Democrat or "imbecile"? Gertrude Stein's Useful Knowledge and Discourses of Intellectual Disability in the To-day and To-morrow Pamphlet Series

The 1928 publication Useful Knowledge is part of Gertrude Stein's response to a mid-1920's dispute over her authorship. On one side of this debate, Stein's oeuvre is figured as "imbecilic," and, on the other, it is presented as manifesting a new type of "intelligence" emerging with modern democracy. These arguments engage with broader anxieties about the expansion of democratic participation, particularly in the context of discussions of intellectual disability in the pamphlet series To-day and To-morrow. The 1928 material Stein produces to frame Useful Knowledge, a collection of pieces written between 1919 and 1926, offers a defense that intervenes in this discourse of democracy and intellectual ability by presenting her work as exemplary of a democratized American intellect.