Spring 2012 Events
Conversations in the Humanities
Friday, February 24
JRC 209, 12:00 pm
Theme: Tourism Studies
Presenters:
Lesley Delmenico, Associate Professor of Theatre and Dance, “Tourist Places”
Dan Reynolds, Associate Professor of German, “Holocaust Tourism”
Roger Vetter, Professor of Music, “Encountering Otherness (and Oneself) through Performance in the Tourism Marketplace"
Lunches will be available for the first 20 faculty members who respond. R.S.V.P. required by noon on Wednesday, February 15 to Jan Graham [grahamj] or ext. 4384.
Reading: Michael Muhammad Knight, The Taqwacores
Thursday, March 1, 4:15pm, Faulconer Gallery
Author Michael Muhammad Knight will read from and discuss The Taqwacores, a fictional work that spawned an actual Islamic punk music scene.
Co-sponsored by Writers@Grinnell, Department of Religious Studies, Center for Humanities, and Faulconer Gallery.
Panel Discussion: Muhammad was a Punk Rocker
Friday, March 2, 4:15pm, Faulconer Gallery
Author Michael Muhammad Knight, film director Omar Majeed, and musicians from The Kominas will speak about evolving Islamic punk rock culture in the United States.
Film Screening and Director's Talk: Taqwacore: the Birth of Punk Islam
Friday, March 2, 7:00pm, Faulconer Gallery
Three years in the making, this feature documentary traces the progression of the Muslim Punk scene: from its imaginary inception in a novel written by a white-convert named Michael Muhammad Knight to a full-blown, real-life scene of Muslim punk bands and their fans. Comments by director Omar Majeed will follow the screening.
Co-sponsored by Cultural Films Committee, SGA Films, Department of Religious Studies, Center for Humanities, and Faulconer Gallery.
Festival of Humanities
The Humanities Center is pleased to announce the first ever Festival of Humanities on March 6-9, 2012. We have two exciting speakers and a wide range of student presenters at the symposium that will close the festival on March 8-9. Please mark your calendars and come hear what scholars in different disciplines are saying about the Humanities.
Richard Handler
Director of the Program in Global Development Studies, University of Virginia
Tuesday, March 6, 4:15 p.m.
Joe Rosenfield ’25 Center, Room 101
“Global Development Studies in a Liberal Arts Curriculum: Humanistic Approaches to Global Modernities.”
Richard Handler is a cultural anthropologist who has published on the Québécois nationalist movement. His enduring interest in nationalism, ethnicity, and the politics of culture led to his work on history museums, particularly an ethnographic study of Colonial Williamsburg, which is both an outdoor museum and a mid-sized nonprofit corporation. He has written on Jane Austen's novels, on the literary bent of such noted anthropologists as Ruth Benedict and Edward Sapir. He also has an ongoing interest in the history of American anthropology - in particular, in anthropologists as critics of modernity, and the relationship of the discipline's critical discourse to other intellectual trends.
Harrell Fletcher
Associate Professor of Art and Social Practice, Portland State University in Portland
Wednesday, March 7, 4:15 p.m.
Faulconer Gallery
Gallery Talk
Thursday, March 8, 4:15 p.m.
Bucksbaum Center for the Arts Rotunda
Social Practice Workshop
Artist Harrell Fletcher will lead a workshop exploring art and social practice.
Harrell Fletcher received his BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute and his MFA from California College of the Arts. He studied organic farming at UCSC and went on to work on a variety of small Community Supported Agriculture farms, which impacted his work as an artist. Fletcher has produced a variety of socially engaged collaborative and interdisciplinary projects since the early 1990’s. His work has been shown at many locations including SF MoMA, the de Young Museum, the Berkeley Art Museum, the Wattis Institute, and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in the San Francisco Bay Area, The Drawing Center, Socrates Sculpture Park, The Sculpture Center, The Wrong Gallery, Apex Art, and Smackmellon in NYC, DiverseWorks and Aurora Picture show in Houston, TX, PICA in Portland, OR, CoCA and The Seattle Art Museum in Seattle, WA.
Harrell’s events are co-sponsored by the Art Department, Center for Humanities, and Faulconer Gallery.
