Papers by Mary Kelly Persyn
In 2005 and 2006, Global War on Terror detainees held without trial at Guantánamo Bay entered a h... more In 2005 and 2006, Global War on Terror detainees held without trial at Guantánamo Bay entered a hunger strike to protest their treatment. With the cooperation of doctors stationed there, officers strapped detainees into restraint chairs and force-fed them. This paper examines whether this conduct violated American and international laws against torture. The issue recently arose again in 2023 as Ron DeSantis' provision of advice, in his capacity as a JAG officer, came back into public focus.
Los Angeles Lawyer Magazine, 2023
Gender-affirming care bans are a growing threat to the health of transgender youth in the United ... more Gender-affirming care bans are a growing threat to the health of transgender youth in the United States. This article describes legislative developments, including the constitutional underpinnings of challenges to them, and outlines the state of the law in California. Begins on page 28 of the magazine.
Assessing Trauma in Forensic Contexts, 2020
Every day, refugees seeking asylum in the United States must find a way to present their stories ... more Every day, refugees seeking asylum in the United States must find a way to present their stories in a fact-based, timeline-coherent, rational, and especially a consistent way. Persons traumatized by the very circumstances that would most qualify them to seek asylum can be the least capable of presenting their stories in this manner. The post- and sometimes present-traumatic stress that refugees suffer can impair their memories by erasing or distorting key facts. Even without memory impairments, the necessary recounting of their trauma narrative in the course of the asylum process is remarkably difficult and often re-traumatizing. These difficulties are especially acute for children and minors. The resulting symptoms they often experience and manifest, including anxiety, memory loss, impaired executive function, and more, can put significant roadblocks in the way of their future protection in a safer and more secure environment. It is critical to understand and acknowledge the toxic stress experienced by many asylum-seeking children and minors before, during, and after migration because it negatively impacts their health, including cognitive and mental health, in ways that can directly interfere with their ability to meet the legal requirements of the asylum process. “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men” (Frederick Douglass, 1817–1895).
Every day, refugees seeking asylum in the United States must find a way to present their stories ... more Every day, refugees seeking asylum in the United States must find a way to present their stories in a fact-based, timeline-coherent, rational, and especially a consistent way. Persons traumatized by the very circumstances that would most qualify them to seek asylum can be the least capable of presenting their stories in this manner. The post- and sometimes present-traumatic stress that refugees suffer can impair their memories by erasing or distorting key facts. Even without memory impairments, the necessary recounting of their trauma narrative in the course of the asylum process is remarkably difficult and often re-traumatizing. These difficulties are especially acute for children and minors. The resulting symptoms they often experience and manifest, including anxiety, memory loss, impaired executive function, and more, can put significant roadblocks in the way of their future protection in a safer and more secure environment. It is critical to understand and acknowledge the toxic ...
About 2.5 million American children currently have a parent behind bars. Though they play little ... more About 2.5 million American children currently have a parent behind bars. Though they play little role in the national debate over mass incarceration, these children suffer heavy impacts on their educational attainment, mental and physical health, and more. The article (pp 7-10) discusses many actions communities can take to support and protect them, but ultimately, we need a better approach to criminal justice.
Child traumatic stress can seriously damage cognition, mood, and concentration as well as physica... more Child traumatic stress can seriously damage cognition, mood, and concentration as well as physical and mental health. Poor children and children of color bear the heaviest burden. What can we do about it?
New York Law Journal, Jun 10, 2014
ACSBlog (American Constitution Society Blog), Jul 8, 2015
Science tells us that Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) take a serious toll on physical and me... more Science tells us that Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) take a serious toll on physical and mental health. The impacts can be lifelong, but they don't have to be. Read on to discover how collective action can interrupt and heal exposure to ACEs.
