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April 2006
Cultural Preservation | Film
& Television |History |Literature | Performing Arts |
G1 - "Thoughts in Things": Modernity, History,
and North American Museums
Kohlstedt, Sally Gregory
Isis, December 2005, v96, #4, pp586-601
“Late nineteenth-century public museums in the United States were
intentionally built to be modern, guided by administrators like
George Brown Goode toward scientific goals that included preservation,
research, and education. Self-consciously preoccupied with the
management of museums, intent on attaining mastery over the objects
that constituted their museums, and persuaded that meaning derived
not just from the objects themselves but from their explanation
and configuration by experts, museum masters led a "new museum"
movement. A century later, the critiques of postmodern scholars
attest to the museum directors' effective establishment of a modern
profile.” Sally Gregory Kohlstedt teaches courses on science
in American culture and on women, gender, and science in the Program
of History of Science and Technology at the University of Minnesota.
Fulltext
Film & Television
G2 - 25 Years of Sundance
Spines, Christine et. al.
Entertainment Weekly, February 3, 2006, #861, pp32-36
As Sundance celebrates its silver anniversary, Spines looks back
at the 10 most influential movies that debuted at the Sundance
Film Festival. These include Reservoir Dogs, Clerks, and El Mariachi.
Christine Spines is a writer for Entertainment Weekly.
Fulltext
History
G3 - The Pony Express: Riders of Destiny
Corbett, Christopher
Wild West, April 2006, v18, #6, pp44-52
The Pony Express only operated for about 18 months, but the picture-perfect
enterprise captured the imagination of a nation and has grown
larger than life through the years. This article discusses the
historical fact and fiction surrounding the legendary cross-country
mail ride linking St. Joe on the wide Missouri with the California
state capital of Sacramento. Christopher Corbett teaches journalism
at the University of Maryland. He is author of the 2003 book “The
Twisted Truth and Lasting Legend of the Pony Express”. Fulltext
G5 - The Thirty-One-Day Presidency
Jones, Marty
American History, April 2006, v.41, #1, pp48-55
The presidency of William Henry Harrison was the briefest term
of all American residents. The Supreme Court ruling on the case
of the mutiny aboard the slave ship Amistad -an action requiring
no executive involvement-is the sole event during his stint in
office that merits mention in modern history books. The author
looks at what happened during the four weeks and three days that
William Henry Harrison lived-and died-at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Marty Jones is art director and journalist with American History.
He has been fascinated with the lesser-known presidents since
his school days. Fulltext
Literature
G6 - Updike and Salinger: A Literary Incident
Donald J Greiner.
Critique, Winter 2006,v47, # 2, p115-, 16p
“In 2003, when John Updike published The Early Stories, 1953-1975,
he included a foreword in which he recalled the development of
the first two decades of his enduring and esteemed career. Yet
the foreword to The Early Stories is particularly noteworthy for
confirming what initiated readers have long suspected: that J.
D. Salinger's short fiction, the stories largely published in
the New Yorker during the late 1940s and early 1950s, was so refreshingly
new as to have a lasting impact on Updike when he was taking his
first steps toward perfecting the art of the tale. Understanding
the historical context and Updike's subsequent remarks about Salinger,
Greiner examines how Updike learned to vary, in his own fiction,
the "revelations" that were Salinger's tales.” Donald
Greiner is Associate Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Affairs
University of South Carolina. Fulltext
Performing Arts
G7 - The Legendary Katherine Dunham: Still Dancing To
Her Own Tune?
Robinson-English, Tracey
Ebony, February 2006, v61, #4, pp103-107
"Katherine Dunham, now 96, was not only one of the greatest
dancers of her day, but a social activist who constantly fought
prejudice as the daughter of mixed-race parents. She was one of
the first African-American students to earn a bachelor's degree
from the University of Chicago. She also earned a master's degree
in anthropology there. She combined Caribbean dance with classical
ballet to produce a style called the "Dunham Technique".
She elevated African-American dance to a highly-respected art
form. Tracey Robinson-English is a staff writer with Ebony.
Fulltext
G8 - Jazz Bridge to Afghanistan
Odell, Jennifer
Down Beat, March 2006, v73, #3, 1p
The article reports on the efforts of John Ferguson, pianist and
executive director of the television program “American Voices,”
to record “Jazz Bridges Afghanistan,” to stimulate cultural dialogue
between the U.S. and Afghanistan. The album features Ferguson
with the Mike del Ferro Jazz Trio, vocalist CoCo York, and Afghan
musicians. Foundation for Civil Society has helped Ferguson to
find Afghan musicians. Jennifer Odell is a graduate of Columbia
Journalism School. In her writing she focuses on music. Fulltext
G9 - Bare Notes
Panken, Ted
Down Beat, April 2006, v73, #4, pp44-49
"At 44, Wynton Marsalis is perhaps the most visible jazz
artist on the planet. He's filled clubs and concert halls since
he formed his first band at 20, and became a bona fide mainstream
celebrity at 23, when he won his fist Grammy. Yet, he feels, with
some justification, that the impact of his corpus on the sound
of jazz is less than it might be. Here, Panken explores Marsalis'
impact on the jazz establishment" Ted Panken is a staff
writer at Downbeat. Fulltext
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