AHI The Future of Hellenism in America Conference – 2013

http://www.ahiworld.org/media-center/announcements/2013/1802-12th-annual-future-of-hellenism-conference.html

Greek-American Oral History Collections – by Elaine Thomopoulos

This is to announce the Greek-American Oral History Collections, a work in progress by Elaine Thomopoulos, a historian and a new member of the MGSA Transnational Studies Committee.
Below is a preliminary list of Collections.

Our committee invites directors of modern Greek programs, researchers, librarians,
heritage activists, staff in museums and preservation societies, as well as other interested
parties to share their knowledge of resources with us. We would welcome not merely web links to collections but, if possible, narratives and/or lists that identify and describe the archive in detail.

Please forward all information to Elaine Thomopoulos ‎[thomop@msn.com]‎

• Greek-American Oral History Collections [A Work in Progress]

Queens College Hellenic-American Oral History Project: Greek http://www.qc.cuny.edu/Academics/Degrees/DSS/Sociology/GreekOralHistory/Pages/Interviews.aspx On the Internet.

“Features recorded oral history interviews of immigrants and American-born Greeks. The library contains personal narratives about ethnic and racial identities, as well as profiles of Greek American administrators, artists, businessmen and -women, politicians, professionals, students, and workers. Additional interviews will be added as they become available.”
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National Hellenic Museum

http://www.nationalhellenicmuseum.org/

Has over 300 histories covering Chicago, Tarpon Springs, Colorado, NY, Virginia/D.C., Berrien County, Michigan and others.
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Berrien County Historical Association in Berrien Springs, Michigan
http://www.berrienhistory.org/arch.html
Fifty interviews of Greeks who made their home in Berrien County, Michigan or who vacationed there. (These oral histories are also available at the National Hellenic Museum).
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Grand Rapids Public Library. Grand Rapids, Michigan
Collection 277 contains material gathered for an exhibit in the 1980s at the public museum.
"Greek-American Family: Continuity through Change” It includes oral histories of the following: Boxes 10-15 Masters
Boxes 16-21 Usage copies (UT.GH#)
Box 10 and 16
UT-GH.1 Mrs. Christopoulos [could be Sophia, Maria, Wilma - 1981 city directory]
