Department of English
207 Lind Hall
207 Church Street SE
Minneapolis, MN 55455

Phone: 612-625-3363

College of Liberal Arts Voices from the Gaps

Ellen Messer-Davidow

 

Professor

Department of English
University of Minnesota
22 Lind Hall
207 Church Street SE
Minneapolis, MN 55455
(612) 625-2071
emd@umn.edu

Special Interests

  • Fields: literary, feminist, cultural, and American studies
  • Interests: cultural, social, and discourse theory; the organization and production of knowledge; social movements and social change

Honors & Awards

  • Scholar of The College, 2005-08
  • McKnight Research Award, 2002-05
  • McKnight-Land Grant Professorship, University of Minnesota, 1989-92
  • Distinguished Alumna Award, University of Cincinnati, 1992
  • Grants-in-Aid of Research, University of Minnesota Graduate School, 1987-88, 1988-89, 1992-93, 1993-94, 1998-99

Background

  • Education
    • University of Cincinnati, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.
  • Academic Appointments
    • University of Minnesota, Professor and Full Member of Graduate Faculty, 2002-
    • University of Minnesota, Associate Professor and Full Member of Graduate Faculty, 1991-2002
    • University of Minnesota, Assistant Professor, 1986-91
    • University of Minnesota, Program in American Studies: Adjunct Faculty, 1997-
    • University of Minnesota, Department of Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature/Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society (PhD program): Adjunct Faculty, 1990-
    • Department of Women’s Studies/Center for Advanced Feminist Studies: Adjunct Faculty, 1986-
    • University of Cincinnati, Adjunct Instructor, Department of English, 1985-86

Publications

Books

Disciplining Feminism cover

Disciplining Feminism: From Social Activism to Academic Discourse. Durham: Duke University Press, 2002.
  • Knowledges: Historical and Critical Studies in Disciplinarity. Ed. Ellen Messer-Davidow, David R. Shumway, and David J. Sylvan. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993.
  • (En)Genderinq Knowledge: Feminists in Academe. Ed. Joan E. Hartman and Ellen Messer-Davidow. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1991.
  • Women in Print II: Opportunities for Women’s Studies Publication in Language and Literature. Ed. Joan E. Hartman and Ellen Messer-Davidow. New York: Modern Language Association, 1982.
  • Women in Print I: Opportunities for Women’s Studies Research in Language and Literature. Ed. Joan E. Hartman and Ellen Messer-Davidow. New York: Modern Language Association, 1982.
Book in Progress
  • The Spiders' Web: The Judicial Discourse of Racial Discrimination
Articles
  • "Why Democracy Will Be Hard To Do," Social Text. 17 (Spring 2006):1-35.
  • "Rosenberger v. Rectors and Visitors of the University of Virginia: From Discourse and Dollars to Domination." South Atlantic Quarterly 98, 1 (March 2002): 868-93.
  • "The Struggle for the Academy." Encyclopedia of American Cultural and Intellectual History. Eds. Mary Kupiec Cayton and Peter W. Williams. New York:Scribners, 2001. Vol. 2, 237-51.
  • "Whither Cultural Studies?" From Sociology to Cultural Studies. Ed. Elizabeth Long. Cambridge: Basil Blackwell, 1997. 489-522.
  • "Dollars for Scholars: The Real Politics of Humanities Scholarship and Programs." The Politics of Research. Ed. E. Ann Kaplan and George Levine. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1997. 193-233.
  • "Acting Otherwise." Provoking Agents: Theorizing Gender and Agency. Ed. Judith Kegan Gardiner. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995. 23- 51.
  • "Who (Ac)Counts and How." MMLA Journal 27, 1 (Spring 1994): 26-41.
  • "Looking Out and Looking Ahead: Prospects for a Post-Conservative Feminist Agenda?" Transformations (Spring 1994): 1-11.
  • "Manufacturing the Attack on Liberalized Higher Education." Social Text 36 (Fall 1993): 40-80.
    • Short version trans. as "Die Neue Rechte der USA im Kampf um die Hochschulen: Zum Institionellen Netzwerk einer Kampagne". Das Argument 202 (December 1993): 929-40.
    • Short version in Marxism in the Postmodern Age. Ed. Antonio Callari, Stephen Cullenburg, and Carole Biewener. New York: Guilford, 1994. 524-34.
    • Rpt. in After Political Correctness: The Humanities and Society in the 1990s. Ed. Christopher Newfield and Ronald Strickland. Boulder: Westview, 1995. 38-78.
  • "Feminist Literary Theory and Criticism, 1963-71." Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism. Ed. Michael Groden and Martin Kreiswirth. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993. 231-37.
  • "Doing the Right Thing." Women’s Review of Books 9, 5 (February 1992): 19-20.
  • "Disciplinarity: An Introduction." (With David R. Shumway). Poetics Today 12, 2 (Summer 1991): 201-25.
    • Trans./rpt. in Disciplines, Knowledge and Power. Ed. P. K. Hui. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1996.
  • "Changing the System: The Board of Trustees Caper." Women’s Studies Quarterly 18, 3-4 (Fall-Winter 1990): 136-46.
  • "A Dialogue on Feminism and Academic Change." (With William E. Cain). Social Epistemology 4, 1 (1990): 41-55.
  • "The Right Moves: Conservatism and Higher Education." Language, Literature, and Politics. Ed. Betty Jean Craig Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1988. 54-83.
  • "Knowing Ways: A Reply to My Commentators." New Literary History 19, 1 (Autumn 1987): 187-94.
  • "The Philosophical Bases of Feminist Literary Criticisms." New Literary History 19, 1 (Autumn 1987): 65-103. (Rpt. in Gender and Theory: Dialogues on Feminist Criticism. Ed. Linda Kauffman. Oxford: Blackwell, 1988. 63-106.)
  • "Knowers, Knowing, Knowledge: Feminist Theory and Education." Journal of Thought 20, 3 (Fall 1985): 8-24.
Journal Issues Co-edited
  • "American Knowledges." Ed. David R. Shumway and Ellen Messer-Davidow. Poetics Today 19, 3 (1998).
  • "Knowledge (Ex)Change." Ed. Ellen Messer-Davidow and David R. Shumway. Social Epistemology 9, 3 (1995).
  • "Disciplinarity." Ed. David R. Shumway and Ellen Messer-Davidow. Poetics Today 12, 2 (Summer 1991).
  • "Crossdisciplinarity." Ed. Ellen Messer-Davidow and David R. Shumway. Social Epistemology 4, 3 (July-September 1990).

