Whitman, Disability Studies, and Nova Alumni

Villanova English alumnus Don James McLaughlin has co-edited a special issue of Common-place, exploring intersections between Walt Whitman and disability studies. McLaughlin is also featured in the issue, having contributed a piece examining the posthumously published book of Whitman’s letters to Peter Doyle titled Calamus (1897), focusing primarily on the importance of the letters to understanding their evolving relationship following Whitman’s paralytic stroke in 1873.

Here is the official announcement about the issue:

"Common-place Journal is pleased to announce a new special issue, “Revisiting the Whitmanian Body at 200: Memory, Medicine, Mobility," exploring the poet’s intersection with disability, age, theories of mind, and the history of medicine. Coinciding with Whitman’s upcoming 200th birthday on May 31, these articles offer new approaches to Whitman’s understanding of the body, in all of its contradictions, from the perspective of current movements in scholarship that theorize and historicize ideas about disability and embodiment."

Way to go, Don James!