American foreign policy, iconic poet topics of humanities lectures at OSU

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

The impact of religious identity on U.S. foreign policy in 1899 and the works of American poetry icon Amiri Baraka will be the topics of public lectures hosted April 12-13 by OSU’s English department.

Susan Harris, Hall Distinguished Professor of American literature and culture at the University of Kansas, will present “Imperialism, American Identity and the National Christian: The Crisis of 1899” at 7:30 p.m., April 12, in 313 Classroom Building. Harris is visiting Oklahoma as part of the Kirkpatrick Lecture Series in the Arts and Humanities, an OSU College of Arts and Sciences scholarly exchange program funded in fall 2006 by Oklahoma’s Kirkpatrick Foundation.

William Harris, Jimmy Rushing Distinguished Scholar and associate professor of English at KU, will present “The Jazz Life of Amiri Baraka” at 4 p.m., April 13, in 412 OSU Student Union. His presentation is sponsored by OSU’s American Studies Program, Center for Africana Studies and Development, music department and English department.

Summarizing her lecture's theme, Susan Harris cites a statement by Sen. Alfred Beveridge during the 1900 U.S. Senate vote to annex the Philippines: “We will not renounce our part in the mission of our race, trustee of God, of the civilization of the world.”  

In detailing how the nation presented itself during the annexation, Harris will explore religion's role and how 19th-century schoolbooks fused Enlightenment and Protestant histories to teach children that specifically “American” values could only be achieved by white Protestants. She will explain how representation of the “typical American” as white and Protestant was used by both expansionists and anti-expansionists in the national debate on the annexation’s legitimacy.

“There are some telling similarities between today’s events and the national discourse that took place in the late 19th century that she will describe,” said Ed Walkiewicz, OSU English professor and director of literature, who was instrumental in bringing the Harrises to OSU. “She is someone whose work I have admired for a long time, and I think she has an extremely significant message.”

Susan Harris is the author of “Annie Adams Fields, Mary Gladstone Drew, and The Work of the Late 19th-Century Hostess,” “The Courtship of Olivia Langdon and Mark Twain,” “19th-Century American Women’s Novels: Interpretive Strategies” and “Mark Twain’s Escape from Time: A Study of Patterns and Images.”

For his lecture on Amiri Baraka, the founder of the 1960s Black Arts Movement in Harlem, William Harris will demonstrate how, in both written and performance poems, Baraka embodies the cadences, movements, and musical ideas of contemporary jazz, bebop and free jazz. Harris’ will explore jazz in Baraka’s poetry by reading his poems, playing his performance pieces and comparing them to works by favorite musicians and composers.

“Jazz has been an essential part of African American poetry going back to the Harlem Renaissance,” Walkiewicz said. “Prof. Harris’ lecture and accompanying jazz performances will be a delightful event for anyone interested in poetry or music.”

William Harris is the author of “The Poetry and Poetics of Amiri Baraka: The Jazz Aesthetic,” “Hey Fella Would You Mind Holding This Piano a Moment,” and “In My Own Dark Way.” He has edited or co-edited “The LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka Reader,” “Call and Response: The Riverside Anthology of African American Literary Tradition,” and a double issue of “The African American Review” on Amiri Baraka. Harris also is a member of the jazz study group at Columbia University’s Center for Jazz Studies.

Walkiewicz said the scholarly exchange is important to stimulating creativity and the overall higher learning experience and credited the Kirkpatrick Foundation for support that has increased interaction for OSU faculty and students with peers off and on campus.  

“College of Arts and Sciences Dean Peter Sherwood was instrumental in getting the Kirkpatrick Foundation to provide the funding, and the foundation is dedicated to sponsoring a full series of events and programs,” Walkiewicz said. “Departments in the college have had great collaboration working to bring in such great speakers this past year, and it’s been an enriching experience for us all.”