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<\/a>The event, which will feature Dr. Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch, associate professor of history, and Dr. Melissa Baltus, assistant professor of anthropology, will take place Friday, March 27, from 6 to 7 p.m. in the Libbey Hall dining room.<\/p>\nThe free, public event will begin at 5 p.m. with a beer and wine cash bar and free refreshments that will continue through the talks and end at 8 p.m. <\/p>\n
Pflugrad-Jackisch will share the story of 18th-century Virginia plantation mistress Mary Willing Byrd and her experiences during the American Revolution in her talk, \u201cThe World of Westover: Mary Willing Byrd and Life in Revolutionary Virginia.\u201d During the war, her plantation, which was called Westover, was invaded by Gen. Benedict Arnold and Lord Charles Cornwallis. <\/p>\n
\u201cIn relation to events that occurred as a result of these raids, she was accused of being disloyal to her country,\u201d she said. \u201cI discuss how Byrd\u2019s struggles demonstrate that she possessed individual political agency, which was new and unusual for women at the time.\u201d <\/p>\n
While Pflugrad-Jackisch said she has always been interested in the subject of gender and citizenship in early America, Byrd only recently came onto her radar when she saw a poster about her at the Library of Virginia for Women\u2019s History Month. <\/p>\n
\u201cI was really fascinated by Byrd\u2019s experiences during the Revolution, but when I went to look for more information about her there was almost none,\u201d she said. \u201cShe was such an interesting person \u2014 I couldn\u2019t believe that no other historians had written about her. This led me to conduct my own research, and I decided to write a book about her life and the life of the slaves who lived at Westover alongside the Byrd family.\u201d<\/p>\n
This research is part of a larger book that reconstructs life for Byrd and the other inhabitants of her plantation in Charles City Country, Virginia, Pflugrad-Jackisch said. <\/p>\n
Baltus\u2019 talk, \u201cThe Revitalization and Abandonment of Cahokia: Native North America\u2019s First City,\u201d will focus on Cahokia, the Native American city located across the river from modern day St. Louis. This native city was the first city north of Mexico and the biggest until Philadelphia became the U.S. capital in the late 1790s. <\/p>\n
The city was the most populated between 1050 and 1375 AD; with a population upward of 25,000 people, it featured earthen pyramids, roads and causeways similar to Mayan cities that were built decades before. <\/p>\n
According to Baltus, many people focus on the rise Cahokia, which is often attributed to a religious movement. However, around 1150 to 1200, some big changes suggest conflict and warfare in the region, and other social changes imply the city is starting to decline. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy interest lies in what\u2019s going on during this beginning of the end,\u201d she said. \u201cLooking at these changes that are taking place right around that time period as something like a social political movement, similar to these religious movements or revitalizations, where people are disconnecting themselves intentionally from that earlier religion and refocusing on a tradition of an ancient past \u2014 either pre-Cahokia or back to Cahokia\u2019s earlier years.\u201d <\/p>\n
Baltus explained that Cahokia was a multi-ethnic region, making it difficult to determine where this diverse population relocated to as the city declined. <\/p>\n
While Baltus\u2019 interests originally were in the Southwest United States, she became interested in Cahokia when an undergraduate professor mentioned her work in Cahokia: \u201cAs an undergraduate, I thought, \u2018What is this place? I\u2019ve never heard of it.\u2019 And you find that\u2019s fairly common that most people don\u2019t know much about this huge city that was in the center of the United States.\u201d <\/p>\n
Humanities Happy Hour was started last spring by the Humanities Institute in the College of Languages, Literature and Social Sciences. The institute serves as an advocate and support for the study of human cultures at UT. <\/p>\n
\u201cIn a way, archaeology and history are the parents of all of the humanities because the humanities began with a desire to study ancient cultures through their material remains and their documentary remains,\u201d said Dr. Christina Fitzgerald, director of the institute and English professor. \u201cAnd then from that rose the need for the study of languages, literature, art and architecture, religion, and so on.\u201d<\/p>\n
She added, \u201cBoth an awareness of our mortality and memory of the past are part of what makes us human, so we should continue to study and remember the past if we want to be remembered.\u201d <\/p>\n