Margaret Fuller (1810 - 1850) famously asserted that there is “no essential difference” between men and women. She believed that giving everyone equal opportunity would restore to society what it was so desperately lacking: the equal contributions of all its citizens. In this free virtual talk, Fuller scholar Dr. Christina Katopodis will draw on the image of the magnolia tree in Fuller’s short story, “The Magnolia of Lake Pontchartrain,” to outline comparisons between the unfurling taxonomies of plants and of gender(s), framing all attempts to categorize and classify as mere moments in a fluid, ever-evolving process of living and growing. The talk will take place on Wednesday, June 16th, at 12 p.m. PDT. Christina Katopodis, PhD, is the Executive Director at Transformative Learning in the Humanities at the City University of New York (CUNY). A scholar of environmental studies, sound studies, and American literature, she has written articles published in ESQ: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century American Literature and Culture, ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, and Profession. Her book project, “Sound Ecologies: Listening to America’s Literary Vibrations from Emerson to Standing Rock,” argues that embodiment and relationality are key to understanding the American literary soundscape and examines both human and nonhuman sonic occupations of territory. Her work has been supported by the Ralph Waldo Emerson Society and the National Science Foundation, and numerous grants from The Graduate Center, CUNY.

This lecture is part of the programming for the Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art's exhibition "A Beauteous Tree" curated by Jenessa Kenway. Support for this exhibition is provided by the UNLV Jean Nidetch CARE Center, a Nevada Humanities Project Grant, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the WESTAF Regional Arts Resilience Fund, a relief grant developed in partnership with The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to support arts organizations in the 13-state western region during the COVID-19 pandemic.