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Crowds

CROWDS II is the continuation of a large-scale collaborative research project initiated in 2000 dedicated to examining the importance of multitudes in the modern era. The project's first cycle was completed in 2005 and involved:

  • publication of CROWDS, edited by Jeffrey Schnapp and Matthew Tiews (Stanford University Press, 2006). The book provides a crowded, multilayered look at modern multitudes by weaving together three types of contributions: full-length essays that slice their object of study in a number of ways; short essays that assume the form of testimonies regarding first-hand experiences of crowd behavior; and microhistories that track the shifting semantic fields of key vocabulary concerning collectivities. It includes essays by: Jessica Burstein, Joy Connolly, William Egginton, Susanna Elm, Allen Guttmann, N. Katherine Hayles, Stefan Jonsson, Anton Kaes, John Plotz, Christine Poggi, Joan Ramon Resina, Haun Saussy, Jeffrey T. Schnapp, Urs Stäheli, Matthew Tiews, Charles Tilly, Andrew V. Uroskie, and Jobst Welge. The testimonials are by Luigi Ballerini, Susan Buck-Morss, Jessica Burstein, T. J. Clark, Luiz Costa-Lima, David Theo Goldberg, Michael Hardt, David Humphrey, Tirza True Latimer, Greil Marcus, Armando Petrucci, Richard Rorty, Alain Schnapp, Thomas Seligman, Michel Serres, Ann Weinstone, and Hayden White. The semantic histories are by Jeronimo Ernesto Arellano, Dustin Condren, Sebastian de Vivo, Marisa Galvez, John B. Hill, Dániel Margócsy Na’ama Rokem, Peter Samuels, Susan Schuyler, Alexandra Katherina Sofroniew, Maria Su Wang, and Ka-Fai Yau.  Crowds received the Modernist Studies Association prize for the Best Book of 2006.
  • the staging of a large-scale traveling exhibition, Revolutionary Tides: The Art of the Political Poster, 1914-1989: a collaboration between the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Center for the Visual Arts at Stanford University, the Hoover Institution, the Stanford Humanities Lab, and The Wolfsonian-Florida International University. Curated by Jeffrey Schnapp, the exhibition examined the artistic consequences of the triumph of popular sovereignty as a political ideal more than one hundred years after the French revolution (1789). The exhibition and the catalogue that accompanied it tracked the changing face of revolution from World War I (1914-1918) through the year of the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989) by means of over one hundred political posters, as well as a number of related sculptures and objects, from twenty different countries, drawn from the collections of the Hoover Institution Archives and The Wolfsonian-FIU. It was exhibited at Cantor between Sept. 14, 2005 - Dec. 31, 2005 and at the Wolfsonian-FIU in Miami Beach between Feb. 24, 2006 - July 25, 2006. The exhibition catalogue was published by Skira (Milan) in English, French, and Italian editions.
  • building and launch of the Crowds website. Built with Ten.Fold Design in Oakland, the website is divided into three main sections: Crowds, Revolutionary Tides, and Crowds Intermedia. The first features reference materials on the rise of social science discourses regarding the behavior of collectivities, virtual galleries on topics ranging from theater riots to crowds in film to the science of counting crowds, semantic histories, and testimonials. The second documents the Revolutionary Tides exhibition, accompanies visitors through the show, and describes various features of the installation including its media kiosks. The third houses sample materials from the Crowds book, video capture of the Crowds seminar that was held in 2005 to mark the completion of phase I of the project, and a database of writings on crowd psychology and sociology from the birth of the social sciences through the late 1920’s. The website has won numerous prizes including a Silver Medal from Horizon Interactive Awards, a prestigious international competition recognizing outstanding achievement in interactive media production.

Phase II of the project involves the continued building of the website: whether of additional galleries, new reference materials, more semantic histories and testimonies, and the like. The project welcomes outside proposals for adding to or expanding any of its features. For further information, please contact the project P.I. or Project Manager (see below).

During Phase I, major funding for the project was provided by a grant from the Seaver Institute. During Phase II, it has received continuing funding from the DLCL Research Division at Stanford University.

Project Principal Investigator:

Project Manager: