性视界传媒

Alison Landsberg

Portrait of Alison Landsberg
Titles and Organizations

Professor and Director, Center for Humanities Research

Contact Information

Email: alandsb1@gmu.edu
笔丑辞苍别:听703.993.1110
惭补颈濒蝉迟辞辫:听Department of History/Art History MS-3G1听
Campus: Fairfax
Office: Horizon Hall 3157

Biography

Professor Landsberg is an internationally recognized scholar in the field of memory studies.听 Her book,听Prosthetic Memory: The Transformation of American Remembrance in the Age of Mass Culture听(Columbia UP, 2004) considers the way in which individuals are increasingly able to take on memories of events they did not live through.听 She is interested in the potential of such memories to produce empathy and to become the grounds for progressive politics. Professor Landsberg has been invited to speak at conferences in the Norway, the UK, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany and France. 听In 2007, the journal听Rethinking History听published a forum on her book.

Her book entitled,听Engaging the Past,听explores popular modes of engagement with the past in contemporary mediated society, and the ramifications of those modes of engagement for the projects of history and politics. Considering a wide range of history texts鈥攈istorical fiction films, TV historical dramas, Reality History TV, Immersive History Museum websites, among others鈥攖his book engages with the dynamics of the experiential to explain both what it makes possible for people and what it obscures or refuses.听听Engaging the Past听suggests that these popular engagements pose some fundamental challenges for our sense of what constitutes history in the 21st听century, but also that academic historians need to take more seriously the kind of work popular media can do in the production of historical knowledge.

Professor Landsberg divides her teaching between the History and Art History Department and the Cultural Studies PhD program.

Current Research

I am currently working on a project entitled, Post Postracial America, in which I am exploring the contemporary eruption of discourse about race on both the political left and right, in the context of the post-Obama landscape and the Trump campaign and election.听

Selected Publications

鈥淢emory vs. History: The Politics of Temporality at the Legacy Museum in Montgomery,鈥 in The Routledge Handbook of Memory Activism, eds. Yifat Gutman and Jenny W眉stenberg, (NY and London: Routledge, 2023)

鈥淗orror v茅rit茅: politics and history in Jordan Peele鈥檚听Get Out听(2017),鈥澨颁辞苍迟颈苍耻耻尘听

听鈥淧ost Post-Racial America:听On听Westworld,听the听Smithsonian听National Museum of African American History and Culture,鈥澨Cultural Politics, 14.2 (July 2018): 198-215听

鈥淕hosts on Screen: The Politics of Intertemporality,鈥 in听Spectral Spaces and Hauntings: The Affects of Absence听ed. Christina Lee (London: Routledge, 2017).

Engaging the Past: Mass Culture and the Production of Historical Knowledge听(New York: Columbia UP, 2015).

听鈥溾楾his isn鈥檛 usual, Mr. Pendleton, this is history鈥: Spielberg鈥檚 Lincoln and the Production of Historical Knowledge,鈥澨Rethinking History, April 2015.

鈥淧olitics and the Historical Film:听Hotel Rwanda听and the Form of Engagement,鈥 in听A Companion to the Historical Film, eds. Robert Rosenstone and Constantin 听Parvulescu. Wiley-Blackwell, 2013

鈥淐inematic Temporality: Modernity, Memory and the Nearness of the Past,鈥 in 听Time, Media, Modernity听ed. Emily Keightely, London: Palgrave, 2012.

鈥淲aking the听Deadwood听of History: Listening, Language, and the 鈥楢ural Visceral鈥欌澨Rethinking History听14.4 (December 2010): 531鈥549.

鈥淢emorie riflesse: lo schermo tra vero e falso鈥: atti del secondo seminario internazionale su Memoria e mass media tenutosi a Trento il 18 novembre 2009. A cura di Daniela Cecchin e Matteo Gentilini. Fondazione Museo storico del Trentino, Trento, 2010 (Collana: Quaderni di Archivio trentino, 26), forthcoming.

鈥淢emory, Empathy, and the Politics of Identification,鈥澨International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society听22.2 (June 2009). To be republished in听American Politics and Global Citizenship, ed. Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein.

Prosthetic Memory: The Transformation of American Remembrance in the Age of Mass Culture听(New York: Columbia UP, 2004).

Courses Taught

HIST 387/INTS 375: History at the Movies

CULT 812: Visual Culture

HNRS 130: Conceptions of the Self

HIST 393: Reading the Past Through Film

HIST 389: Which memories? Which past? Commemoration in Modern American Culture

HIST 628: Immigration and Ethnicity in the US

HIST 615: Memory, History, Material Culture

CULT 802: Histories of Cultural Studies

CULT 860: Body, Subjectivity Citizenship

Dissertations Supervised

Katja Hering,听"We Are All Makers of History:" People and Publics in the Practice of Pennsylvania German Family History, 1891-1966 (History/Art History, graduated 2009)听听听听听听听听

Sheila Brennan, 听鈥淪tamping American Memory: Stamp Collecting in the U.S., 1880s-1930s (History/Art History, graduated December 2009)

Dan Gifford,"To You and Your Kin: Holiday Images from America's Postcard Phenomenon, 1907-1910"听(History and Art History, graduated 2011)

Joanne Clark Dillman, 鈥淒ead Beginnings/Dead Ends: Circulations 听of Dead Women in an Era of Disposability (Cultural Studies, graduated December 2009)

John Woolsey, The Humanitarian Imaginary鈥澨(Cultural Studies, graduated 2013) 听

Tracy Fisher, 鈥溾橣or Us the Living': How America Buried its World War I Overseas Dead" (History/Art History, graduated 2016)

