Assistant Professor in American Studies at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. Teach and write about American Literature and Culture, Media History, and the History of Cultural Institutions. Current book project is about U.S. writers' colonies in the 20th century.
The Cultural Sociology of Art and Music: New Directions and New Discoveries, 2022
Artist residencies are key sites of artistic practice today, which open up processes of creation ... more Artist residencies are key sites of artistic practice today, which open up processes of creation and career development to sociological study. Since the 1990s, these sites have proliferated globally, but have attracted no systematic research. Beginning from classic approaches to the sociology of cultural production, this chapter demonstrates the residency’s role as a site of creative autonomy, and one where social conventions are negotiated. Yet these approaches tend to neglect questions of what is made, as well as the hyper-mobility and technological mediation of art production today. Based on two interviews with young artists, we introduce “creative ecologies” as a term that captures the unstable and porous features of art production today, and the role that art objects play in stabilizing artistic careers.
Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) has found unusual currency of late. In 2011, the play lent its ... more Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) has found unusual currency of late. In 2011, the play lent its name to a major funding program launched by the National Endowment for the Arts; in 2017, it appeared in the center of a popular podcast and was revived by a British theater company in the wake of a terrorist attack. These productions recognize what terms like middlebrow obscure: Our Town is a civic mediator, a performance that installs art at the center of community life and community at the center of art. Taking inspiration from Antoine Hennion’s sociology of music, this essay ventures into the archive to trace an unfamiliar origin story for Our Town, involving a turn-of-the-century writers’ colony, a Progressive-Era historical pageant, and Wilder’s self-understanding as both confirmed bachelor and “community man.” Through the trajectory of a single play, civic mediation emerges as a pervasive strategy and ethos of American cultural practice, connecting diverse media through time and s...
[This article is Open Access: https://academic.oup.com/alh/article/31/3/395/5540984] Thornton Wil... more [This article is Open Access: https://academic.oup.com/alh/article/31/3/395/5540984] Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) has found unusual currency of late. In 2011, the play lent its name to a major funding program launched by the National Endowment for the Arts; in 2017, it appeared in the center of a popular podcast and was revived by a British theater company in the wake of a terrorist attack. These productions recognize what terms like “middlebrow” obscure: Our Town is a civic mediator, a performance that installs art at the center of community life and community at the center of art. Taking inspiration from Antoine Hennion’s sociology of music, this essay ventures into the archive to trace an unfamiliar origin story for Our Town, involving a turn-of-the-century writers’ colony, a Progressive-Era historical pageant, and Wilder’s self-understanding as both confirmed bachelor and “community man.” Through the trajectory of a single play, civic mediation emerges as a pervasive strategy and ethos of American cultural practice, connecting diverse media through time and space.
The Cultural Sociology of Art and Music: New Directions and New Discoveries, 2022
Artist residencies are key sites of artistic practice today, which open up processes of creation ... more Artist residencies are key sites of artistic practice today, which open up processes of creation and career development to sociological study. Since the 1990s, these sites have proliferated globally, but have attracted no systematic research. Beginning from classic approaches to the sociology of cultural production, this chapter demonstrates the residency’s role as a site of creative autonomy, and one where social conventions are negotiated. Yet these approaches tend to neglect questions of what is made, as well as the hyper-mobility and technological mediation of art production today. Based on two interviews with young artists, we introduce “creative ecologies” as a term that captures the unstable and porous features of art production today, and the role that art objects play in stabilizing artistic careers.
Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) has found unusual currency of late. In 2011, the play lent its ... more Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) has found unusual currency of late. In 2011, the play lent its name to a major funding program launched by the National Endowment for the Arts; in 2017, it appeared in the center of a popular podcast and was revived by a British theater company in the wake of a terrorist attack. These productions recognize what terms like middlebrow obscure: Our Town is a civic mediator, a performance that installs art at the center of community life and community at the center of art. Taking inspiration from Antoine Hennion’s sociology of music, this essay ventures into the archive to trace an unfamiliar origin story for Our Town, involving a turn-of-the-century writers’ colony, a Progressive-Era historical pageant, and Wilder’s self-understanding as both confirmed bachelor and “community man.” Through the trajectory of a single play, civic mediation emerges as a pervasive strategy and ethos of American cultural practice, connecting diverse media through time and s...
[This article is Open Access: https://academic.oup.com/alh/article/31/3/395/5540984] Thornton Wil... more [This article is Open Access: https://academic.oup.com/alh/article/31/3/395/5540984] Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) has found unusual currency of late. In 2011, the play lent its name to a major funding program launched by the National Endowment for the Arts; in 2017, it appeared in the center of a popular podcast and was revived by a British theater company in the wake of a terrorist attack. These productions recognize what terms like “middlebrow” obscure: Our Town is a civic mediator, a performance that installs art at the center of community life and community at the center of art. Taking inspiration from Antoine Hennion’s sociology of music, this essay ventures into the archive to trace an unfamiliar origin story for Our Town, involving a turn-of-the-century writers’ colony, a Progressive-Era historical pageant, and Wilder’s self-understanding as both confirmed bachelor and “community man.” Through the trajectory of a single play, civic mediation emerges as a pervasive strategy and ethos of American cultural practice, connecting diverse media through time and space.
Uploads
Papers by Kathryn S Roberts