So Many Roads: The World in the Grateful Dead. San Jose State University, November 5–8, 2014.
Co-Directors: Nicholas G. Meriwether, Michael Parrish.
Hosted by San Jose State University, this conference brought together members of the Grateful Dead, their staff, and their extended family with scholars, students, and fans for the second and largest academic meeting on the Grateful Dead phenomenon to date.
Papers and Presentations
Alexander, Kay. “Let Us Now Reconsider Pigpen.”
Backstrom, Melvin. “‘Circle Songs and Sands of Time’: Pastoral Complexity in the Music of the Grateful Dead.”
Baldovinos, Jaime. “Creative Destruction, ‘China Cat Sunflower,’ ‘Dark Star,’ Silicon Valley, and the Grateful Dead.”
Balter-Reitz, Susan. “‘Shall We Go’? Visiting the Enshrined Grateful Dead.”
Barnes, Barry. “Steve Jobs and Jerry Garcia: Two Iconic Aesthetic Leaders.”
Bellone, Dominic. “‘A Band Beyond Description’: Metacantrics, Bohemian Nationalism, and Conjuring the Infinite Divine in ‘The Music Never Stopped.’”
Berg, Jeremy. “Silver Haystacks and Golden Needles: The Folksonomies That Brought Order to Grateful Dead Concert Recordings.”
Blakesberg, Jay. “Chasing the Light: The Grateful Dead Photography of Jay Blakesberg.”
Boone, Graeme. “Dark Star: Biography of a Song.”
Boyer, Frank V. “Jan Sawka’s Dead Set as Exemplary Collaboration.”
Browne, David. “Re-Estimating Prophets and Writing the Dead.”
Burnett, Gary. “‘A Place of First Permission’: Some Thoughts on the San Francisco Poetry Scene and the Grateful Dead.”
Carlson, Scott. “‘Take it, You Can Have It’: Grateful Dead Taping and the Idea of Open Access.”
Carroll, Beth. “Feminist Rhetorical Perspectives on Women and the Grateful Dead.”
Cline, Elizabeth, and Mark Rodriguez. “Fine Art and the Dead: ‘If the Head Fits Wear It.’”
Cohen, Elizabeth. “Margins and Frontiers: The Grateful Dead, Technology, and Silicon Valley.”
Daley, Mike. “Listening to ‘Space’.”
Deetz, Scott, and Bob Trudeau. “Measuring the Immeasurable: Studying the Meaning of ‘Just Exactly Perfect’ for Deadheads.”
Dolgushkin, Mike. “Grateful Statistics: DeadBase and Documenting the Dead.”
Dollar, Natalie. “‘Steal Your Face’: The Paradox of Symbol Co-optation in One Communitarian Movement and Museum Exhibitions.”
Eliasoph, Philip. “Art History and the Grateful Dead: Highbrow/Middlebrow/Lowbrow Zeitgeist Contexts.”
Felix, Brian. “The Development of ‘Playing in the Band’ as an Improvisational Vehicle, 1971–1972.”
Gans, David. “Surveying the Dead: A Guided Listening Session.”
Gertner, Doug. “Who Were the Grateful Dead, and Why Were They Always Following Jews Around?”
Goodenough, Mary. “‘Take a Step Back’: Swedenborg, Steiner, Jung, Campbell and the Grateful Dead Phenomenon.”
Gunderman, Hannah. “‘The Music Never Stopped’: Naming Businesses as a Method for Memorializing the Legacy of the Grateful Dead.”
Hausmann, John. “Parodies, Popular Memory, and the Deadhead Community.”
Intihar, Pyra. “Dead Roots and Regional Branches: the Grateful Dead in St. Louis.”
Jarnow, Jesse. “The Hip Economy: LSD Manufacture, Concert Taping, and the Birth of the Deadhead Network.”
Johnston, Lucas. “Cities of Dreams: Musical, Spiritual, and Communal Improvisation in the Jam Band Scene.”
Kramer, Michael. “‘Here Beside the Rising Tide’: The Dead, the Counterculture, and American Democracy.”
Kreutzmann, Bill, with Benjy Eisen. “Drumming With the Dead: Reminiscing, Writing, and Rhythm.”
Krippner, Stanley. “Truckin’ with the Grateful Dead: From Acid Rock to Dream Telepathy.”
Laurel, Heather. “Disruptive Gestures and Divergent Paths in Grateful Dead Improvisations.”
Lavezzoli, Pete. “Dick Latvala and the Birth of Dick’s Picks.”
Lawton, Leora. “Eyes of the World: A Jewish Viewpoint.”
Mallory, Chaone. “‘Make Yourself Easy’: Interrogating Gender Through Narrative and Memoir.”
Malvinni, David. “On the Use of the bVII (Mixolydian) Chord in the Grateful Dead.”
Marcus, Steve. “The Beginning of A Miracle: From Dead Ducats to Grateful Dead Ticket Sales.”
Mattson, Mark E. “Errors and Expressive Variations in Grateful Dead Performances: A Review.”
McCallister, James D. “Fellow Traveler: A Deadhead’s Literary Journey of Redemption.”
McCrary, Quincy. “Magic and Folklore in Grateful Dead Spirituality.”
McGee, Rosie. “Photographing the Dead: A Documentary Approach.”
McNally, Dennis. “Where the Road Began: The Roots of the Grateful Dead.”
Meriwether, Nicholas G. “So Many Roads: The World in the Grateful Dead.”
Millman, Susana. “Alive with the Dead: A Fly on the Wall with a Camera.”
