[ecrea] Call for Applicants: Summer Institute on "The Politics and Rhetoric of New Populisms"

The annual Rhetoric and Public Culture Summer Institute at Northwestern 
University is scheduled to be held on July 17-21, 2017 (with arrival on 
July 16 and departure on July 22).

This year’s institute theme is: “The Politics and Rhetoric of New 
Populisms.” Participants of the institute will interrogate the 
resurgence of populism in the twenty-first century in its various 
manifestations, covering a wide range of political and ideological 
positions from the left to the right and from the progressive to the 
conservative across the globe.  As evident from Brexit and the election 
of Donald Trump to the US presidency, no geopolitical region or 
national/culture space appears to be immune to the lures of populist 
movements and moments (episodic gatherings and eruptions). The 
persistent and historically erroneous assumption that populism is a 
recurrent feature of politics in developing countries under duress due 
to crushing poverty or uncontained internal religious or ethnic strife 
has been suspended for the time being.  Populism (along with the very 
idea of “people” and the “popular rule”) are beginning to command 
renewed public as well as scholarly attention, which is long overdue. As 
such, the aim of this summer institute will be to participate in and 
contribute to that renewed attention.

The institute will consist of five days of presentations and discussions 
led by John Brenkman (English, Baruch College & Comparative Literature, 
The Graduate Center, CUNY), Jason Frank (Government, Cornell 
University), William Mazarella (Anthropology, University of Chicago) and 
Melanye Price (Africana Studies, Rutgers University).  Each faculty 
member will deliver an afternoon lecture, lead a seminar discussion on 
selected readings (assigned in advance) the following morning, and 
attend a colleague’s presentation that afternoon. The overlapping format 
enables student and faculty participants to continue informal scholarly 
discussions during group lunches and dinners.

The institute is sponsored by the Center for Global Culture and 
Communication, an interdisciplinary initiative of Northwestern 
University School of Communication. The Center will subsidize 
transportation (up to $250), lodging, and some meals (breakfast and 
lunch every day and two group dinners) for admitted students. Applicants 
should send a brief letter of nomination from their academic advisor, 
along with a one-page statement explaining their interest in 
participating in this year’s institute, to the summer institute 
coordinator LaCharles Ward (LacharlesWard2017 /at/ u.northwestern.edu) 
<mailto:(LacharlesWard2017 /at/ u.northwestern.edu)>. We will adopt a policy of 
rolling admissions. Priority will therefore be granted to strong 
applications that are submitted in a timely fashion, preferably by June 
23, 2017.  All inquiries should be directed to LaCharles Ward.


This summer institute is convened by Center for Global Culture and 
Communication (CGCC), an interdisciplinary initiative of Northwestern 
University School of Communication. Dilip Gaonkar (Rhetoric and Public 
Culture) is the Director of CGCC.

*Faculty Bios*

*John Brenkman*is Distinguished Professor of English at Baruch College 
and Professor of Comparative Literature in Graduate Center at City 
University of New York. A literary critic and political theorist, he has 
written extensively about modernism, nihilism, and belief and on 
democracy and political thought. He is the author of /Straight Male 
Modern: A Cultural Critique of Psychoanalysis/ (Routledge 1993) and /The 
Cultural Contradictions of Democracy: Political Thought Since September 
11/(Princeton University Press 2007).

*Jason Frank*is Professor in the Department of Government at Cornell 
University. His focus is in political theory with special interests in 
democratic theory, American political thought, politics and literature, 
and political aesthetics. He is the author of /Constituent Moments: 
Enacting the People in Postrevolutionary America/ (Duke, 2010) and 
/Publius and Political Imagination /(Rowman & Littlefield, 2013).

*William Mazzarella*is Chair and Neukom Family Professor in the 
Department of Anthropology and of Social Science in the College at The 
University of Chicago. He teaches and writes extensively on political 
anthropology, critical theory, and media studies. Mazzarella is the 
author of /Censorium: Cinema and the Open Edge of Mass Publicity/ (Duke, 
2013) and /The Mana of Mass Society/ (Chicago, 2017).

*Melanye Price*is Associate Professor of Africana Studies at Rutgers 
University. She teaches courses in public opinion, black politics, 
social movements, and political psychology. She is the author of 
/Dreaming Blackness: Black Nationalism and African American Public 
Opinion/ (NYU, 2006) and /The Race Whisperer: Barack Obama and the 
Political Uses of Race/ (NYU, 2016).


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