In his new book, Professor of English Carlo Rotella mixes journalism and memoir to write about his hometown, Chicago, and about the greater question of what defines a neighborhood. Rotella interviewed current and former residents of the neighborhood where he grew up, Chicago’s South Shore. As detailed in The World Is Always Coming to an End: Pulling Together and Apart in a Chicago Neighborhood (University of Chicago Press, May 2019) South Shore is a study in contrasts, shaped over the past 50 years by issues of race, class, crime, and other influences. As the middle class disappeared, South Shore became a place of the haves and have-nots, making it difficult for residents to recognize each other as neighbors. A microcosm for the American urban neighborhood, Chicago’s South Shore challenges one to think about how neighbors can build bridges and take down walls in order to create a vibrant community.Rotella, who teaches in BC’s American Studies program, is also the author of Cut Time: An Education at the Fights and Good With Their Hands: Boxers, Bluesmen, and Other Characters from the Rust Belt, among other titles. Read an interview with Rotella in the Chicago Tribune.
The old neighborhood
Posted in Boston College Authors
Tagged Chicago, city life, English Department, urban life
Leave a comment
Blessed are the Peacemakers
In her new book Blessed Are the Peacemakers: Pacifism, Just War, and Peacebuilding (Fortress Press, 2019), Monan Professor of Theology Lisa Sowle Cahill offers a historical understanding of pacifism and just war theory, while advocating a newer approach to conflict situations called peacebuilding. According to Cahill, peacebuilding seeks to transform conditions of violence and bring about a just and sustainable peace. It is particularly needed in the 21st century as evidence grows that other approaches have failed to achieve sustainable peace. She writes: “Peacebuilders agree on the preeminent importance of taking non-violent yet forceful measures to deter ongoing violence, undo social injustice, and bring opposed groups together around a negotiated vision of social coexistence and cooperation.”
When is free trade not free?
In his new book Consent and Trade: Trading Freely in a Global Market (Cambridge University Press, 2019), BC Law School Professor Frank Garcia offers an examination of trade law’s roots in consensual exchange, highlighting the central role of consent in differentiating trade from legally facilitated coercion, exploitation or predation. Garcia contends the U.S. needs to re-capture a vision of trade as mutually beneficial consensual exchange, and negotiate agreements that protect and enhance consent, rather than undermine it. By recovering the idea of consent in trade law, in a global marketplace, the U.S. and its trade partners can flourish. Recently, BC’s Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy gathered a group of international scholars for a roundtable discussion of the ideas put forth by Garcia in his book. Read more in Boston College Law School Magazine.
Posted in Boston College Authors
Tagged Boston College Law School, international trade
Leave a comment
Award for Young
Dr. C. Dale Young, a Boston College alumnus from the Class of 1991, will receive the 2019 Distinguished Alumni Arts Award from the BC Arts Council on Apr. 26. The award recognizes graduates who have demonstrated creativity, innovation, leadership, and vision through their contributions to the arts. Young is the author of a novel in stories, The Affliction, and four collections of poetry, the most recent being The Halo. For more about the award ceremony and Young’s public discussion about his work with Professor of English Suzanne Matson, see the BC Arts Festival website.
Remembering Nabokov
Professor of Russian, English, and Jewish Studies Maxim D. Shrayer marked the 120th anniversary of Vladimir Nabokov’s birth on April 22 with an essay on visiting the Nabokovs’ last home, in Montreaux, Switzerland. The essay appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books. Shrayer’s publications include Waiting for America: A Story of Emigration, Yom Kippur in Amsterdam, Leaving Russia: A Jewish Story, among other titles.
