5th ANNUAL GRADUATE STUDENT CONFERENCE IN AMERICAN POLITICAL HISTORY EXPLORES “THE SIXTIES at 50.”
On March 22-23, 2013 the BU APHI held its fifth annual Boston University Graduate Student American Political History Conference. The theme this year was “The Sixties @ 50” and graduate students from across the country, as well as several from the History and American Studies departments at BU, weighed-in on this topic from a diversity of perspectives. These ranged from Brian Sirman of BU’s insightful and entertaining contribution to the “Projections of American Power” panel with his presentation entitled “Concrete in Camelot: Brutalist Government Architecture, 1960-1976” to Kelly O’Donnell of Yale’s biographical exploration of feminist health advocacy in the Conference’s “Gender and Politics” panel with her paper, “’Pelvic Autonomy’: Barbara Seaman and the Emergence of a Feminist Health Politics, 1965-1975.” Additionally, the Conference organizers would like to recognize Harvard’s Casey Bohlen for his paper, “Crusading for Abortion Reform: Clerical Activists and Religious Politics Before Roe,” which garnered him this year’s Most Outstanding Paper Prize of $1,000. Professor Doug Rossinow delivered the keynote address on “The Continuing Allure of the Sixties.