UT-GH.2 George Karaganis (2 tapes)
UT-GH.3 Marion Orphan
UT-GH.4 George and Bess Orphan
UT-GH.5 Vestpers Holy Trinity G. O. choir
UT-GH.6 Maloley (2)
UT-GH.7 Marianne and James Sampanis
UT-GH.8 Bicentennial Biennial Clergy: Laity Congress; Young Adult Symposium Tues. July 6, 1976, Philadelophia PA Archbishop Iakovos, H. M. Petrakis speakers
UT-GH.9 1976Switchboard Thalia Cheronis Selz: A Sallas, N Macroidis, Patrakis, Songs of Independenc and Freedom: Denis Mimitreas; Piano: Vasilios Gaitanos, Poem: Dance of the Zalongon, Alex Karanikas, Shepherds of Freedom: The years of war, Petrakis, Songs, Sonnets
UT-GH.10 Six tapes of meetings about the exhibit
UT-GH.11 Clark Afendoulis (2)
Box 11 and 17
UT-GH.12 Chris Afendoulos
UT-GH.13 George Afendoulos (2)
UT-GH.14 Sam Afendoulos (2)
UT-GH.15 Tina Afendoulos (2)
UT-GH.16 Steve and Sally Andrinidhes (2)
James Zarafonetis
Delia Zarafonetis (2)
Cleopatra Sedaris
Steve Frangos
UT-GH.17 Bessie Arrigo
UT-GH.18 Steve Bacalis (2)
UT-GH.19Joan and James Bogdan
UT-GH.20 Mary and Paul Bogdan (2)
UT-GH.21 Sophia Cachicalis (2)
Box 12 and 18
UT-GH.22 Paul and Connie Chardoul
UT-GH.23 Constantine Dallis (2)
UT-GH.24 Alex Demar and Delia Zervonitis (2) [zarafonetis?]
UT-GH.25 Alex Demar (3)
UT-GH.26.1 Elaine Mitchell, Delia Demar
UT-GH.26.2 and .3 Mrs. Demar
UT-GH.27 Angelo Dimitriou (2)
UT-GH.28 Emma Dukis and Eleni Limber
UT-GH.29 Andreas Fortias (2)
UT-GH.30 Gounos Sourmelou (2)
Box 13 and 19
UT-GH.31 Dean Georgacakes (2)
UT-GH.32, 33, 34 Vivian Hampers (7)
UT-GH.35 Helen Johnson
UT-GH.36 Athena Jaffas (3)
UT-GH.37 Angeline Kachoutis
UT-GH.38 Gus Koukias (2)
UT-GH.39 Sam and Jeannette Koukios
Box 14 and 20
UT-GH.40 Tom Kouchoukos (2)
UT-GH.41 Andy Limber
UT-GH.4 2Alex Mitchell
UT-GH.43 Elaine Mitchell
UT-GH.44 Terry Monoyios
UT-GH.45 James Nicholas (2)
UT-GH.46 Chrysoula Panopoulos (2)
UT-GH.47 Christo and Joan Panopoulos
UT-GH.48 Jane Patsakos (2)
UT-GH.49 Peter Patsakos (2)
UT-GH.50 Ted Sampanes
UT-GH.51 Ted and Linda Sampanis (2)
Box 15 and 21
UT-GH.52 Mary Skouras
UT-GH.53 Bill Savara
UT-GH.54 E. Stavrou
UT-GH.55 Irene Stavrou
UT-GH.56Johnny Theodore (2)
UT-GH.57 Jim Triant (2)
UT-GH.58 Spiro Vlahos
UT-GH.59 Bill Zarafonetis
UT-GH.60 George Zarafonetis
UT-GH.61 James H. Zarafonetis
UT-GH.62 Sharon Zarafonetis
UT-GH.63 Mrs. M. Zazoupoulos
UT-GH.65 Nicoletta and Alexander N. Paranos (2)
Boxes 22 (masters) and 23 (usage)
UT-GH.64 Mike Zervos (2)
13 more tapes of music, lectures

