The 2010 University of Connecticut Constitution Day observance highlighted the anniversary of the ratification in 1920 of the Nineteenth Amendment: The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.  This year’s presentation included a panel discussion and a keynote lecture on September 16, 2010.  The keynote speaker was Pamela S. Karlan, Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law and Co-Director, Supreme Court Litigation Clinic at Stanford University.

In addition, the Dodd Research Center observed Congress Week (September 13-17, 2010) with an exhibition in the McDonald Reading Room that will be available for viewing through the end of September.  The theme this year was “Main Street to Capitol Hill”  and the exhibition illustrates the activities of the Connecticut Congressional delegation in representing the transportation concerns of their constituents.  From the grading and widening of roads in Meriden to renovations of the docks and bridge in Mystic and the revitalization of Broad Street in New Britain to highspeed rail in Hartford, the concerns of state and town officials, as well as the taxpayer are reflected in the congressional collections housed in Archives & Special Collections at the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center.    The Center actively collects the records of the state’s Congressional delegation and the materials date from the 1930s to the present supporting the research interests of scholars investigating the work of the state’s representatives over time and across political parties.  The collections represented in this exhibit include:  Prescott S. Bush, Sr.  (Republican, Senator 1951-1962), William Cotter (Democrat, Representative 1971-1982), Thomas J. Dodd   (Democrat, Representative 1953-1957, Senator 1958-1971), Robert N. Giaimo (Democrat, Representative 1959-1980), Nancy L. Johnson (Republican, Representative 1983-2006), Barbara B. Kennelly (Democrat,    Representative 1981-1998), Francis Maloney (Democrat, Representative 1933-1934, Senator 1935-1946), Stewart B. McKinney (Republican, Representative 1971-1988), Bruce Morrison  (Democrat, Representative 1983-1990), Robert Simmons (Republican, Representative 2001-2006).

Congress Week, September 13-17, 2010

Lots has been going on in Archives & Special Collections lately as the semester reaches full swing!  Curators are teaching classes, researchers are filling the tables in the reading room, and a variety of events are happening in Konover Auditorium.

A few upcoming events of note:

Album cover by praCh, who will be performing at the Dodd Research Center on September 16 at 4 pm.

Lecture and Performance by Cambodian American rapper praCh
Thursday, September 16, 2010
4 pm
Konover Auditorium

Named by Newsweek as the “pioneer of Khmer Rap” and the “first Cambodian rap star” praCh first received international acclaim with his debut hip hop album, Dalama…The End’n is Just the Beginnin’ (2000). Over the course of a decade, he has emerged as a multimedia force, releasing two sequels to Dalama, in 2003 and 2010.  Born in the farmlands of Cambodia but raised on the mean streets of America, praCh is a committed transnational activist. He battles oppression via rhyme and lyrics, and by example, and makes clear the reasons why hip hop is global and will continue to matter.

Ed Dorn and son, March 1960, photofinisher’s date. From the Charles Olson Papers, Thomas J. Dodd Research Center.

If hip hop is not your speed, on September 21, 2010, our visiting Strochlitz Researcher Justin Katko, will give a talk entitled, “The Archive’s Other Fiction: Alternatives to Edward Dorn’s Gunslinger.”  Katko is a writer and PhD candidate in English Literature at the University of Cambridge, and recipient of a  Strochlitz Travel Grant.

Where does a text end and its archival footprint begin?  Can a text be built to rely upon previous, archived versions of itself?  Can coherency be claimed for a text which intentionally relegates component aspects of itself to the archive?  These questions will be addressed through the lens of Gunslinger, a modernist quest narrative by American poet Edward Dorn (1929-1999).  Gunslinger is a long narrative poem which exceeds the bounds of its own printed text in a number of manifest ways, including a rare secret installment printed as a standalone newspaper.  This talk will address the way in which archived versions of a single poem from the Gunslinger epic both clarify and complicate the work’s fragmented and difficult narrative.   Interpretation of Dorn’s masterpiece is only just beginning to be impacted by the archival materials which constitute the Edward Dorn papers.

Please join the Human Rights Institute, the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center, and the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies for the opening film of the Human Rights in the Americas Film Series.