A lecture by Rob Sullivan.
The ghosts of the past and the traces of history are inscribed on the streets of L.A., conjuring images of shattered dreams and grotesque crimes. The hills and flats of this city are haunted with acts of infamous criminality as well as the anonymous remains of the banality of lives spent in total obscurity. Starting with one of the city’s most notorious crimes – the kidnapping and murder of Marion Parker in 1927 by William Edward Hickman, we explore the ways in which specters haunt Los Angeles.
How far do you have to go to get to the “past”? A series of three lectures explores the notion that you needn’t go very far at all. Under the umbrella of archeology of the contemporary past, Justin Walsh (Chapman University), Annie Danis, and Rob Sullivan (UCLA) will discuss how archeology and geography can help us explore the materials and meaning of people still alive (or still dead as the case may be) today. Surveying the site of the US’s 1969 moon landing, excavating the trash heap of an early 70s hippie commune, and analyzing the ghost geographies of Los Angeles are new windows into a past you already think you know.