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Thursday, April 17, 2025

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1790 - Benjamin Franklin dies in Philadelphia at age 84.

1947 - Jackie Robinson bunts for his first major league hit.

1964 - The Ford Mustang debuts at World’s Fair, over 400,000 Mustangs were sold in the car’s first year of production.

1970 - Apollo 13 safely returns from its mission to the moon.

2011 - “Game of Thrones”, based on the fantasy novels by George R. R. Martin premieres on HBO.

Faculty form AAUP chapter, advocate for academic freedom amid Trump’s research funding cuts, investigations. GW Hatchet.

Painting the Town: Wayson R. Jones, Leon Berkowitz, and Trevor Young Demonstrate the Depth of Local Art. Washington City Paper.

Google Is a Monopolist in Online Advertising Tech, Judge Says. The New York Times.

Photo credit: Matthew Riemer

This newsletter edition we spotlight Matthew Riemer, a fifth-year PhD candidate in the American Studies Department.

Prior to coming to GW, Matthew received a B.A. in History from Middlebury College and his J.D. from the University of Chicago. He previously worked as an attorney, a career in which inspired him to pursue his interest in queer history. In 2016, Matthew and his partner started the Instagram account @lgbt_history which currently boasts over 650,000 followers. The popularity of this account encouraged Matthew to leave the “soul-crushing stability” of a legal career to publish his book We Are Everywhere: Protest, Power, and Pride in the History of Queer Liberation (2019). The publication serves as an introduction to the history of the fight for queer liberation tracing back to queer activism in late-nineteenth-century Europe. 

Matthew’s current research focuses on Sylvia Rivera, a radical queer/trans liberationist, and how liberal multicultural progress narratives exploit or ignore material realities of the marginalized to promote harmonized pluralism. In his dissertation, Matthew aims to expand the archival and theoretical record of Sylvia Rivera by contextualizing her lived experiences. He focuses on her “panethnic Brownness, her gender anarchy, her life and death in post-war New York City, her material poverty, her sex work, her revolutionary politics.” He connects these findings to the mainstream “Rights” movements, which define themselves as against radical collective resistance in the present only to define themselves as in the past. 

In his free time, Matthew loves being in the classroom, hanging out with his dog, and reading!

The Art of Weaving:
Making and Unmaking Gender at the Loom
GW WGSS Program

In Mising tribal villages across the Indian state of Assam, summer afternoons are punctuated by the sound of looms at work. Oftentimes, the person behind the loom is a woman—a daughter or a daughter-in-law—weaving cloth that is instantaneously recognizable across Assam as “Mising textile,” because of its unique patterns and weaves. Professor Krishnan asks how the knowledge of weaving, specifically, pattern-making is passed from mother to daughters, how it is creatively reinvented at the loom, and how it is being reimagined for a neoliberal consumer eager to wear tribal prints. Professor Krishnan studies weaving not only as an art form that is being reconfigured by the neoliberal market, but also as a site where weavers, as the authors of these unique designs, make and unmake at the intersections of gender, ethnicity, and capitalism.

When: Thursday, April 17, 2025; 3:45 PM
Where: Phillips Hall, Room 414B

Register here!

Absolutely Essential: Bioethics and the Rules-Based International Order
GW Philosophy Department

This talk is based on Moreno's forthcoming book Absolutely Essential (MIT Press, 2025). In the book, he explores the field of bioethics as both a creature and a key element of the post-World War II rules-based order. According to the rules-based order, international relations are to be organized according to principles of open markets, liberal democracy, and multilateral organizations. Drawing on Moreno's four decades of experience in the field, the book raises key questions about the future of bioethics in a changed world order, while also theorizing new ways to think about bioethics after the COVID-19 pandemic and the reordering of global alliances.

When: Friday, April 18, 2025; 4:00 PM
Where: Duques Hall, Room 152

Freedom Seder 2025

Hosted by Jewish students from across the DMV, the Freedom Seder of 2025 commemorates the Exodus from Egypt and the Passover-week rebellion of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising against the Nazis in 1943, while calling for the liberation of Palestine, the release of political prisoners, and for our collective freedoms here and now.

When: Sunday, April 20, 2025; 6:30 PM & 8:00 PM EST
Where: Location TBA

Register here!

