FEATURES

GBC Professor Jonathan Foster Releases New Book

Jonathan Foster, professor or history at Great Basin College, recently published his latest book, “Stigma Cities: The reputation and History of Birmingham, San Francisco and Las Vegas.”

Growing up in Birmingham, Alabama, a city that he loved, Foster was forced to come to grips with its reputation for racial violence. In so doing, he began to question how other cities dealt with similar kinds of stigmas that resulted from behavior and events that fell outside accepted norms. He wanted to know how such stigmas changed over time and how they affected a city’s reputation and residents.

The first work to investigate the important effects of stigmatized identities on urban places, Foster’s innovative study suggests that reputation, no less than physical and economic forces, explains how cities develop and why. An absorbing work of history and urban sociology, the book illuminates the significance of ideas in shaping metropolitan history.

Foster is also the author of “Lake Mead National Recreation Area: A History of America’s First National Playground.”

"Myths of Creativity" with Joshua Webster

With: Joshua Webster, PhD, GBC Faculty member
When: Wednesday, October 24, 2018 • 12 noon to 1PM
Where: The Great Basin College Library – Elko

For centuries, people have mythologized, mystified, monetized and marketed the idea of creativity. This presentation will attempt to dispel some of those myths and take a practical look at what it means to be creative through an exploration of the practices of professional creators.

Josh Webster is a Professor of English at Great Basin College where he teaches courses in creative writing, literature and composition. He earned his PhD from the Center for Writers at The University of Southern Mississippi and has written for short fiction journals and theater.

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