Minkin, Bob. “Live Dead: The Photography of Bob Minkin.”
O’Donnell, Shaugn. “Formal Design in a ‘Playing In the Band’ Palindrome.”
Olsson, Ulf. “‘Why Don’t You Arrest Me?’ The Normalization of the Grateful Dead.”
Pearlman, Sandy. “The Grateful Dead’s Grayfolded, Vinyl and Virtual: John Oswald Unwinds the Toxic Consequences of Digital.”
Perlstein, Ed. “Photographing the Dead: Don’t Annoy the Roadies.”
Potter, Pitman B. “The Gospel and the Grateful Dead.”
Quigley, Ellen. “He Had Rings On His Fingers, Bells on His Shoes: Grateful Dead Culture As Liminal Space for the Exploration of Gender Boundaries.”
Ray, Timothy. “Fire on the Mountain: The Grateful Dead, Music Festivals, and the Rhetoric of the Communal Fire.”
Richardson, Peter. “Jerry Garcia’s Annus Mirabilis.”
Sawka, Hanna. “Countercultural Crossroads: Jan Sawka’s Set Design for the Grateful Dead.”
Schoenfeld, Robert. “Why Are There So Many Religious Jewish Deadheads in Israel?”
Silverman, Eric K. “Cultural Dialogics and the Grateful Dead: Or, An Anthropology of ‘Moral’ Beauty and ‘Grotesque’ Imagery in Lyric, Visual, and Sonic Iconography.”
Soni, Varun. “Media, Music, Mysticism: The Pop-Propheticism of the Grateful Dead.”
Sonnenberg, David. “The Other One: Logical and Psychological Context, Collectivism, and Employee Engagement.”
Spector, Stanley J. “‘But They Keep on Dancin’:” Collective Improvisation and Life Affirmation.”
Stanley, Rhoney. “The Writing of Owsley and Me: My LSD Family: The Lessons of Collaboration.”
Weiner, Robert G. “The Grateful Dead and Comics: The Grateful Dead’s Role in Sequential Art.”
Wickersham, Ron. “Evolution Then Revolution: Experiments in the Grateful Dead’s Live and Recorded Sound.”
Williams, Jay. “The Zeitgeist of the Bohemian Dead.”
Wood, Brent. “At the Greek: Garcia’s Tragic Catharsis.”
Roundtable Discussions
“A Psychedelic Renaissance: The Poster Art of the Dead and the Haight-Ashbury.” Chair: John Lyons. Panelists: Dennis Larkins, Stanley Mouse, Lee Conklin.
“After the Haight: The Evolution of the Poster Art of the Dead.” Chair: Chris Shaw. Panelists: Richard Biffle, Gary Houston, Chuck Sperry, Alexandra Fischer.
“Cinematically Dead: Creating the Grateful Dead Documentary.” Chair: David Lemieux. Panelists: Amir Bar-Lev, Ken Dornstein.
“Classically Dead: The Aquilanti-Weir Orchestration Project.” Chair: David Gans. Panelists: Giancarlo Aquilanti, Helen Baldovinos, Bob Bralove.
“Continuities and Discontinuities in the Deadhead Community: The Family, Deadheads, and Jam Band Fans.” Chair: Rebecca G. Adams. Panelists: John Perry Barlow, Justin Lane.
“Cooking for the Dead: The Culinary Arts and the Philosophy of the Grateful Dead.” Chair: Kimball Jones. Panelists: Chez Ray Sewell, Moaya Scheiman, Kevin Weinberg.
“’Dark Star’ as Ouija Board: When Is the Spirit There?” Chair: Henry Kaiser. Panelists: Bob Bralove, Kidd Candelario.
“If Mercy’s In Business”: The Grateful Dead and the Business World. Chair: Peter McQuaid. Panelists: Roger McNamee, Charlie Winton.
“Incubating the Dead: The Folk Scene and the Roots of San Francisco Rock.” Chair: Michael Parrish. Panelists: Peter Albin, Pete Grant, Glenn Howard, Marshall Leicester, Eric Thompson.
“Organically Dead: The Sustainable Agriculture Movement and the Legacy of the Grateful Dead Phenomenon.” Chair: Irene Reti. Panelists: Mark Lipson, Bob Scowcroft.
“Passing the Acid Test: Consciousness, Community, and Celebration in the Grateful Dead.” Chair: Adrian Marin. Panelists: Carolyn Adams Garcia, Wavy Gravy.
“Periodically Dead: Deadhead Journalism and Journalists.” Chair: David Gans. Panelists: Blair Jackson, Steve Silberman.
“Raising the Dead and Opening the Vault: Shaping the Recorded Legacy of the Grateful Dead.” Chair: Nicholas G. Meriwether. Panelists: David Lemieux, Mark Pinkus.
“Resurrecting Jerry Garcia for the Digital Age.” Chair: Marc Allan. Panelists: Mark Silverman, Trixie Garcia.
“’Ripple In Still Water’: Reassessing the Rise and Psychedelic Diaspora of the Haight-Ashbury Community, the Grateful Dead, Dance Concert Posters, and the Road Less Traveled.” Chair: John Lyons. Panelist: Jacaeber Kastor.
“Stay in Your Own Movie”: The Making of Sunshine Daydream. Moderator: Adrian Marin. Panelists: Sam Field, Joe Valentine.
“’The More That You Give’: Philanthropy, Philosophy, and the Rex Foundation.” Chair: John Leopold. Panelists: Carolyn Adams Garcia, Cameron Sears, Sandra Sohcot.