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University of Missouri-St. Louis UMSL Project
http://umslgreekstudies.wordpress.com/community-resources/the-oral-history-project/

The Greek Professorship at UMSL is investigating the history of the St. Louis Greek-American Community. Students will be interviewing members of the community and research materials will be deposited in the Mary E. Critzas Archives of the Greek Culture Center on the campus of UM-St. Louis.
For information contact Dr. Michael Cosmopoulos, Hellenic Government-Karakas Foundation Professor of Greek Studies, University of Missouri-St. Louis, tel. (314) 516-6241, e-mailcosmopoulos@umsl.edu
-----------------------------------------------------------The Youngstown State University Oral History Collection,
http://www.maag.ysu.edu/oralhistory/oral_hist.html
http://jupiter.ysu.edu/search/dGreek+Americans+--+Ohio/dgreek+americans+ohio/1,4,18,B/limit?L=&B=&M=t&NAME=A&VALUE=&W=&Ya=&Yb=

The collection began in 1974. It preserves first-person narratives of northeastern Ohioans who have participated in, or closely observed events which have significantly affected both the state and nation.
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Tsakopoulos Collection 

University Library California State Univ. Sacramento 

http://library.csus.edu/tsakopoulos/oralhistory.asp
List of interviewees and the year each was recorded:
1. Bill Rotas, 2006
2. Speros Sarlis, 2006
3. Irene Compoginis, 2006
4. George Tzikas, 2006
5. George Mackis and Elaine Mackis, 2006
6. Vaso Mayer, 2006
7. Dr. Stratis Zampathas, 1984
8. Marie Brauou, 1985
9. Presbytera Eleutheria Dogias, 1985
10. Father Demetrius Dogias, 1985
11. Eugene Fotos, 1984 & 2005
12. Tony Stathos, 2006
13. Mary Stathos, 2006
14. Helen Caparis, 2005
15. Mary Lydon, 2006
16. Bess Anton Feil, 2006
17. Stella Demas and George Ballis, Louis Demas, and Marilyn Demas, 2005
18. Julie Mamalis, 2006
19. Nicholas Kerhoulas, 2005
20. Gus Petrakas, 2005
21. Koula Poulos, 2006
22. Vasilis Verrios, 2006
23. JoAnne Alexia Demas Horrell, 2006
24. Jim Vallas, 2006
25. Louis Demas, 2005
26. Zita Vlavianos Hosmer, 2013
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State Historical Society of Missouri
S0644 Greek American World War II Oral History Project, 2000
http://shs.umsystem.edu/stlouis/manuscripts/s0644.pdf
“This collection is available at The State Historical Society of Missouri. If you would like more information, please contact us atshsresearch@umsystem.edu.
Taped interviews with Greek-American men of St. Louis who fought in World War II, conducted in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of Greece's entry into the war.”
Box 1
Series 1 - Master Tapes
T644.1 Spiro Abadgis T644.2 Trefont Abadgis T644.3 Spiro Boudoris, 8/10/00 T644.4 Emmanuel Cassimantis T644.5 Thomas A. Ginos, 5/5/00 T644.6 Bill Glastris, 7/8/00 T644.7 Leon Golfin, 3/24/00 T644.8 Tasso Karides T644.9 George Liringis, 4/20/00 T644.10 George Nicozisan, 8/2/00 T644.11 Bill Papageorge, 6/28/00 T644.12 Babe Pappas, 7/16/00 T644.13 George Pappas, 6/21/00 T644.14 Nicholas Stamulis, 7/12/00 T644.15 Elias B. Vlanton, 3/12/00
Box 2
Series 2 - Copies
T644.1 Spiro Abadgis T644.3 Spiro Boudouris, 8/10/00 T644.4 Emmanuel Cassimatis T644.5 Thomas A. Ginos, 5/5/00 T644.6 Bill Glastris, 7/8/00 T644.7 Leon Golfin, 3/24/00 T644.8 Tasso Karides T644.9 George Liringis, 4/20/00 T644.10 George Nicozisan, 8/2/00 T644.11 Bill PapaGeorge, 3/12/00 T644.13 George Pappas, 6/21/00 T644.15 Elias B. Vlanton, 3/12/00
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Utah Division of State History, Utah Department of Heritage and Arts. http://www.heritage.utah.gov/apps/history/findaids/B01644/B1644.xml
The Helen Z. Papanikolas Oral Histories Collection, 1969-1974 A Register of the Collection

Persons interviewed :

Angelos, Georgia

Cononelos, Louis

Cozakas, Efrosini

Demiris, Olympia

Demiris, Peter

Jerefos, Katherine

Kisamitakis, Athena

Klekas, Wilma Mageras

McMichael, Millie Mageras

Papanikolas, Helen

Parchinski, Michelle

Paulos, Theodore

Stephanopoulos, George

Ypsilantis, Eugenia

Zamboukos, Virginia Latsis

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Greeks in Washington
http://www.greeksinwashington.org/collections/memories.html
Oral histories from the Greek-American community in Washington State.
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IHRC Univ. of Minneapolis Includes over 100 oral histories from Daughters of Penelope http://www.ihrc.umn.edu/support/greek.php
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Got Greek –The Next Generation Initiative’s National Student Survey
“The Got Greek” National Student Survey is the first national online survey of American university students of Greek ancestry”
http://gotgreek.hellenext.org/about-the-got-greek-student-survey/about/
http://gotgreek.hellenext.org/category/interviews/ On line interviews
-----------------------------------------------------------University of Kentucky Libraries: Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History
http://kentuckyoralhistory.org/collections/ethnicity-lexington-multi-culturality-oral-history-project Includes Greeks.

