Title: Operation Mind: A Brief Documentary Account of the House Committee on Un-American Activities. And Why It Matters Now.
Publisher: Disobedience Press
Publication Date: 2025
Language: English
ISBN 10: 196409805X
ISBN 13: 9781964098050
Binding: Soft cover
Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

A re issue and reframing of a 1952 publication confronting censorship and right-wing threats to freedom of expression in higher education in the US. Natalie Zemon Davis and Elizabeth Douvan’s Operation Mind is a body of evidence, a prophetic warning, and a call to action about the urgency of doing all we can to prevent thought control in America. In 1952, this meticulously researched pamphlet documented the House Committee on Un-American Activities’ attacks and impact. The HUAC abused its charge to intimidate and silence academics, union members, social critics, scientists, artists, teachers, political opponents, rabbis and other religious leaders, to make them appear suspect and “un-American” in the eyes of the American people. The 2025 reprint of Operation Mind, with a foreword by Silke-Maria Weineck and a new introduction by Natalie Zemon Davis, connects this history of McCarthyism with present-day attacks on academic freedom.

About the Author

Natalie Zemon Davis was a foremost historian of early modern Europe. Her first works focused on France, plumbing the archives for records that elucidate the lives of ordinary people, especially marginalized groups and women. She is best known for The Return of Martin Guerre (1983), a work that uncovered the case of a sixteenth-century imposter and was later made into a highly acclaimed film. Davis’s later scholarship focused on the daily interactions of Christians, Jews, and Muslims and on slaves and slaveholders, with a particular interest in their social encounters and cultural exchanges.

Davis grew up in a middle-class Jewish family in Detroit, Michigan. She attended the Kingswood School for Girls, where she was one of only a few Jewish students. Her interest in history, as well as her leftist political allegiances, began to develop in high school and grew stronger in her college years. As a student at Smith College in the late 1940s, Davis participated in several political organizations, ranging from Marxist discussion groups to campaigns against racial discrimination.

Natalie and Chandler Davis remained politically active, and both suffered the repercussions of the 1950s anticommunist backlash. Chandler Davis refused to sign the university’s required anticommunist oath, and in 1953 he was brought to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. His refusal to cooperate in the government witch-hunts resulted in his being dismissed from the faculty, blacklisted within the profession, and briefly imprisoned. Shortly before her husband’s firing, Davis had spent several months in France, a period she described as initiating her “lifelong love affair with the archives.” After returning from Europe, the government confiscated both the Davises’ passports, making it impossible for her to continue any research abroad. Forced by circumstance to revamp her research agenda, Davis turned her attention to rare book collections in the United States. Throughout her career, Davis continually broadened the intellectual scope of her work, examining the categories of class, gender, and religion, and employing the methodological tools of history, anthropology, and literature within her scholarly repertoire.

Elizabeth Douvan’s pioneering research on the social and psychological condition of Americans before and after the changes that swept the country in the 1960s painted an intriguing portrait of shifts in American mental health, family life, the roles and status of women, and adolescent development and behavior. The co-author with Joseph Veroff and Richard Kulka of “The Inner American” and “Mental Health in America,” published by Basic Books in 1981, Douvan was also the co-author with historian Natalie Zemon Davis of “Operation Mind,” a 1952 pamphlet that attacked the activities of the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC).

“In ‘The Inner American,’ Libby Douvan brilliantly traced the historical changes in men and women’s sense of self over the second half of the 20th century, as American society moved from an emphasis on community connections to an emphasis on intimate relationships,” says Veroff. “It was within marital life that she saw a major support for psychological well-being, and as a result, spent many of her later years doing research on the marital stability of couples.” Her last book, “Marital Instability,” co-authored with Veroff and Shirley Hatchett, points to the different ways that African-American and white marriages founder. Douvan, who directed the Family and Sex Role Program at the ISR, had a particular interest in the development and changing roles of women and was instrumental in establishing one of the nation’s first women’s studies programs in the early 1970s at Michigan.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Store Description

Kennys.ie is the largest exporter of books from Ireland currently exporting to approximately 100 countries around the world. Kennys Bookshop houses hundreds of thousands of books and specialises in collection development and library services, supplying booksellers and state and university libraries on a global scale including the U.S.A.,Japan and Europe. Kennys.ie is Ireland's Largest Online Bookshop.