Student Symposium
Thursday, March 8, 11:00 a.m., JRC 101, "Deciphering the Source"
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Tad Boehmer '12 |
An Analysis of an Unidentified Medieval Manuscript in the Grinnell College Libraries Department of Special Collections and Archives |
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Kate Ferraro '12 |
William Shakespeare: Poet, Playwright, and Translator? A Comparison of Shakespeare's Macbeth and Holinshed's Chronicles |
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Briel Waxman '12 |
The Italian Encounter with Wagner: Intercity Rivalry in Post-Risorgimento Italy |
Thursday, March 8, 12:00 p.m., JRC 101, “Culture and Hybridity”
| Sunanda Vaidheesh '12 | Bridging Postcolonial Worlds: Leaving and the Liminal in Rushdie’s “East, West” |
| Erica Hauswald '12 | “Inducing Something Like Sexual Despair”: Gender Performance and the Abject in Infinite Jest |
| Olivia Horan '12 | Visual Culture and the Destruction of Gaņēśa Caturthī |
Thursday, March 8, 7:30 p.m., BCA 152, “Telling Stories, Making Music”
| Clare Boerigter '14 | Gusanos |
| Michael Maiorana'12 | Snowflakes |
| Vincent Newton '12 | Day of Sunshine |
Friday, March 9, 12:00 p.m., JRC 101, “Drawing Now: Three Propositions”
| Lauren Flynn '12 | New Embroideries |
| Allison Jamieson-Lucy '12 | Gravitas |
| Kyle Espinosa '12 | Take Care |
Friday, March 9, 4:15 p.m., ARH 102, “Crossing Borders, Queering Film”
| Paul Dampier '12 | The “Eastern Western”: Cross-cultural Hybridity and Violent Coexistence |
| Zoe Schein '12 | Puccini and the Pussy Wagon: Queer Parody in Thriller and Telephone |
Humanities International Film Festival
Tuesday, April 3
Strand Theatre, 4:15 pm
Rang de Basanti, Hindi film
Dir. Rakeysh OmPrakash Mehra
171 minutes, with English subtitles
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A young idealistic English filmmaker, Sue, arrives in India to make a film on Indian revolutionaries Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekhar Azad and their contemporaries and their fight for freedom from the British Raj. Owing to a lack of funds, she recruits students from Delhi University to act in her docu-drama. She finds DJ, who passed out five years back but still wants to be a part of the University because he doesn't think there's too much out there in the real world to look forward to. Karan, the son of Industrialist Rajnath Singhania, who shares an uncomfortable relationship with his father, but continues to live off him, albeit very grudgingly. Aslam, is a middle class Muslim boy, who lives in the by-lanes near Jama Masjid, poet, philosopher and guide to his friends. Sukhi, the group's baby, innocent, vulnerable and with a weakness for only one thing - girls. Meal and talk on Hindi cinema following. Corey Creekmur, “Experiments with Truth: Popular Hindi Cinema and Historiography” RSVP required by March 28 to Jan Graham: grahamj@grinnell.edu. |
Wednesday, April 4
Strand Theatre, 4:15 pm
Meeting Andrei Tarkovsky, Russian film
Dir. Dmitrii Trakovsky
90 minutes, with English subtitles
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In honor of the twentieth anniversary of Andrei Tarkovsky's death, student filmmaker Dmitry Trakovsky sets out in search of his favorite director's legacy. His journey leads him to fifteen moving interviews in California, Italy, Sweden, and finally, Russia as he attempts to come closer to the meaning of one of Tarkovsky's most enigmatic beliefs... that death doesn't exist. The film will be introduced by the director, Dmitrii Trakovsky with a Q & A session following the film. |
Friday, April 6
Strand Theatre, 4:15 pm
Still Life, Chinese film
Dir. Jia Zhang-ke
111 minutes, with English subtitles
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In Still Life, great changes have come to the town of Fengjie due to the construction of the Three Gorges hydro project: Countless families that had lived there for many generations have had to relocate to other cities. Fengjie’s old town, which has a 2000-year history, has been torn down and submerged forever, but its new neighborhood hasn’t been finished yet. There are still things that need to be salvaged and yet there are also things that must be left behind. In Still Life, such life-changing choices face both Sanming, a miner traveling to Fengjie in search of his ex-wife of sixteen years, and Shen Hong, a nurse who has come to Fengjie to look for her husband who she hasn’t seen in two years. Both Sanming and Shen will find who they’re looking for, but in the process they too will have to decide what is worth salvaging in their lives and what they need to let go of. Meal and talk on Chinese cinema following David Leiwei Li, "Globalization on Speed: Jia Zhangke's Cinematic Meditation on STILL LIFE" RSVP required by March 28 to Jan Graham: grahamj@grinnell.edu. |
Events are co-sponsored by the Center for International Studies, Center for the Humanities, Chinese and Japanese Departments, Cultural Films Committee, English Department, and the Russian Department.
