This work reveals the storied love affair that has long existed between native Nebraskans and the University of Nebraska football team. The author draws upon his experiences as a devoted "Huskerviller," and the insights of more than 500 other Husker fans who shared their ideas through interviews, questionnaires, and Internet communication, to compose a story that highlights how the culture, history, and geography of Nebraska are intimately embedded in fans' devotion to the Cornhuskers. The book features photographs and an extensive bibliography, while an appendix provides 16 essays written by devoted Husker fans.

A conversation about who we are, where we’ve been, and where we might be going   Popular Stories and Promised Lands enters a conversation about who we are, where we’ve been, and where we might be going by suggesting that possible answers to those questions can be found in the popular stories we encounter at the movies, on television, in popular magazines, and even on the funny pages. As countless scholars and popular writers have noted, those of us living in the United States find ourselves at a cultural crossroads. We are increasingly aware that the stories that once permeated life in these United States, stories that tell us that social and economic progress comes from working hard, that everyone has an equal opportunity to experience such progress, do not resonate to the degree they once did. Because many Americans have traditionally defined themselves, others, and their unique sense of place through these stories, we find ourselves displaced socially, economically, politically, and/or culturally. So, Roger Aden says, we go to places of our own making. Fans of the television series The X-Files return to the Funhouse each week for a dose of frightening fun. Fans of the weekly magazine Sports Illustrated play in the American Elysian Fields where democratic efforts at balancing work and play are valued. Fans of the movie Field of Dreams work as altruistic producers in an alternative garden spot. Grounded in the author’s own experiences and reinforced by the voices of approximately two hundred additional fans of the four popular stories, this book offers a compelling case for understanding the alleged wasteland of popular culture as a fertile site of individually and communally created sacred places.

Childhood Memory Spaces: How Enduring Memories of Childhood Places Shape Our Lives explores the places adults remember from their childhood. More specifically, it examines the questions "what kinds of places do we remember?" and "why do they linger in our memories?". The answers emerge from a variety of sources, including scholarship in cognitive science, environmental psychology, geography, communication, etc., but they are illustrated primarily through the over 100 stories told by adults who still vividly recall the places where key facets of their identity developed. Those stories reveal both that the answers are significantly more complex than one academic perspective can explain and that profoundly personal narratives can highlight their complexity in ways that scientific and social scientific research alone cannot.This book meets a need to integrate related, yet independent, lines of research in the natural and social sciences—doing so with a decidedly humanistic touch. Specifically, the book offers an interdisciplinary exploration of how place, memory, and identity intersect as we craft our life stories while seeking what Kenneth Burke called equipment for living with the challenges that life presents along the way.Weaving theory with personal narratives, Childhood Memory Spaces underscores a fundamental relationship: the stories of our lives are entwined with place, and we understand these stories (and ourselves) by reflecting upon the ways in which these memorable places have shaped, and continue to shape, our lives.

The 2002 revelation that George Washington kept slaves in his executive mansion at Philadelphia's Independence National Historical Park in the 1790s prompted an eight-year controversy about the role of slavery in America's commemorative landscape. When the President's House installation opened in 2010, it became the first federal property to feature a slave memorial.  In Upon the Ruins of Liberty, Roger Aden offers a compelling account that explores the development of this important historic site and how history, space, and public memory intersected with contemporary racial politics. Aden constructs this engrossing tale by drawing on archival material and interviews with principal figures in the controversy-including historian Ed Lawler, site activist Michael Coard, and site designer Emanuel Kelly.  Upon the Ruins of Liberty chronicles the politically-charged efforts to create a fitting tribute to the place where George Washington (and later, John Adams) shaped the presidency while denying freedom to the nine enslaved Africans in his household. From design to execution, the plans prompted advocates to embrace stories informed by race, and address difficulties that included how to handle the results of the site excavation. As such, this landmark project raised concerns and provided lessons about the role of public memory and how places are made to shape the nation's identity.

The 2002 revelation that George Washington kept slaves in his executive mansion at Philadelphia's Independence National Historical Park in the 1790s prompted an eight-year controversy about the role of slavery in America's commemorative landscape. When the President's House installation opened in 2010, it became the first federal property to feature a slave memorial.  In Upon the Ruins of Liberty, Roger Aden offers a compelling account that explores the development of this important historic site and how history, space, and public memory intersected with contemporary racial politics. Aden constructs this engrossing tale by drawing on archival material and interviews with principal figures in the controversy-including historian Ed Lawler, site activist Michael Coard, and site designer Emanuel Kelly.  Upon the Ruins of Liberty chronicles the politically-charged efforts to create a fitting tribute to the place where George Washington (and later, John Adams) shaped the presidency while denying freedom to the nine enslaved Africans in his household. From design to execution, the plans prompted advocates to embrace stories informed by race, and address difficulties that included how to handle the results of the site excavation. As such, this landmark project raised concerns and provided lessons about the role of public memory and how places are made to shape the nation's identity.

US Public Memory, Rhetoric, and the National Mall examines “the nation’s front yard,” understanding it as both a public face the United States presents to the world and a site where its less apparent moral story is told. This book provides a uniquely thorough, interdisciplinary, and integrated examination of how the National Mall shares a moral story of the United States and, in so doing, reveals the soul of the nation. The contributors explore 11 different memorials, monuments, and museums found across the Mall, considering how each rhetorically remembers a key element of the nation’s past, what the rhetorical memory tells us about the nation’s soul, and how each site must thus be understood in relation to the commemorative landscape of the Mall.