2025 Thacher Fellows Presentations
GW Philosophy Department

The 2024-25 Thacher Fellows Megan Clancy and Lucas Scott will be presenting their research. Clancy will present their work "Alone-in-the-World: Authenticity & Friendship in the Age of Modern Technology." Scott will present their work "Mismanaged Uncertainty: What Complex Illnesses Like Long Covid Teach us About Philosophies of Medicine."

When: Friday, April 25, 2025; 3:00 PM EST
Where: Duques Hall, Room 251!

Book Talk & Launch:
This Is Rhythm w/ Prof. Gayle Wald
Politics & Prose

Based on dozens of interviews and access to Ella Jenkins's personal archives, Gayle F. Wald's This Is Rhythm shares how Jenkins, a "rhythm specialist" with no formal musical training, became the most prolific and significant American children's musician of the twentieth century, creating a beloved catalog of songs grounded in values of community-building, antiracism, and cultural pluralism. Wald traces how the daughter of southern migrants translated the music of her own Black girlhood on the South Side of Chicago into a form of civil rights activism--a musical education that empowered children by introducing them to Black history, African diasporic rhythms, and a participatory, community-centered approach to music. Prof. Wald will be in conversation with NPR Morning Edition host Michel Martin at Politics and Prose.

When: Sunday, April 27, 2025; 5:00 PM EST
Where: 5015 Connecticut Avenue NW, DC 20008

Prof. Libby Anker was quoted by USA Today in the article “It's Barron Trump's birthday: The 'King of the internet' and MAGA crown prince turns 19.’’

Current PhD candidate Ben Hanley recently had a paper accepted to the Cultural Studies Association’s Annual Conference in California. The paper is entitled “The Politics of Annihilation: A Queer/Crip Framing of Fear and Destruction.” In addition, the essay will be published in an upcoming volume of CSA’s Lateral journal.

All four first-year American Studies PhD students had papers accepted for the upcoming 2025 American Studies Association Annual Conference in San Juan, Puerto Rice. PhD student Vit Bitencourt will present their paper entitled "The Federalized Basement: US Government, American Identity and the National Endowment for the Arts." PhD student Jonah Fox will present their paper entitled “Arab-American Protest During the Second Intifada: Defending Palestine in the Twenty-First Century." PhD student Samantha Davis will present their paper entitled “Anti-Carcerality, ‘Esoteric Aid’, and the Sacred.” PhD student Clara Lee will present their paper entitled “(Re)Living the Forgotten: Memory, War, and Re-enactment as Imperial Nostalgia.” Congrats to all four!

Call for Applications: The Albert H. Small Center for National Capital Area Studies is currently hiring a part-time summer intern to support the exhibition, care, and interpretation of the Washingtoniana collection. Click here to learn more // Deadline: rolling

Call for Applications: The University of Southern California Writing Program in the Dana and David Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, seeks qualified applicants for part-time, one-semester, in-person positions as Instructor or Lecturer to join their faculty at the DC Capital Campus beginning Fall 2025. Click here to learn more // Deadline: rolling

Call for Applications: Monument Lab is currently seeking applications for their Summer 2025 paid student internship program. Click here to learn more // Deadline: Apr. 21, 2025

Call for Applications: The Whiting Foundation is seeking applications to support writers working on a book-length work of deeply researched and imaginatively composed nonfiction for a general adult readership. Click here to learn more // Deadline: Apr. 23, 2025

Call for Applications: Democracy House is currently accepting applications for their Young Leaders Summer Institute (YLSI) scheduled for Summer 2025. Click here to learn more // Deadline: May 4, 2025

Call for Submissions: GW's University Writing Program is currently accepting submissions for The Julian Clement Chase Prize for Research Writing on the District of Columbia. Click here to learn more// Deadline: May 15, 2025

Call for Applications: The Foggy Bottom Association is seeking GW students for three research internship opportunities. Click here to learn more // Deadline: Rolling

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What We're Listening To!
"Tiny Dancer" - Elton John
"EARFQUAKE" - Tyler, The Creator
"Wildflowers" - NAO

Like what you see? Have spotlights, kudos, events, or opportunities that you would like to share? We want to hear from you! Navigate to our feedback form using the link below, or more simply, forward your tip to amst@gwu.edu.