present  on Sunday. He will join Wayne Rebhorn from 11:30 to 12:15 in the Capitol Extension Room E2.012 to talk about "Bringing Classics Back." Check out his most recent book, Practical Classics: 50 Reasons to Read 50 Books You Haven't Touched Since High School here.Here are a few other presentations to check out:SATURDAYFrom 10:00 to 11:00, Geoff Dyer will discuss Zona: A Book About a Film About a Journey to a Room, on his book-length film essay, in the Capitol Auditorium Room E1.004.Claire Vaye Watkins, author of Battleborn, and Zachary Karabashliev, author of 18% Gray, will present in a panel tauntingly titled America the Beautiful? from 12:00 to 1:00 in the Capitol Extension Room E2.026From 1:00 to 2:00, horror master R. L. Stine will present in the House Chamber with his newest, A Midsummer Night's Scream.Where to Fight the Fight: Books on Conservation will feature Brad Tyer (Opportunity Montana) and Deni Béchard (Empty Hands, Open Arms) from 1:45 to 2:30 in the Capitol Extension Room E2.016.SUNDAYMark Binelli (Detroit City Is the Place To Be) and Jeffrey Stuart Kerr (Seat of Empire: The Embattled Birth of Austin, Texas) will discuss the evolution of Austin and Detroit in a session called Rebuilding from 11:00 to 11:45 in the C-SPAN2/ Book TV Tent.Sherman Alexie, author of twenty-two books, including The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, will present on Sunday from 1:15 to 2:15 in the Capitol Auditorium Room E1.004. Alexie will discuss his new work Blasphemy and the 20th anniversary of The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven.From 3:30 to 4:30 Sunday, Roy Flukinger, Senior Research Curator of the Harry Ransom Center, will discuss Arnold Newman: At Work at The Contemporary Austin--Jones Center (700 Congress).From 4:15 to 5:00 in the C-SPAN2/Book TV Tent,  Ricardo Ainslie (The Fight to Save Juarez) and Alfredo Corchado (Midnight in Mexico) will present their work in a panel titled Border Politics.Hope to run into you there!For more about American Studies at UT, subscribe to our newsletter here.

Faculty Research: Steve Hoelscher on Reading Magnum

In honor of all the great events taking place this week surrounding the Magnum Symposium: Magnum Photos into the Digital Age, (including a lecture by Alec Soth - tonight!) we want to draw your attention to an incredible book edited by our own Dr. Steve Hoelscher: Reading Magnum: A Visual Archive of the Modern World (UT Press, 2013).We sat down with Dr. Hoelscher a few weeks ago and chatted about the ins and outs of putting together such a rich, complex book about this storied institution. Reading Magnum was a four-year project, which, in comparison to most academic projects, is light-speed. The book is not a catalogue, though its publishing coincides with the Magnum exhibition at the Harry Ransom Center, Radical Transformation: Magnum Photos into the Digital Age. With the arrival of the Magnum collection of photographs at the Ransom Center in 2009, Dr. Hoelscher began work on this far-ranging consideration of the historical, political, and cultural context in which Magnum has worked since its founding in the wake of World War II.Instead of focusing on Magnum's photographic "geniuses," the book takes a decidedly more contextualist approach to the archive. Dr. Hoelscher did not want to represent a hermetically-sealed vision of the photography world; he wanted to bust things open and make connections across photographers, time periods, and subjects. To add depth to the work, Dr. Hoelscher contacted a diverse group of scholars to contribute essays to Reading Magnum: Alison Nordstrom, Barbie Zelizer, Frank H. Goodyear III, Erika Doss, Robert Hariman, and Liam Kennedy. The work is theoretically informed, but style is paramount and clarity key. It is also, as you can see from just a couple of the spreads, incredibly beautiful.According to Dr. Hoelscher, Magnum was in many ways the post-war geographic information system, and place as much as narrative defined the Magnum project. Magnum photographs published and re-published around the globe constructed a certain understanding of the world in the second half of the 20th century and into the 21st. While many of the photographs featured in the book look at the horrors of war, there are also examples of photographs that addresses the quotidian, street life, stardom, and Civil Rights struggles. Scattered throughout the book are illuminating "Notes from the Archive" sections that give a behind the scenes look at the process of photographic distribution as well as "Portfolio" sections that highlight themes that wind through the archive: portraiture, geography, cultural life, social relations, and globalization.Definitely check out the Magnum exhibition at the Ransom Center, up until January 5, and get your hands on this beautiful book!

Announcement: AMS Film Series Returns This Thursday with 'The Game'

Join us for another installment of the AMS Film Series, which is featuring films related to this year's department theme: security/insecurity. This week's film, David Fincher's The Game, will be introduced by Dr. Randolph Lewis, whose research includes surveillance culture and cinema studies.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kqQNBR09Rc]

The film features wealthy financier Nicholas Van Orton, who gets a strange birthday present from wayward brother Conrad: a live-action game that consumes his life. Before there was Fight Club, there was The Game, Fincher's under-appreciated masterpiece -- a dark examination of morose privilege, perverse entertainment, and Situationist surveillance. Nothing is what it seems… no one can be trusted… nothing can protect you.Check it out in CMA 2.306 at 6:15 on Thursday, October 24.For more about American Studies at UT, subscribe to our newsletter here.