The Baker Nord-Center for the Humanities will host a Faculty Work-In-Progress lecture by Vicki Daniel, an instructor in the Department of History, titled “Bodies of the Nation: U.S. Disaster Identification in the Early Cold War.” The lecture will be held Tuesday, Oct. 29, from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. in Clark Hall, Room 206.
A pre-lecture reception begins at 4:15 p.m.
This event is free and open to the public. Registration is requested.
About the lecture
The years following World War II witnessed a dramatic shift in disaster victim identification in the United States. What had once been a fragmented effort proscribed by local resources developed into an orderly and scientific system bolstered by national networks of specialists. In the 1940s, however, police, coroners and physicians around the country were inspired by their firsthand experiences with mass-fatality events to find more efficient and objective means of identification and to develop new methods for reading the body.
In her talk, Daniel will discuss how these new systems of identification were shaped by the larger social and political context of the Cold War to transform disaster identification into a symbolic performance of the state’s ability to protect its citizens in times of political uncertainty and corporeal threat.