Home-grown Terrorism: 'America' and Political Violence in the 90s
We seek abstracts and/or articles for a collection of essays provisionally entitled "Home-grown Terrorism: 'America' and PoliticalViolence in the 90s." This cultural-studies driven collection will have two purposes. First, it will examine recent outbreaks of political violence and what these say about the social and political constitution of the United States at the end of the century. This means taking seriously and being willing to theorize right-wing rhetoric and practices, including but not limited to the Oklahoma bombing, abortion clinic sieges, sabotage literature, the NRA and paramilitary organizations. Second, however, it will examine how representations of such acts circulate and function symbolically to sustain particular theories of self, other, and nation. Appropriate topics at this level include, for example, representations of Waco and/or Ruby Ridge; terrorism and action-adventure films; paranoia and the social imaginary; constructions of the "angry white male'; the function of the "child" in apologies for and defenses of violence; instabilities surrounding the term "terrorist" itself. Ideally, together the essays will illuminate how right-wing violence reinforces, disrupts, or complicates theories of the social that have underwritten progressive rhetoric and analysis in the United States.
Feminist, materialist, and lacanian analyses welcome. Queer studies encouraged. Contributions should be theoretically-informed but accessible to students at both advanced undergraduate and graduate levels.
Lucinda Cole and Richard G. Swartz
Department of English
University of Southern Maine
Portland, ME 04102
Inquiries may be directed to Lucinda@maine.maine.edu