March 11, 2024: NeMLA Reflections: Opening Address

[This pastweekend I attended the one scholarly conference I never miss: the Northeast MLA. It was agreat time as it always is, so as usual here’s a seriesof reflections on some of the great work I heard, saw, and shared there! Leadingup to a few more reflections on NeMLA as an organization!]

On threeimportant layers to openingspeaker Dr. Rickie Solinger’s public scholarly work.

1)     Books: Like every scholarly keynote speakerI’ve ever encountered at NeMLA, Dr. Solinger brought along and prolific publishing career with her to that podium. In this case, thatcareer has centered on a range of different publications tracing the historyand significance of reproductive politics in the United States, from monographslike WakeUp Little Susie: Single Pregnancy and Race before Roev. Wade (1992) and TheAbortionist: A Woman Against the Law (2019) to textbooks like ReproductiveJustice: An Introduction (2017, co-authored with Loretta Ross). Wecan’t talk about reproductive politics in our own moment without engaging withthose multilayered histories and issues, and Dr. Solinger’s publications offera great starting point for that work.

2)     Exhibitions: As I know everyone reading thisblog would agree with, scholarly publications are far from the only way to getour voices and ideas to audiences and into our conversations, and in her workas a curator Dr. Solinger has also consistently done so through another medium:museum exhibitions, both installed and traveling. A great example is 2013’s InterruptedLife: Incarcerated Mothers in the United States, a traveling exhibitionwhich as that write-up describes featured five mixed-media installations thatoffered a variety of ways to present the voices, perspectives, identities,experiences, and communities of its focal women. I had the chance many yearsback to be part of a planned traveling exhibition for the then-in-development American Writers Museum, I canattest to the incredible work that curators as well as artists put into theseexhibitions, making them very much a form of collaborative public scholarship.

3)     Engagement: As the NeMLA talk itself reflectedof course, Dr. Solinger, like most of us interested in public scholarship,finds many opportunities to share her work beyond those more formal forms. Thatincludes not only more familiar forms like this compelling NeMLA keynoteaddress, but other and more unusual opportunities like the chance to talkwith an adoption rights blogger, or a lunchtimeconversation (alongside her co-author Loretta Ross) with a student grouplike UMass Students for Reproductive Justice. Every NeMLA keynote speaker I’veseen has been distinct in important ways, but one linking thread has been theirdesire to connect with audiences, including but far beyond that conferencecommunity, and Dr. Solinger embodies that goal to be sure.

Nextreflection tomorrow,

Ben

PS. If youwere at NeMLA, what would you share? If not or in any case, other organizationsyou’d highlight?