Humanities – Jordan Stish
Jordan Stish
University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire
“Acceptable Activists, Absence, and Antifeminists: A Feminist Historical Critique of National Statuary Hall”Jordan Stish earned her undergraduate degree in history from the University of Wisconsin-Superior in 2021. She completed her graduate degree in public history from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire in 2023. Her research examines the messaging and meanings behind public monuments and their intersections with gender and collective memory. In her thesis, Jordan discusses gender representation in the monumental landscape of National Statuary Hall at the US Capitol in Washington, D.C., a place widely understood to be the commemorative core of the United States. By examining the history of the existing monuments within Statuary Hall prior to 2015 and the creation of historical narratives surrounding the lives and legacies of the individuals commemorated within the Hall, Jordan argues that the inclusion of specific women chosen for their ‘acceptable’ patriotic activism, the misrepresentation and erasure of notable feminist women from commemoration, and the inclusion of contemporary antifeminists have led Statuary Hall to become a site of state-constructed antifeminism. As a result, the national narrative surrounding American women has been misrepresented. Jordan currently works as a prospect research development specialist at Planned Parenthood North Central States. She is in the process of converting her thesis into an article to be published in an academic journal.
Humanities Honorable Mention: Caden Testa, University of Oklahoma, “Species Transformation and Social Reform: The Role of the Will in Jean-Baptiste Lamarck’s Transformist Theory”