Rewriting the West: Exploring Lineages of Transformation

Join the Center of the American West for presentations from three writers with innovative multimedia projects that challenge our notions of both “writing” and “the west.”

CU professor of English and Chair of the Women and Gender Studies Program, Julie Carr, will present from her 2023 book, Mud, Blood, and Ghosts: Populist, Eugenics, and Spiritualism in the American West, accompanied by a film directed by Carolina Ebeid and music composed by Ben Roberts that evocatively blends archival materials with contemporary imagery.

Distinguished Professor & Director of the American West Center at the University Utah and former Utah Poet Laureate, Paisley Rekdal will delve into her project, West: A Translation, that includes a book and interactive website that “respond to an anonymous Chinese poem carved into the walls of the Angel Island Immigration Station where Chinese migrants to the U.S. were detained during the Chinese Exclusion Act” (from https://www.paisleyrekdal.com/west).

Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Oklahoma and 2023 Guggenheim Fellowship recipient, Lucas Bessire will explore “what it means to inherit the troubled legacies of the past and how we can take responsibility for a more inclusive, sustainable future” (from https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691212647/running-out) based on his 2021 book, Running Out: In Search of Water on the High Plains, which has won numerous awards and was a finalist for the National Book Award.