Jane Addams said, "Intellectual life requires for its expansion the influence of the affection of others." I sure felt that this week. The Warren Center fellows' seminar met on Monday and yet again I was struck by the intellectual energy and affection in the room as we discussed Teresa's fabulous project on antebellum-era anti-slavery panoramas. What a privilege it is to spend nine months with these smart and warm people. Right after our meeting I hightailed it up to Illinois for a quick and very busy two days, where I had the chance to reconnect in ways both intellectual and affectionate with colleagues, friends and students. I was reminded yet again how nice it is to have colleagues who are friends and friends who are colleagues and students who are already friends who are also becoming colleagues (congratulations, Dr. Jensen!).
Then, yesterday, it was back to Nashville in time to hear a speaker brought in by our fellows' group, the Brown University art historian Dian Kriz. Her talk examined 19th century lithographs (like this one) produced in the 1830s by Jamaican-born Jewish artist Isaac Belisario. She used a variety of critical approaches (close "reading," attention to visual genres, study of circulation) to make a compelling case about how the images, which feature no Jews, still worked to figure tensions in Jewish identity and social position. More broadly, Dian's work on the visual culture of the early modern Atlantic world is helping me fill in a mammoth historical gap in my own knowledge. The week's intellectual expansion was capped off with a great dinner last night with Dian and folks from the fellows group where we discussed, among other things, the material complexities of doing image-text work (i.e., it would be much easier if we could all win the lottery).
A hectic week, but a good week. I hear I'm missing a talk today at Illinois that should be a pretty darn good one, too. (And -- it's just a talk, people!).