The Power of Sports
A former reporter, Associate Professor of Communication Michael Serazio turns his journalistic eye on sports in America in his new book, The Power of Sports: Media and Spectacle in American Culture (NYU Press, April 2019). After conducting more than 50 interviews with people in sports media as well as the business and marketing of sports, Serazio argues that the idea of sports as merely an entertaining diversion is a myth. Rather, he contends, sports has messaging on topics such as politics, gender, economic inequality, and other issues, and is a lens through which we can observe and understand American culture as it is today. Serazio also writes about the spiritual appeal of sports in a culture that is increasingly moving away from organized religion and, as one of the last remaining live television experiences, sports’ lucrative power in the field of advertising and branding. Serazio has written for The Washington Post and The Atlantic, among other outlets. His previous book is Your Ad Here: The Cool Sell of Guerrilla Marketing. Serazio recently discussed his book on WNPV-AM.
Mayan women
The Center for Human Rights and International Justice will host an event Apr. 25 to mark the publication of a new book co-authored by BC Lynch School of Education and Human Development Professor M. Brinton Lykes and Alison Crosby of York University in Toronto. At the event, the co-authors will discuss their book, Beyond Repair? Mayan Women’s Protagonism in the Aftermath of Genocidal Harm (Rutgers University Press, May 2019), followed by responses from scholars. According to the publisher, Beyond Repair “explores Mayan women’s agency in the search for redress for harm suffered during the genocidal violence perpetrated by the Guatemalan state in the early 1980s at the height of the 36-year armed conflict. The book draws on research conducted with 54 Q’eqchi’, Kaqchikel, Chuj, and Mam women who are seeking truth, justice, and reparation for the violence they experienced during the war, and the women’s rights activists, lawyers, psychologists, Mayan rights activists, and researchers who have accompanied them as intermediaries for more than a decade.” The book talk, which will be moderated by BC Law School Professor Katie Young, will begin at 4:30 p.m. in Campion Hall, room 139. Books will be available for sale at the event. Lykes is also the co-director of the Center for Human Rights and International Justice.
Translating Homer’s Odyssey
Composed over 2,700 years ago, Homer’s Odyssey is the second oldest extant text of Western literature and has been widely translated by prominent men of letters. In 2017, University of Pennsylvania Professor of Classical Studies Emily Wilson published the first English translation done by a woman, which was widely lauded by scholars and poets. In the Heinz Bluhm Memorial Lecture on April 24, Wilson will talk about her translation and the creative process behind it, as well as previous translations of the Odyssey and the reception of her work. Wilson’s publications include The Death of Socrates and The Greatest Empire: A Life of Seneca. Her lecture will take place in Devlin Hall, room 101, beginning at 5:30 p.m. More on Wilson from the New York Times Magazine.
Key to digital transformation
Organizations need to understand that best way to respond to digital disruptions is not through technology, but through people and processes. Being digital in today’s world means having an organizational culture that is agile, risk tolerant, and experimental. That’s the message in a new book by BC Information Systems Professor of Information Systems Gerald (Jerry) Kane and co-authors Anh Nguyen Phillips (Deloitte Center for Integrated Research), Jonathan Copulsky (Northwestern University), and Garth Andrus (Deloitte Consulting LLP). In The Technology Fallacy: How People Are the Real Key to Digital Transformation (MIT Press, April 2019), the authors argue that effective digital transformation involves changes to organizational dynamics and how work gets done. Their book draws on four years of research, conducted in partnership with MIT Sloan Management Review and Deloitte, surveying more than 16,000 people and conducting interviews with managers at such companies as Walmart, Google, and Salesforce. The authors illuminate the concept of digital maturity and address the specifics of digital transformation, including cultivating a digital environment, enabling intentional collaboration, and fostering an experimental mindset.
Hollywood is calling
Boston College alumna Juliette Fay transports readers back to 1920s Hollywood in her new historical novel, City of Flickering Light (Simon & Schuster, 2019). City of Flickering Light tells the story of Irene Van Beck, Millie Martin, and Henry Weiss, three friends who search for fame and fortune in the silent film industry. According to the publisher: “Despite the glamour and seduction of Tinseltown, success doesn’t come easy, and nothing can prepare Irene, Millie, and Henry for the poverty, temptation, and heartbreak that lie ahead.” Fay’s previous novels include The Tumbling Turner Sisters, Shelter Me, and The Shortest Way Home.
BC Bookmarks 