In A Sympathetic Pair, my dissertation, I examine the history of representation conceived as a kind of resemblance in American political thought. I excavate 18th and 19th century rhetoric articulated by prolific political actors during moments of crisis: constitutional ratification, Reconstruction, and its aftermath. Through this discussion, I explore descriptive representation as a widely invoked set of discourses and concepts aimed at achieving correspondence of politically salient features between the represented and their representatives. Proponents were frequently concerned with sentimental connections embedded in representative relationships, wrestling with the consequences of emotionally uninvested or even disdainful rulers. My project builds on scholarship on emotional attachments and descriptive representation in US politics, demonstrating their recurring pairing and the deep cutting implications this has for how we understand and design popular government(s).

A common view held by founding generation Americans was that social and spatial distance weaken sympathy toward others. In “Distance Divides,” I show that this served as a foundation for a powerful Anti-Federalist critique of the 1787 Constitution. One of the problems of the proposed document for New York based Brutus, Federal Farmer, and Melancton Smith was that it threatened to nationalize representation. This would in turn fundamentally undermine attached connections for officeholders, who they held should be a substitute that shared professions, interests, feelings, and views with constituents. Using this reconstruction of Anti-Federalist thought in its context, I point to structural tendencies in American elective representation that exacerbate political alienation. Two articles have resulted from this project, including a paper I am working on that places this theory of representation in dialogue with theories of sortition.

We can often gain conceptual purchase on dynamics in our politics by the way they are dramatized in literature. On the theme of ethics in politics, I have written on the schism between efficacy and morality in Robert Penn Warren’s writings. I argue the crisis at the core of his critique of modernity lends itself to an amoral acceptance of corruption, or embracing a radical reimagining of political ethics. I am open to collaboration on projects related to American literature, representation, emotional attachments, and radicalism.