Events

Monday, March 25, 2019
The Pennsylvania State University
University Park, Pennsylvania
Foster Auditorium, Paterno Library

Taking our cue from the current moment—where opponents regularly accuse each other of being corrupt, corrupted, and corruptible—and the notion that we may be living in a new Gilded Age, this year’s symposium showcases nationally prominent scholars alongside Penn State faculty and will examine ways in which American literature, culture, and society engage and are engaged in corruption.

Welcome: 10:00 AM

Roundtable One: The Roots and Routes of Corruption 10:15 AM—Noon

• Leigh Claire La Berge, Assistant Professor of English, Borough of Manhattan Community College (CUNY)

• Gordon Fraser, Senior Visiting Fellow, Center for Humanities and Information, The Pennsylvania State University, and Presidential Academic Fellow, University of Manchester

• Cynthia Young, Associate Professor of African American Studies and English, The Pennsylvania State University

• Jeffrey T. Nealon, Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English and Philosophy, The Pennsylvania State University

• Nick Mitchell, Assistant Professor of Critical Race and Ethnic Studies and Feminist Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz

• Michael Bérubé, Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English, The Pennsylvania State University

Roundtable Two: The Art(s) of Corruption 2:00 PM—3:45 PM

• Kyla Wazana Tompkins, Associate Professor of English and Gender and Women’s Studies, Pomona College

• Nicole Seymour, Associate Professor of English, California State University, Fullerton

• Eric Bennett, Associate Professor of English, Providence College

• Julia Kasdorf, Professor of English and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, The Pennsylvania State University

• Scott Selisker, Associate Professor of English, University of Arizona

• Rosemary Jolly, Professor of English and Comparative Literature and Weiss Chair of the Humanities, The Pennsylvania State University

Wrap-up Session: 3:45 PM—4:30 PM

For additional information, please contact Sean X. Goudie, Director of the Center for American Literary Studies (sxgoudie@psu.edu )