Ozden Ocak, 鈥淭heorizing France鈥檚 Ministry of Immigration and National Identity: Borders, Populations and National Identity in Postcolonial Europe鈥 (Cultural Studies, graduated 2016)

Laina Saul, 鈥淪exuality, Capital, and Representations of Women: Reading Spaces of Exception and the Body in a Global World鈥 (Cultural Studies, graduating Spring 2018)

John Baker, 鈥淎 Dual Catastrophe: Mass Culture and Nuclear Terror During the Transition to Neoliberalism鈥 (Cultural Studies, graduated 2015)

Ariella Horwitz, "Celebrity Politics and the Cultivation of Affect in the Public Sphere鈥 (Cultural Studies, graduated 2016)

Recent Presentations

鈥淗orror V茅rit茅: Politics and History in Jordan Peele鈥檚听Get Out听(2107).鈥 Invited keynote address at the 鈥淔iction and Facts in Narratives of Political Conflict鈥 conference at the University of Agder, Kristiansand, Norway, as part of the Narrative and Memory: Ethics, Aesthetics, Politics interdisciplinary research network, 8-10 March 2018.

鈥淧ost Post-Racial America.鈥 Invited keynote address at 鈥淎n Interdisciplinary Workshop on Cultural Memory: Memory, Nation, Race,鈥 University of St. Andrews, Scotland, UK, 25-6 May 2017.

鈥淕hosts on Screen: The Politics of Intertemporality,鈥 Invited keynote address at 鈥淢use of Modernity: Remembering, Mediating and Modernising Popular Dance鈥 conference, University of Chichester/Senate House, London, UK, 16 April 2016.

Engaging the Past听project presented at the Historical Fiction Research Network听Conference, Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK, 27-28 February 2016.

鈥淎t the Fringes of National Belonging: Squaw Men as Transnational Subjects in the 19th C American West,鈥 presented at the American Studies Association Annual Convention, San Juan, Puerto Rico, 15-8 November, 2012.

听鈥淭ranslating Atrocity: The Materiality of Virtual Sites of Experience.鈥滻nvited keynote address at听 鈥淟anguages and Cultures of Conflicts and Atrocities鈥 in Winnipeg, Canada, October 11-13, 2012.

"Memory and the Historical Film: Theorizing Affective Engagements.鈥 Invited 听听听听听听 plenary address at 鈥淢emory, Mediation, Remediation:听An International Conference on Memory in Literature and Film,鈥澨 Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Canada,听28-30 April 听2011.

"Beyond Identification: The Historical Film and the Production of Affect.鈥 Invited talk at Brown University, 7 March 2011.

鈥淢emory, Media, Political Subjectivity: Theorizing Distant Engagement.鈥 Invited 听 talk at the international symposium, 鈥淢emory on the Move鈥, University of Utrecht, Netherlands, 2-3 December 2010.

鈥淓mpathetic Engagements with the Past: Considering the Televisual and Filmic Sensorium.鈥 Invited talk at the 鈥淐reolizing Memory鈥 seminar at听American Comparative Literature Association鈥s Annual Meeting, New Orleans, 1-4 April 2010.

鈥淓mpathetic Engagements with the Past: Negotiating Proximity and Distance in HBO鈥檚听Deadwood鈥 Invited talk at the听Memory and Media听conference, Trento, Italy, November 18, 2009.

鈥淲aking the听Deadwood听of History: Listening, Language, and the 鈥楢ural Visceral鈥欌 Invited plenary address at the听Televising History听conference,听University of Lincoln, UK, July 2009.

鈥淓mpathy and the Politics of Identification: Negotiating the Other in Roman Polanski鈥檚听The Pianist.鈥 Invited talk at听Old Dominion University鈥擟ity of Norfolk Film Festival, 1 April 2008.

鈥淢emory, Empathy and the Politics of Identification.鈥 Invited talk at 鈥Is an Interdisciplinary Field of Memory Possible?鈥 conference, New School for Social Research,听 7-9 February 2008.

鈥淢aking Love, Not War: Illicit Liaisons and Prosthetic Remembering in the Silent Western.鈥 Invited lecture,听Fisher Humanities Center, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, 5 September 2007

In the Media

Guest on the NPR show,听On the Media, 鈥淲hat鈥檚 so Bad About Being a Replicant,鈥 October 6, 2017. https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/whats-so-bad-about-being-replicant/

Guest on the NPR show,听With Good Reason听on听Engaging the Past. Aired on Saturday March 12, 2016.

Interviewed for 鈥淭he Examined Lie,鈥 by James Mc Williams in听The American Scholar听June 8, 2015.

Consulting Historian, 鈥溾 online exhibit of the National Women鈥檚 History Museum.

Guest on the NPR (WBEZ, Chicago) show听Odyssey, 鈥淢emory and History,鈥 April 28, 2003.

Guest on the NPR (WBEZ, Chicago) show听Odyssey, 鈥淢emory and History, October 19, 2001.

Dissertations Supervised

Sitah AlQahtani,听听(2020)

Savannah Fetterolf,听听(2020)

Myrtle Andrews,听听(2019)

Caroline Guthrie ,听听(2019)

Megan Fariello,听听(2019)

Amanda Regan,听听(2019)

Laina Saul,听听(2018)

Tracy Fisher,听听(2016)

Ariella Horwitz,听听(2016)

John C. Baker,听听(2015)

Ozden Ocak,听听(2015)

John Woolsey,听听(2013)