Sherman, Texas — Ryan Ashley Caldwell, sociologist and Austin College alumna, will present a lecture, “The Women of Abu Ghraib and Expressive Torture,” on Oct. 18 at 4:30 p.m. in Caruth Administration Building Room 201 on Austin College’s campus.
Caldwell’s talk will address her recent doctoral research at Texas A&M University on the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq. Austin College’s gender studies program invited Caldwell to campus to share her work, which has been published in “Talcott Parsons: Theories, Developments and Applications” and will be included in the fall 2007 issue of “Cultural Sociology.”
Accounts of abuse of prisoners held in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq became public in 2004, but a criminal investigation had already been underway when the photos and reports were made public. Seventeen soldiers and officers were removed from duty and seven solders were charged with aggravated assault and battery. The seven were convicted in courts martial, sentence to federal prison, and dishonorably discharged from service.
In Caldwell’s presentation, the concept of gender is used to provide both an understanding of some of the events surrounding the courts martial of the seven soldiers, as well as to understand the abuse of detainees at the hands of American military soldiers. Dr. Caldwell considers how gender is conceived of in the U.S. military, what this means for gender roles, and how this is connected to power? Within this analysis, a application and expansion of Talcott Parsons’ instrumental and expressive gender roles leads to new concepts such as expressive torture, expressive power, instrumental torture, and instrumental chaos.
Caldwell graduated from Austin College in 1999 and is an instructor at San Jacinto Community College, having finished her doctorate earlier in 2007.
Austin College is a leading national independent liberal arts college located 60 miles north of Dallas in Sherman, Texas. Founded in 1849, making it the oldest institution of higher education in Texas operating under original name and charter, the college is related by covenant to the Presbyterian Church (USA). Recognized nationally for academic excellence in the areas of international education, pre-professional training, and leadership studies, Austin College is one of 40 schools profiled in Loren Pope’s influential book “Colleges that Change Lives.”