Smithsonian Archives of Art.

http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/interviews
Includes transcribed interviews with several Greek-American artists.
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Library of Congress American Folk Live Center
http://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/0506-8/voices.html
Arete: The Memories of Greek-American Women: An Oral History Collection Project. This collection contains oral history interviews with people of Greek descent living in the United States, collected during 1987-88.
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Library of Congress American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1940
http://www.loc.gov/collection/federal-writers-project/?q=greek
Life histories compiled and transcribed by staff of the Folklore Project of the Federal Writers’ Project for the U.S. Works Progress (later Works Project Administration (WPA) from 1936 to 1940. There are several Greeks among them. Transcripts are on line.
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Library of Congress Veterans History Project www.loc.gov/vets/‎
Library of Congress. American Folklife Center Tending the Commons: Folklife and Landscape in Southern West Virginia
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/cmnshtml/
Includes a few oral histories of Greeks of Whitesville or about Greeks of Whitesville
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USC Shoah Foundation 

http://sfi.usc.edu
Audio-visual interviews with survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust. Includes Greek Jews.

«΄Ωπα, ψοφάω για δολάρια»

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-xg4uLG3m0

«βραδιάζω, ξημερώνομαι με την Αμερικάνα»

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6Jm1us1L4E

Η Ξενιτιά στα Δημοτικά Τραγούδια – Η Διάσταση του Φύλου

http://stigmalogou.blogspot.com/2013/09/blog-post_13.html

MGSA Symposium – Informal Discussion about Greek American Studies

We invite colleagues to an informal discussion about Greek American and Modern Greek transnational studies. Possible topics and questions for reflection:

• As a field of studies rather than an academic discipline, Greek American studies faces the challenge of fostering conversation across disciplines. How do we address this issue? What needs to be done to establish cross-disciplinary exchange and avoid disciplinary insularity? Workshops? Non-specialized essays? What are the possible venues?

• How do we teach Greek America? What is the aim? What has worked well in the classroom? Challenges? Create a venue to share reflections and resources?

• Think of ways to increase the visibility of Greek American studies in discussions about ethnicity and diaspora. How can we bring Modern Greek studies and Greek American studies closer?

• Identify concerns of young scholars

• Open forum – participants raise their own issues

Meeting Place and Time: Saturday, November 16, 12:15 pm. We have a half-an hour window during lunch break, so please bring your lunch to the Registration Table and then we will convene in one of the adjoining rooms.

Yiorgos Anagnostou

Visualizing Greek Identity and Community

Zorba doesn't Live Here Any More – The Creation of An American Zorba

For the last year or so, I have been working on an article-length analysis of the film My Life in Ruins. I am interested in the ways in which this piece of popular culture draws from Hollywood genres, Western, and Greek narratives of identity to construct national belonging for the diaspora. In other words, this is a transnational analysis of the making of a diaspora subject.

During the analysis I realized that the film is as much interested in constructing diaspora as it is in projecting an image of positive American (white male) identity. This latter concern is necessary for ideological purposes. Because the narrative tells the story of heroine who is an unhappy American ethnic, and who eventually turns down an offer for an academic career in the U.S. (having found a sense of belonging in Greece), the film implicitly interrogates the United States, albeit vaguely, as an anomic society. Thus the image of Irv (Richard Dreyfuss) as a fulfilled individual (professionally and maritally) serves the following narrative function: it restores the idea of the U.S. as a place where one can find happiness. In fact, a close analysis shows that the film does something more than this. Here is my analysis, building on some initial thoughts I posted in this blog almost three years ago, http://immigrations-ethnicities-racial.blogspot.com/2010/05/my-life-in-ruins.html (in Greek): 

The film neutralizes its implicit critique of the U.S. when it attaches a host of affirmative attributes to male whiteness. The figure of Irv delivers a template of desirable masculinity: wise, passionate, creative, playful, loving, tender, sensitive, fulfilled, and, as an unattached male, yes, open to sexual dalliances. This construction works relationally in a series of hierarchies, of which I have already identified the first: The gendered and classed pair American-male-professional/ American-ethnic-female-scholar corresponds to the contrast fulfilled body/closed off body. The second hierarchy builds on a reversal, demythologizing the global icon of Greek national identity, namely the figure of Zorba the Greek (1). It juxtaposes white masculinity with this celebrated portrayal of Greek manhood along the plane civilization/savagery to proceed with the metonymic devaluation of Neohellenism. To explore this latter duality, my discussion moves from the film’s tongue-in-cheeck critique of American society to its voluble indictment of, in fact orientalist gaze on modern Greece. 

