BAAS PG Conference 2018: Keynote Review
USSO Keynote Competition Winner – James West, ‘Write Me In: Dick Gregory and the 1968 Presidential Campaign’, BAAS PG Conference 2018, 3rd Nov. 2018 Available at: https://northumbria.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=9082ec92-31b2-4771-921e-a98d00a2fbb9 James West (University of Northumbria) opened 2018’s USSO Keynote speech with a list of Dick Gregory’s occupations: ‘activist, author, artist, conspiracy theorist, nutritionist, athlete . . . and Presidential candidate’. He went on to characterise the comedian as a kind of real-life ‘Forrest Gump’ and this light-hearted and evocative phrase not only reflected the seeming unreality of Gregory’s life and his association to major historical and political events, but also set the tone for an engaging and informative discussion. This levity was maintained throughout the keynote and was appropriate given Gregory’s own career as a comedian and the wry humour which pervaded his campaign and his response to it. Despite numerous humorous moments there was a sustained analytical engagement with the topic throughout, […]