Ben Chappell
- Professor, American Studies
Contact Info
1440 Jayhawk Blvd.
Lawrence, KS 66045
Biography —
Trained as a musician and anthropologist, Ben Chappell works as an ethnographer and interdisciplinary scholar. His current research areas include Mexican American studies, vernacular cultural production and neoliberalism.
Education —
Teaching —
Prof. Chappell's teaching efforts focus on the graduate program and core requirements in the AMS major.
Teaching interests:
- Ethnography
- Cultural Studies
- Theory
- U.S. in Global Context
- American Identities
Selected Publications —
Books
Santillán, Richard, Gene T. Chávez, Rod Martínez, Raymond Olais, and Ben Chappell. 2018. Mexican American Baseball in Kansas City. Charleston, SC: Arcadia.
Chappell, Ben. 2012. Lowrider Space: Aesthetics and Politics of Mexican American Custom Cars. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Book Chapters
Chappell, Ben. 2016. “The Borders the Cross Us: Ethnographic Sensibilities for Transnational American Studies.” In Approaching Transnational America in Performance, edited by Birgit Bauridl and Pia Wiegmink. Peter Lang.
Chappell, Ben. 2016. “Lowrider Publics: Aesthetics and Contested Communities.” In The Routledge Companion to Latina/o Popular Culture, edited by Frederick Aldama, 267–78. London/New York: Routledge.
Chappell, Ben. 2014. “Barrio Metaxis: The Ambivalent Aesthetics of Lowrider Cars.” In Vehicles: Cars, Canoes, and Other Metaphors of Moral Imagination, edited by David Lipset and Richard Handler. Oxford/New York: Berghahn.
Chappell, Ben. 2009. “Ordinary Exceptions: The Violence of Threat Governmentality.” Book Chapters. In Shifting Positionalities: The Local and International Geo-Politics of Surveillance and Policing, edited by María Amelia Viteri and Aaron Tobler, 124–36. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Chappell, Ben. 2008. “Lowrider Style: Cultural Poetics and the Politics of Scale.” In Cultural Studies: An Anthology, edited by Michael Ryan, 634–45. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Review
Chappell, Ben. 2013. “Lowriders.” Edited by Ilan Stavans. Latino Studies. New York: Oxford University Press.
Other
Chappell, Ben. 2015. “The Nature and Meaning of Research in American Studies (.pdf).” American Studies Association White Papers. American Studies Association.
Selected Presentations —
Chappell, B. (11/17/2019). Google’s Lowrider, the Jokers, and the Conquest of the Eastside. American Anthropological Association/Canadian Anthropology Society. Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Chappell, B. (11/7/2019). Strategies for Survival and Success in the Academic Job Market. American Studies Association. Honolulu, HI
Chappell, B. (5/30/2019). Mexican American Fastpitch: Vernacular Sport, Utopian Performance, and Cultural Citizenship in Mid-América. Cultural Studies Association. New Orleans, LA
Chappell, B. (6/28/2018). Everything can be Counted, Nothing can be Known: Neoliberalism and Knowledge Production. 10th anniversary conference, Regensburg European American Forum. University of Regensburg, Germany
Chappell, B. (2/14/2018). Layered Memory and Contested Value: Popular Aesthetics in a Mexican American Barrio. Capitalism and the City series. Free University of Berlin