In this episode, we hear from Henry, an English major whose thesis journey took a few unexpected turns: from exploring Pacific Northwest regionalism to diving deep into the world of literary naturalism. Henry unpacks how authors Jack London and Frank Norris challenged historian Frederick Jackson Turner’s “frontier myth,” reimagining the American frontier not as a vanished landscape but as an evolving cultural, economic, and imaginative force.
Tune in to hear about survival narratives, Social Darwinist ideas, and what happens when you have to scrap half your thesis to start again (spoiler: it’s not fun, but it’s worth it). Henry reflects on the highs and frustrations of the Reed thesis process, the art of negotiating with an advisor, and the unexpected joy of discovering how to make seemingly unrelated ideas work together.
Reed community members can read Henry’s thesis, “Naturalist Afterlives of the Frontier Myth” online in the Electronic Thesis Archive: https://rdc.reed.edu/i/917eb624-f94d-453a-9638-4975c6123d5f
Explore more interviews with Reed College alumni on our website:
reed.edu/burnyourdraft
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In this episode, we hear from Henry, an English major whose thesis journey took a few unexpected turns: from exploring Pacific Northwest regionalism to diving deep into the world of literary naturalism. Henry unpacks how authors Jack London and Frank Norris challenged historian Frederick Jackson Turner’s “frontier myth,” reimagining the American frontier not as a vanished landscape but as an evolving cultural, economic, and imaginative force.
Tune in to hear about survival narratives, Social Darwinist ideas, and what happens when you have to scrap half your thesis to start again (spoiler: it’s not fun, but it’s worth it). Henry reflects on the highs and frustrations of the Reed thesis process, the art of negotiating with an advisor, and the unexpected joy of discovering how to make seemingly unrelated ideas work together.
Reed community members can read Henry’s thesis, “Naturalist Afterlives of the Frontier Myth” online in the Electronic Thesis Archive: https://rdc.reed.edu/i/917eb624-f94d-453a-9638-4975c6123d5f
Explore more interviews with Reed College alumni on our website:
reed.edu/burnyourdraft
#55: Oregon's Black Exclusion Laws and a Salem Church with Peri Joy Long '23, Religion
Burn Your Draft
30 minutes 56 seconds
1 year ago
#55: Oregon's Black Exclusion Laws and a Salem Church with Peri Joy Long '23, Religion
Peri Joy planned for the work of her thesis year to center on race, religion, and the history of Oregon, and her writing focused on archives related to a 19th century congregation in Salem, Oregon led by Reverend Obed Dickinson. Dickinson’s decision to admit three formerly enslaved Black persons—Elizabeth Johnson and Robert and Polly Holmes—into his congregation marked the beginning of a six-year conflict between Dickinson, the white church members, and the broader Salem community over the issue of race.
Her thesis was titled, “Bringing the Truth to Bear: Obed Dickinson and an Imagined Community of Racial Equality in Nineteenth-Century Salem, Oregon.”
You can learn more about Obed Dickinson and Oregon's Black exclusion laws from the Oregon Historical Society's Oregon Encyclopedia.
Obed Dickinson: https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/dickinson-obed/
Oregon's Black exclusion laws: https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/exclusion_laws/#.Y02IQlLMIbY
Burn Your Draft
In this episode, we hear from Henry, an English major whose thesis journey took a few unexpected turns: from exploring Pacific Northwest regionalism to diving deep into the world of literary naturalism. Henry unpacks how authors Jack London and Frank Norris challenged historian Frederick Jackson Turner’s “frontier myth,” reimagining the American frontier not as a vanished landscape but as an evolving cultural, economic, and imaginative force.
Tune in to hear about survival narratives, Social Darwinist ideas, and what happens when you have to scrap half your thesis to start again (spoiler: it’s not fun, but it’s worth it). Henry reflects on the highs and frustrations of the Reed thesis process, the art of negotiating with an advisor, and the unexpected joy of discovering how to make seemingly unrelated ideas work together.
Reed community members can read Henry’s thesis, “Naturalist Afterlives of the Frontier Myth” online in the Electronic Thesis Archive: https://rdc.reed.edu/i/917eb624-f94d-453a-9638-4975c6123d5f
Explore more interviews with Reed College alumni on our website:
reed.edu/burnyourdraft