Visit Seller's Storefront

Seller's business information

Kennys Bookshop and Art Galleries Ltd.
Liosban Industrial Estate, Tuam Road, Galway, Ireland

Sale & Shipping Terms

Terms of Sale

Terms of Sale - Credit Cards: Visa, Master Card, American Express, Diner.
Payment can also be made by bank draft in Euros, drawn on an Irish Bank.

We regret that PO Boxes are not acceptable to the U.S. as our courier will not deliver to them.

In case of returns or queries please contact us by email books@kennys.ie or by phone +353 91 709350

VAT Registration - IE2238521A

Conor Kenny

Right of cancellation

If you are a consumer you can cancel the contract in accordance with the following. Consumer means any natural person who is acting for purposes which are outside his trade, business, craft or profession.

INFORMATION REGARDING THE RIGHT OF CANCELLATION

Statutory Right to cancel

You have the right to cancel this contract within 14 days without giving any reason.

The cancellation period will expire after 14 days from the day on which you acquire, or a third party other than the carrier and indicated by you acquires, physical possession of the the last good or the last lot or piece.

To exercise the right to cancel, you must inform us, Kennys Bookshop and Art Galleries Ltd., Kilkerrin Park, Liosban, Galway, Ireland, +353 91709350, of your decision to cancel this contract by a clear statement (e.g. a letter sent by post, fax or e-mail). You may use the attached model cancellation form, but it is not obligatory. You can also electronically fill in and submit a clear statement on our website, under "My Purchases" in "My Account". If you use this option, we will communicate to you an acknowledgement of receipt of such a cancellation on a durable medium (e.g. by e-mail) without delay.

To meet the cancellation deadline, it is sufficient for you to send your communication concerning your exercise of the right to cancel before the cancellation period has expired.

Effects of cancellation

If you cancel this contract, we will reimburse to you all payments received from you, including the costs of delivery (except for the supplementary costs arising if you chose a type of delivery other than the least expensive type of standard delivery offered by us).

We may make a deduction from the reimbursement for loss in value of any goods supplied, if the loss is the result of unnecessary handling by you.

We will make the reimbursement without undue delay, and not later than 14 days after the day on which we are informed about your decision to cancel with contract.

We will make the reimbursement using the same means of payment as you used for the initial transaction, unless you have expressly agreed otherwise; in any event, you will not incur any fees as a result of such reimbursement.

We may withhold reimbursement until we have received the goods back or you have supplied evidence of having sent back the goods, whichever is the earliest.

You shall send back the goods or hand them over to us or Kennys Bookshop and Art Galleries Ltd., Kennys Bookshop, Liosban Retail Park, Tuam Road, Galway, Ireland, +353 91709350, without undue delay and in any event not later than 14 days from the day on which you communicate your cancellation from this contract to us. The deadline is met if you send back the goods before the period of 14 days has expired. You will have to bear the direct cost of returning the goods. You are only liable for any diminished value of the goods resulting from the handling other than what is necessary to establish the nature, characteristics and functioning of the goods.

Exceptions to the right of cancellation

The right of cancellation does not apply to:

the delivery of newspapers, journals or magazines with the exception of subscription contracts; and
the supply of digital content which is not supplied on a tangible medium (e.g. on a CD or DVD) if you accepted when you placed your order that we could start to deliver it, and that you could not cancel it once delivery had started.

Model withdrawal form

(complete and return this form only if you wish to withdraw from the contract)

To: (Kennys Bookshop and Art Galleries Ltd., Kilkerrin Park, Liosban, Galway, Ireland, +353 91709350)

I/We (*) hereby give notice that I/We (*) withdraw from my/our (*) contract of sale of the following goods (*)/for the provision of the following goods (*)/for the provision of the following service (*),

Ordered on (*)/received on (*)

Name of consumer(s)

Address of consumer(s)

Signature of consumer(s) (only if this form is notified on paper)

Date

* Delete as appropriate.

Shipping Terms

Free Shipping

Shipping rates from Ireland to U.S.A.

Shipping rates from Ireland to U.S.A.
Order quantity	12 to 22 business days	10 to 20 business days
First item	� 9.06	� 9.93

Delivery times are set by sellers and vary by carrier and location. Orders passing through Customs may face delays and buyers are responsible for any associated duties or fees. Sellers may contact you regarding additional charges to cover any increased costs to ship your items.