This work reveals the storied love affair that has long existed between native Nebraskans and the University of Nebraska football team. The author draws upon his experiences as a devoted "Huskerviller," and the insights of more than 500 other Husker fans who shared their ideas through interviews, questionnaires, and Internet communication, to compose a story that highlights how the culture, history, and geography of Nebraska are intimately embedded in fans' devotion to the Cornhuskers. The book features photographs and an extensive bibliography, while an appendix provides 16 essays written by devoted Husker fans.

A conversation about who we are, where we’ve been, and where we might be going   Popular Stories and Promised Lands enters a conversation about who we are, where we’ve been, and where we might be going by suggesting that possible answers to those questions can be found in the popular stories we encounter at the movies, on television, in popular magazines, and even on the funny pages. As countless scholars and popular writers have noted, those of us living in the United States find ourselves at a cultural crossroads. We are increasingly aware that the stories that once permeated life in these United States, stories that tell us that social and economic progress comes from working hard, that everyone has an equal opportunity to experience such progress, do not resonate to the degree they once did. Because many Americans have traditionally defined themselves, others, and their unique sense of place through these stories, we find ourselves displaced socially, economically, politically, and/or culturally. So, Roger Aden says, we go to places of our own making. Fans of the television series The X-Files return to the Funhouse each week for a dose of frightening fun. Fans of the weekly magazine Sports Illustrated play in the American Elysian Fields where democratic efforts at balancing work and play are valued. Fans of the movie Field of Dreams work as altruistic producers in an alternative garden spot. Grounded in the author’s own experiences and reinforced by the voices of approximately two hundred additional fans of the four popular stories, this book offers a compelling case for understanding the alleged wasteland of popular culture as a fertile site of individually and communally created sacred places.

Childhood Memory Spaces: How Enduring Memories of Childhood Places Shape Our Lives explores the places adults remember from their childhood. More specifically, it examines the questions "what kinds of places do we remember?" and "why do they linger in our memories?". The answers emerge from a variety of sources, including scholarship in cognitive science, environmental psychology, geography, communication, etc., but they are illustrated primarily through the over 100 stories told by adults who still vividly recall the places where key facets of their identity developed. Those stories reveal both that the answers are significantly more complex than one academic perspective can explain and that profoundly personal narratives can highlight their complexity in ways that scientific and social scientific research alone cannot.This book meets a need to integrate related, yet independent, lines of research in the natural and social sciences—doing so with a decidedly humanistic touch. Specifically, the book offers an interdisciplinary exploration of how place, memory, and identity intersect as we craft our life stories while seeking what Kenneth Burke called equipment for living with the challenges that life presents along the way.Weaving theory with personal narratives, Childhood Memory Spaces underscores a fundamental relationship: the stories of our lives are entwined with place, and we understand these stories (and ourselves) by reflecting upon the ways in which these memorable places have shaped, and continue to shape, our lives.

The 2002 revelation that George Washington kept slaves in his executive mansion at Philadelphia's Independence National Historical Park in the 1790s prompted an eight-year controversy about the role of slavery in America's commemorative landscape. When the President's House installation opened in 2010, it became the first federal property to feature a slave memorial.  In Upon the Ruins of Liberty, Roger Aden offers a compelling account that explores the development of this important historic site and how history, space, and public memory intersected with contemporary racial politics. Aden constructs this engrossing tale by drawing on archival material and interviews with principal figures in the controversy-including historian Ed Lawler, site activist Michael Coard, and site designer Emanuel Kelly.  Upon the Ruins of Liberty chronicles the politically-charged efforts to create a fitting tribute to the place where George Washington (and later, John Adams) shaped the presidency while denying freedom to the nine enslaved Africans in his household. From design to execution, the plans prompted advocates to embrace stories informed by race, and address difficulties that included how to handle the results of the site excavation. As such, this landmark project raised concerns and provided lessons about the role of public memory and how places are made to shape the nation's identity.

The 2002 revelation that George Washington kept slaves in his executive mansion at Philadelphia's Independence National Historical Park in the 1790s prompted an eight-year controversy about the role of slavery in America's commemorative landscape. When the President's House installation opened in 2010, it became the first federal property to feature a slave memorial.  In Upon the Ruins of Liberty, Roger Aden offers a compelling account that explores the development of this important historic site and how history, space, and public memory intersected with contemporary racial politics. Aden constructs this engrossing tale by drawing on archival material and interviews with principal figures in the controversy-including historian Ed Lawler, site activist Michael Coard, and site designer Emanuel Kelly.  Upon the Ruins of Liberty chronicles the politically-charged efforts to create a fitting tribute to the place where George Washington (and later, John Adams) shaped the presidency while denying freedom to the nine enslaved Africans in his household. From design to execution, the plans prompted advocates to embrace stories informed by race, and address difficulties that included how to handle the results of the site excavation. As such, this landmark project raised concerns and provided lessons about the role of public memory and how places are made to shape the nation's identity.

US Public Memory, Rhetoric, and the National Mall examines “the nation’s front yard,” understanding it as both a public face the United States presents to the world and a site where its less apparent moral story is told. This book provides a uniquely thorough, interdisciplinary, and integrated examination of how the National Mall shares a moral story of the United States and, in so doing, reveals the soul of the nation. The contributors explore 11 different memorials, monuments, and museums found across the Mall, considering how each rhetorically remembers a key element of the nation’s past, what the rhetorical memory tells us about the nation’s soul, and how each site must thus be understood in relation to the commemorative landscape of the Mall.