Teaching

  • English
    • Consumer Culture
    • Civil Rights Discourse
    • Modern and Contemporary Critical Theory: Four Issues in Modernism/ Postmodernism--Structure, Representation, Meaning, Discourse
    • Critical Analysis and Social Change: The Second Women’s Movement, 1963-71
    • Reading Marxisms
  • Cultural Studies/Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society (PhD program)
    • Sexualities--From Perversity to Diversity
    • Reading Foucault
    • The Academic-Knowledge Enterprise: Discourses, Practices, Institutions
  • Women’s Studies/Center for Advanced Feminist Studies (doctoral concentration)
    • Women and Public Policy
    • The Cultural Construction of Sex, Gender, and Sexuality
    • Theory and Method
  • Crosslistings
    • Media Constructions of the Cold War
    • The Invention of Modern Subjectivity
    • Academic Knowledge and Public Policy

Other Activities

  • Book Series Coeditor: Knowledge: Disciplinarity and Beyond. University Press of Virginia, 1992-97
  • Editorial Board, Social Epistemology, 1990-
  • Associate Editor, Signs, 1992-94
  • Coorganizer of Conferences:
    • "Disciplinarity: Formations, Rhetorics, Histories," University of Minnesota, 1989
    • "New Art Museums: Revis(ion)ing Art, Architecture, and Culture," Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota, 1993
    • "Knowledges: Production, Distribution, Revision," University of Minnesota, 1994
  • Coorganizer of Lecture Series: "Academic Knowledge and Public Policy," Humphrey Institute, University of Minnesota, 1996
  • Women's Caucus for the Modern Languages: vice president 1991 and 1992, president 1993
  • Modern Language Association, Executive Committee, Division on Sociological Approaches to Literature, 1996-2000
  • Modern Language Association, Delegate Assembly, 1997-2000
  • Modern Language Associaation, Delegate Assembly Organizing Committee, 2000-02 (Chair, 2002)