The concept of “self” incorporates dozens of different identities in each person, from personality to race to nationality and beyond.  Research done by Albion College faculty on various groups and their definitions of self is the focus of an interdisciplinary symposium, “The Social Construction of Self:  Views Across History and Culture.”  This symposium will be held Feb. 6-8 on the Albion College campus.  A full schedule of events follows.

“The symposium is dedicated to showcasing current faculty research about how people in different cultures throughout history have identified themselves, with their nation or a particular social group, such as the deaf community or the Latino community or the Church,” says Leslie Cavell, visiting assistant professor of art history and symposium organizer.  “Our goal is to open a conversation with people from many disciplines—who use different approaches to study history and culture--to help us understand and act on specific, fruitful ideas of what it means to define ourselves or be defined.”

A keynote address, “Modern Pain and Nazi Panic,” will be given by Geoff Cocks, the College’s Royal G. Hall professor of history, at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 6, in Norris Hall Room 101.  “Nazi Germany was a place whose racism represented panic at the reality of human illness and death,” explains Cocks.  “My paper will focus on some of the ways society in Nazi Germany struggled with the volatile and destructive confluence of racist policy with social constructions of pain and self.”

The symposium will be complemented by three exhibits:  “Art and Self: Works by Douglas Goering, Frank Machek and Anne McCauley,” and “Darktown Comics: a Series by Currier & Ives,” will be shown in the Wendell Will Room of Albion College’s Stockwell-Mudd Libraries.  “Reading America Latina: between Tradition and Postmodernity,” will be on display in the College’s Gerstacker International House Auditorium.

This symposium is sponsored by the Center for Interdisciplinary Study in History and Culture (CISHC) and is free and open to the public.  For more information, contact CISHC co-director Leslie Cavell, 517-629-0373.

Schedule for “The Social Construction of Self:  Views Across  History and Culture”

Wednesday, February 6  
7  p.m., Norris 101:  Keynote Address:  “Modern Pain and Nazi Panic,” Geoffrey Cocks, Royal G. Hall professor of history.  Reception to follow.

Thursday, February 7
10 a.m., Bobbitt Auditorium:  Faculty Lecture: “Social and Cultural Influences on Cognitive Processes,” Michael Anes, Psychology

1:30 p.m., Bobbitt Auditorium: Panel 1:  “The Desire for God: Visual Strategies of Inclusion in Romanesque France,” Leslie Cavell, Art and Art History; “Richard Coeur de Lion and English National Identity in the Fourteenth Century,” Andrew Bethune, English; “Embodying the Self:  Narratives of Sexual Awakening in the Art of Margaret and Frances McDonald,” Bille Wickre, Art and Art History

3:30 p.m., Wendell Will Room: Panel 2: “Two Methodological Traditions in the Social Sciences,” Glenn Perusek, Political Science; “Crimes of Color: Profiling and the Racialization of Social Control,” William Rose, Political Science

7 p.m., Bobbitt Auditorium:  Film, “The Eternal Jew,” Fritz Hippler, 1940.  Discussion to follow, led by Geoffrey Cocks. Extreme racist and anti-Semitic content

Friday, February 8
10:30 a.m., International House Lounge: Panel 3:  “Lâche pas la patate: The role of music festivals in preserving South Louisiana culture,” Dianne Guenin-Lelle, Foreign Languages; “Reading America Latina: Rhizomes, Hopscotches and Labyrinths,” Zulema Moret, Foreign Languages; “Theorizing the Links between History and Practice:  Sexuality, Gender, and Culture in Paris and Chicago Nightclubs,” Mimi Schippers, Anthropology and Sociology

1:30 p.m., Wendell Will Room: Panel 4:  “Creating Experts and Novices in a Scientific Community,” Robert Swieringa, Speech Communication; “Pressures of Medical Technologies on Deaf Culture,” Amy Terstriep, Anthropology and Sociology; “Between the ‘Ivory Tower’ and Community: Identity, Control, and Currier & Ives’ Darktown Comics,” Marcy Sacks, History.  Reception to follow.

5 p.m., International House Auditorium:  “Reading America Latina: between Tradition and Postmodernity,” Installation rite with pinata and poetry reading

7 p.m., Bobbitt Auditorium: Film, “Dark Side of the Heart,” Eliseo Subiela, 1993.  Discussion to follow, led by Zulema Moret. Poetic vulgarity, nudity and sexuality.

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