The Kluge Center welcomed several new fellows into residence for the summer months.
Thomas Bishop, an Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Fellow, arrived from the University of Lincoln to work on his research project, “‘Not in my Backyard’: Community Activism and the Decline of Nuclear Power in the American South, 1979-1989.” While at the Library, he will look at several collections found in the Manuscript Division, including the papers of James Schlesinger, Leo Goldman, and Daniel Moynihan, as well as the catalog of periodicals produced by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission during the 1980s. He plans to make progress on research examining the social and political history of regional activism against the expansion of nuclear power in the 1980s.
Frank Cirillo, a J. Franklin Jameson Fellow in American History, arrived from the New York Historical Society to conduct research on “‘The Day of Sainthood Has Passed’: Abolitionists and the Golden Moment of the Civil War.” He will examine collections in the Manuscript Division, including the papers of prominent abolitionists (William Lloyd Garrison, Wendell Phillips, and Frederick Douglas) and Radical Republican politicians (George W. Julian, Charles Sumner, and Zachariah Chandler). He hopes to illustrate the connections forged between abolitionists and politicians in support of the Union war effort, supplementing his research as he turns his dissertation into a book.
Anna Dlabacova, a Kluge Fellow, arrived from Universite Catholique de Louvain to research a project titled “Inspiring, Innovative, and Influential: The Role of Gerard Leeu’s Incunabula in Late Medieval Spirituality and Devotional Practice.” While in residence, she will work in the Lessing J. Rosenwald collection, which holds multiple incunabula (printed books produced before 1501) from the Low Countries. She hopes to advance in her study on the role that incunabula from the Netherlands played in late medieval religious practice and visual culture, and their effect on devotional practices.
Catherine Morgan-Proux, a French Association of American Studies (AFEA) fellow, arrived from the Universite Clermont Auvergne. Catherine will research “The Road She Travelled: Cultural Representations of the Road from Women’s Perspectives.” She will utilize several collections within the Prints and Photographs Division and Manuscript Division, as well as various newspaper collections and the Lomax Collection. She hopes to build evidence for her hypothesis that the road can be sacred to women in different ways, giving them physical presence and agency or a channel for their voices.
Check back next month for more arriving scholars. Click here for the full list of scholars currently in residence.