Homeland Insecurity:
Civil Liberties, Repression, and Citizenship
in the 1950s
a conference
Thursday January 23, 2003-Sunday January 26, 2003
Smith College ~ Northampton, Massachusetts

***NEW - Photos from the conference***

The impetus for this conference was the controversy that emerged from Northampton writer Barry Werth's award-winning The Scarlet Professor: Newton Arvin, A Literary Life Shattered by Scandal (Doubleday 2001). Werth, with what Martin Duberman called "spellbinding skill," told the story of the vice squad's entry into Arvin's apartment on Prospect Street in September 1960 and confiscation of mildly homoerotic material. In the wake of the nationally-publicized scandal, Smith College persuaded Arvin to retire (he died in 1963) and terminated the employment at the college of two junior, gay professors, Joel Dorius and Ned Spofford. In the academic year 2001-02, professors, administrators, and trustees at Smith grappled with what had happened forty years ago. One of the outcomes of the campus-wide debates was a decision to hold this major conference. Participants will consider civil liberties, repression and citizenship in the 1950s as well as what can we learn from these events that might help us see and understand our own cultural and political climate in 2003.   

The co-chairs of the conference are Dan Horowitz, professor of American Studies and Marilyn Schuster, professor of Women’s Studies. Additional support provided by Jayne Mercier, administrative assistant in Interdisciplinary Studies.

SCHEDULE
Full schedule of events and list of participants

FILM SERIES
through the Fall semester and Interterm, screenings at the Academy of Music.

EXHIBIT
November 11, 2002-January 31, 2003 - “Homeland Insecurity: Civil Liberties, Repression, and Citizenship in the 1950s."

OTHER LINKS OF INTEREST
Links to the Bill of Rights, ACLU, Bayard Rustin and more.