Amy Allen
Monday, April 16, 7:30 p.m.
JRC 101
"Critical Theory and the Idea of Progress"
Amy Allen is the Parents Distinguished Research Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy and Women's and Gender Studies at Dartmouth College. She is the author of two books: The Power of Feminist Theory: Domination, Resistance, Solidarity (1999) and The Politics of Our Selves: Power, Autonomy and Gender in Contemporary Critical Theory (2008). She is Co-Editor-in-Chief of the journal Constellations, series editor of New Directions in Critical Theory (Columbia University Press), and executive co-director of SPEP.
Conversations in the Humanities
Noon, Friday, April 27, JRC 209
Presenters:
Caleb Elfenbein, Assistant Professor of History and Religious Studies, "Interconnected histories: the limits of area studies in approaching the modern Middle East"
Danielle Lussier, Assistant Professor of Political Science, "Crossing Regional Boundaries: From Europe to Southeast Asia"
Tanika Sarkar, Visiting Heath Professor in History and Religious Studies, "South Asian Studies in India"
Lunches will be available for the first 20 faculty members who respond. R.S.V.P. required by noon on Wednesday, April 25 to Jan Graham at grahamj@grinnell.edu or ext. 4384.
Fall 2011 Events
Conversations in the Humanities
Friday, September 9
JRC 209, 12:00 pm
If you’re interested in learning more about the “Conversations in the Humanities” luncheon series please RSVP to Jan Graham at grahamj@grinnell.edu or x4384 by noon on Wednesday, August 31st. The number of attendees is limited.
Geoffrey Harpham
Geoffrey Galt Harpham is president and director of the National Humanities Center in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, the only institute for advanced study in the world dedicated exclusively to the humanities. Under his leadership, the National Humanities Center has sponsored initiatives that have encouraged dialogue between the humanities and the natural and social sciences.
Tuesday, September 27
JRC 101, 4:15 pm
“From Eternity to Here: Shrinkage in American Thinking about Higher Education”
Wednesday, September 28
Faculty Roundtable Discussion, "Engaging Across the Disciplines: Humanities Now"
JRC 209, 12:00 pm
RSVP required by September 14 to Jan Graham at grahamj@grinnell.edu or x4384.
Conversations in the Humanities
Faculty Lunch Discussion
Friday, October 7, JRC 209, 12:00 pm
Jennifer Brown
The Real Thing: what primary sources tell us that copies cannot
It will focus on the opera manuscripts of Francesco Cavalli (17th century Venetian composer). By studying the physical state of these documents, we can reconstruct the processes of composing, copying, revising, and performing this music--aspects of history otherwise lost to us. In the case of Cavalli, such a study illuminates the fascinating interactions between Cavalli and his wife Maria, his principal copyist, who some scholars argue composed portions of works attributed to Francesco.
Jin Feng
Mixed Fun: Embracing Chaos in Interdisciplinary Research
In my research on web-based popular Chinese romance, I move between different approaches: virtual ethnography, oral interviews, observation of Web publishers and users, textual and discourse analysis. I seek to distill the welter of textual and extra-textual forces that shape Internet users’ online personae into a lucid account, without reducing the complexity of cultural transactions on or off the Web in contemporary China. I hope to expose the linkages between events, people, and their discursive output while also offsetting the shortcomings of these methods used in isolation from one another.
