State Historical Society of Iowa Press Release

State Historical Society of Iowa presents "Iowa History Mysteries" Tuesday

UI Professor Linda Kerber and students discuss Human Rights and American Women

DES MOINES – The State Historical Society of Iowa in Iowa City will present a symposium next week about the challenges women and their families have faced regarding citizenship and human rights.

The “Iowa History Mysteries” symposium, featuring University of Iowa Professor Linda Kerber and her students, will begin at 11 a.m. Tuesday, May 1, 2012, at the State Historical Society of Iowa, 402 Iowa Avenue in Iowa City. It is free and open to the public. Seating is limited. Contact Mary Bennett at 319-335-3911 for more information.

During the Spring 2012 semester, Kerber’s students conducted research as part of a “Human Rights and American Women” course, using library and archival materials in the Iowa Women’s Archive and the State Historical Society of Iowa to investigate Iowa cases and events in which human rights were at stake. The list of topics they will discuss during the symposium follows:

• The Murder of Susan Fletcher
• Seduction and Domestic Violence in 19th Century Iowa
• The Iowa Press Women
• The Civic Engagement of the Johnson County League of Women Voters 1950s
• American Love Story: Gender Roles in a Young American Family During the Cold War
• Italian Immigrants in Chicago Factories
• Female Meat Packing Workers in Iowa Before and After the Civil Rights Act of 1964
• Myrtle K. Aydelotte and the Professionalization of Nursing
• Title IX

 

Kerber is May Brodbeck Professor in the Liberal Arts and Sciences, Professor of History, and Lecturer in Law at the University of Iowa. She was inducted into the Iowa Women’s Hall of Fame in 2009.

Preeminent among historians of her generation, Kerber has served as president of the Organization of American Historians, the American Historical Association and the American Studies Association. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, Kerber has been a champion of libraries and archives, and has been a supporter of the State Historical Society of Iowa for decades.

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The Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs is responsible for developing the state’s interest in the areas of the arts, history and other cultural matters with the advice and assistance from its two divisions: the State Historical Society of Iowa and the Iowa Arts Council. DCA preserves, researches, interprets and promotes an awareness and understanding of local, state and regional history and stimulates and encourages the study and presentation of the performing and fine arts and public interest and participation in them. It implements tourism-related art and history projects as directed by the General Assembly and designs a comprehensive, statewide, long-range plan with the assistance of the Iowa Arts Council to develop the arts in Iowa. More information about DCA is available at www.culturalaffairs.org.