Journal of Internet Law, Jun 2013
Romanticism on the Net, May 2002
The Sublime Turn Away from Empire" argues that the Haitian Revolution-and Toussaint l'Ouverture's... more The Sublime Turn Away from Empire" argues that the Haitian Revolution-and Toussaint l'Ouverture's role in it-heavily influenced Wordsworth during his early years and that the1802 sonnet to Toussaint l'Ouverture epitomizes the poet's development of the "sublime turn." The Wordsworthian sublime, often interpreted in part as a reaction to the violence of the French Revolution, thus appears in this article as a reaction to the frightening and incomprehensible facts of colonial slavery and revolution-the very realities responsible for L'Ouverture's capture, imprisonment, and eventual death in France's Fort de Joux. In this context, the poet formulates his sublime turn as a turn away from the recognition of material slavery and bondage and toward an imaginative freedom nationed specifically English.
European Romantic Review, 1999
Conference Presentations by Mary Kelly Persyn
Sometimes to tell a story is to speak a life into words against any barrier that threatens creati... more Sometimes to tell a story is to speak a life into words against any barrier that threatens creative, dignified, meaningful life. To speak and bear witness in the service of education is perhaps the most powerful form of resistance that we have, for communal education changes hearts and minds rather than forcing the unwilling into reluctant acceptance.
To what extent can the voices of Romanticism's "others" revise our view of the metropolis and tea... more To what extent can the voices of Romanticism's "others" revise our view of the metropolis and teach us to think differently about the texts and contexts of the era? The question weighs heavily upon Romanticism's critics, who have recently taken up the question of the periphery's influence upon the center.
Book Reviews by Mary Kelly Persyn
Romanticism on the Net, 2000
Romanticism on the Net, 2000
New Idols of the Cave: On the Limits of AntiRealism. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 199... more New Idols of the Cave: On the Limits of AntiRealism. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997. ISBN: 0719050928 (hbk); 0719050936 (pbk). Price: £40, $49.95 (hbk); £14.95, $24.95 (pbk).
European Romantic Review
3 9 1 lence. Pushkiri often seems to be problematizing the idea of creativity rather than represe... more 3 9 1 lence. Pushkiri often seems to be problematizing the idea of creativity rather than representing an unequivocal point of view. Indeed, had Cooke focused more on the ironies and ambiguities of Pushkin's treatment of the poet and creativity, the monograph might have been far inore suggestive and have engendered more interesting analyses of the relevant texts. Nevertheless, scholars of Pushkin can read Cooke's work with great profit In Blake's Nostos, Kathryn Freeman offers a new perspective on The Four Zoas that places an imageless, undifferentiated silence at the "centric" focus of the poem, thus drawing Eastern nondualistic philosophy into the service of understanding Blake's thought Freeman's analysis identifies apocalypse, redemption, silence, and emptiness with the "undifferentiated consciousness" of .''organized innocence" (a term popular in Blake criticism even though he never used it). Like Shelley, whom she cites, Freeman believes that the deep troth is imageless, and in reference to Blake's mythos she equates that imageless truth with the image of the redeemed vortex in Night DC of The Four Zoas. Freeman's study is valuable for its ability to place fragmentation in the larger context of a wholeness-producing subsuming consciousness; for its recognition that the characters' fragmented perceptions and voices should not be confused with those of the author; and for its discussion of Blake's sublime. Although I finished the book wishing that she had provided a fuller description of how "undifferentiated consciousness" might function, Freeman offers an intriguing and original reading of the opposing forces of fragmentation and duality in the epic... Freeman states that she has produced the first nonlinear reading of The Four Zoas, although the middle four chapters progress chronologically through the poem; the "nonlinear".quality that Freeman describes comes from the juxtaposition of certain parts of Night DC to other parts of earlier Nights within the chapters. The first chapter opens wjth Freeman's rejection of Western dualist thinking as a tool for reading Blake; such a system,
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Papers by Mary Kelly Persyn
Conference Presentations by Mary Kelly Persyn
Book Reviews by Mary Kelly Persyn