Alan Schrift
Research Opportunities using Online texts
I will talk about a couple of ways that I have regularly made use of online texts to carry out my research. First, I’ll talk about using “google books” to examine first and original editions of 16th-19th Century French and German texts, which has been essential for me to provide bibliographic information for some of the essays in my 8-volume History of Continental Philosophy, as well as locating passages in texts cited by Nietzsche so that I can find these passages in available English translations to assist readers of the Stanford UP Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche, which I am editing. Second, some French researchers working on possibilities for hypertexts happened to choose Nietzsche’s writings as the “trial text” to work with. I will talk about an early version of their project, and the current version, which is an online edition that is, at this moment, the philologically “purest” Nietzsche edition in existence in any language. I work with this all the time in my capacity as editor of the Stanford translations.
R.S.V.P. required by Monday, September 26 to Jan Graham at grahamj@grinnell.edu or ext. 4384.
Conversations in the Humanities
Faculty Lunch Discussion
Friday, November 11, JRC 209, 12:00 pm
Research in the arts: Methodologies of the Interdisciplinary Practice Group
Presentation led by Andrew Kaufman, Craig Quintero and Lee Running
R.S.V.P. required by Tuesday, November 1st to Jan Graham at grahamj@grinnell.edu or ext. 4384.
Global Modernities Roundtable
Modernities and Its Complications
Thursday, November 17
11:00 am, JRC 101
Presenters:
Johanna Meehan, professor of philosophy at Grinnell College. In her previous work she has explored questions about subjectivity, ethics, politics, narrative and violence. She has written about Critical Theory, Habermas’s ethics, psychoanalysis, and Arendt. She is currently working on a project that brings empirical work on infants together with psychology, philosophy, literary and political theory.
Claire Fox, associate of English and International Studies at the University of Iowa. Her research and teaching interests include literatures and cultures of the Americas, Latina/o Studies, U.S.-Mexico border studies, visual culture studies, and cultural policy studies.
Michael Haedicke, is an assistant professor of sociology in the Department for the Study of Culture and Society at Drake University. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of California in San Diego and his B.A. in Sociology from Kalamazoo College. He teaches classes about social activism, the sociology of the environment, food and agriculture, sociological theory, and the sociology of work and inequalities. He is currently working on a book that traces the history of the organic foods sector in the United States, focusing on the relationships between market-building activities and social activism. He has also studied immigration and social justice campaigns in the meatpacking industry and the evolution of the natural foods co-op movement. During June and July, 2011, Professor Haedicke taught a course about globalization and inequalities at Nanjing University in Nanjing, China. This experience led to a nascent project that investigates the extent to which ideologies and institutions of "ethical consumption" are taking root in Chinese society. In his presentation at Grinnell, Professor Haedicke will discuss the relationship between modernity, agriculture and risk, with a special focus on bacterial contamination in the modern food system.
Humanities Now Speaker: Susan McClary
The Stuff of the Humanities
Thursday, December 1
4:15 pm, Bucksbaum 152, Lawson Lecture Hall
Susan McClary (PhD, Harvard) is Professor of Music at Case Western Reserve University; she has also taught at the University of Minnesota, McGill University, and UCLA. Her research focuses on the cultural analysis of music, both the European canon and contemporary popular genres. In contrast with an aesthetic tradition that treats music as ineffable and transcendent, her work engages with the signifying dimensions of musical procedures and deals with this elusive medium as a set of social practices. Best known for her book Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality (1991), she is also author of Georges Bizet: Carmen (1992), Conventional Wisdom: The Content of Musical Form (2000), Modal Subjectivities: Renaissance Self-Fashioning in the Italian Madrigal (2004), Reading Music: Selected Essays (2007), Desire and Pleasure in Seventeenth-Century Music (2012), and editor of Structures of Feeling in Seventeenth-Century Expressive Culture (2012). Her work has been translated into at least thirteen languages. McClary received a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship in 1995.
Faculty Reception
A Celebration Honoring Faculty Scholarship
Friday, December 9
4:30 - 6:30 pm, Grinnell House
The Center for the Humanities is hosting a reception to honor faculty publications, grants, and creative projects that were published/awarded/completed in the last two years. All faculty are invited to attend.
