Loyola University Chicago

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Robert Self spoke on March 13th

Robert Self spoke on March 13th

‌Professor Robert Self spoke on "Cultural Politics in an Age of Economic Decline" on Wednesday, March 13th, at 4 pm in Cudahy Hall 202.  

From the Great Society in 1965 to the Contract with America in 1994, families have been at the center of American political rhetoric. Notions of family, gender roles, and sexuality structure not just private life but public life and the state as well. This talk examines the liberal claim that families require economic assistance, the conservative claim that they require moral protection, and how family has been an organizing principle of political commitment.

Robert O. Self is Professor of History at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. His most recent book is All in the Family: The Realignment of American Democracy Since the 1960s (Hill and Wang, 2012). He is also the author of the award winning American Babylon: Race and the Struggle for Postwar Oakland (Princeton University Press, 2003).

Loyola PhD candidate Christopher Ramsey recently ignited an extended dialogue on the book with his review of All in the Family on the U.S. Intellectual History Blog.

The talk was sponsored by the History Department and the J.A. Galiagno Chair in American Urban History.