The heroine’s interaction with the crude receptionist serves as a pretext for this critique. A male of savage sexuality (exchanging postage for sex) and vulgar manners, this character does not simply serve as a cultural type to focus a feminist and cultural critique. The figure stands metonymically for generalized national dysfunction. Significantly, this is someone absorbed by televised images of Zorba the Greek, transfixed by and bodily emulating the famous dancing scene. Heralded as an icon of modern Greek identity, Zorba could be read as a character who refuses to be subdued in the face of life’s adversity and loss. The lewd receptionist’s identification with Zorba stains the legendary male archetype of Greekness with pathological masculinity. In her indictment, the heroine reads Zorba in a literalist manner – the man dances in response to loss (not in spite of loss) – to condemn this image as a sign of a dysfunctional society: The country does not work (2). Once more, the encounter between Greek America and the homeland perpetuates the Orientalist image of Greece as a place engulfed in irrational abandon and unregulated passion. Rationality and agency is absent when the answer to failure is dance.

As an essential Greek male archetype, Zorba is bankrupt, in need of reconstruction. One alternative is the romantic Greek native, “Poupi” Kakkas (Alexis Georgoulis), who falls in love with the heroine. The other is Irv, who restores meaning to whiteness against vacuous identity. My Life in Ruins quotes scenes from Zorba the Greek with the purpose of reversing the hierarchy embedded in the latter between the emotionally freed Greek native (Zorba) and the psychologically oppressed, westernized male (Basil/Alan Bates). The figure of Irv resoundingly testifies that the west does not repress.

The text undermines the exalted indigeneity of Greek masculinity by rewriting Irv as a (reconstructed) Zorba away from the national soil. The global icon of the ideal male is deterritorialized. The rationalized meaning of dance as the expression of a positive outcome (recall the occasion of the tourists dancing in the newly air-conditioned bus) is restored. As the credits fall, Irv gleams while watching alienated Basil urging Zorba, “teach me how to dance.” It is him, after all, who has been instrumental in mentoring Georgia’s rehabilitation of self. The Greek Zorba has been dethroned. An American male has taken the role of a caring yet paternalistic mentor of gendered ethnicity. Male whiteness is not merely restored; its authority is also asserted as a cultural template for American ethnic women to emulate, including, as I discuss in the forthcoming article, the narration of heritage. The feminist critique in this narrative thread degenerates to all-encompassing Orientalism and the cultural domination it reproduces.

Notes

1. Peter Bien (2000) notes the inconsistencies between the literary and filmic Zorba. “The whole point of the book’s end is that the boss is liberated as an artist… He does not become like Zorba (as the film would have us believe)” (164).    

2. The Zorba image is contested in Greek America. My Life in Ruins registers the narrative of discomfort, aptly captured in Dan Georgakas’ personal response: Zorba the Greek “projected the Greek male as an instinctive brute, lovable at times, but totally incompetent and irresponsible” (236). Charles Moskos (1989) draws an unambiguous boundary between that image and U.S. Greek immigrants: “They had their share of rascals and more than their share of infighting, but Zorbas they were not” (185).

References Cited

Bien, Peter. 2000. “Nikos Kazantzakis’s Novels on Film.” Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 18 (1): 161–169.

Georgakas, Dan. 2006. My Detroit: Growing Up Greek and American in Motor City. New York City: Pella Publishing.

Moskos, Charles. 1990. Greek Americans: Struggle and Success. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. (Originally published in 1980 by Prentice-Hall)

The State of Italian American Studies

A discussion about the place of Italian American Studies in the University raises issues, and presents a series of ideas and arguments

of interest to all of us in transnational modern Greek Studies:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aRSP6_aK-o

Modern Greek Studies Association Symposium 2013 – Preliminary Program

http://mgsasymposium.org/sch.html