Thursday, June 12, 2008

Berkshire Conference: The Radical Registers

After a rough day in the archives of the University of Minnesota Women's Studies program (eight boxes in five hours -- do I rock or what?) where I ran into Berks secretary Laura Lovett, I floated over to Registration in Willey Hall Atrium, where things are working like clockwork. There I ran into Historiann and one of her program co-chairs, Susan Amussen, who tells me that she has just been appointed a full professor in the School of Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts at UC-Merced.

This is, of course, the Radical's life goal: to get a job in a Warm Place before she retires.

In the Berks registration packet, there is sad news for feminists everywhere: the oldest independent feminist bookstore in North America, the Twin Cities' Amazon Bookstore Cooperative is having a going out of business sale: read about it here. Of the many virtually unwritten histories of feminism and GLBT life is the story of bookstores as cultural and political sites, for feminists and for GLBTQ communities. Any takers out there?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

http://www.amazon.com/Finding-Movement-Sexuality-Contested-Perspectives/dp/0822340836/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1213324577&sr=1-1

Anonymous said...

Actually, I'm doing it! I'm an independent researcher based in the SF Bay area, and I'm in Minneapolis this weekend for exactly this reason; I'm recording oral histories with the owner of Amazon and some other folks. I'm hoping to get over the Berks tomorrow - maybe I could meet up with you irl there. I'll email you.

Plain(s)feminist said...

I was just at Amazon this afternoon, and - they are not closing! Two longtime customers are buying the store, so it will remain open.