Events

This paper analyzes interactions between blacks and whites depicted between 1957 and 1961 in Jean Rouch’s I, a Black Man, The Human Pyramide, and Chronicle of a Summer. It concludes with remarks on Shadows, a 1958-59 feature film by John Cassavetes often credited as a breakthrough in U.S. independent filmmaking. In so doing, I mean to explore what Rouch and Cassavetes were trying to accomplish through production practices that bordered on the experimental. Major topics to be raised include: ...

This lecture focuses on Eileen Chang’s Xinjing, The Heart Sutra to map and understand the ways in which the author depicted different types of emotional, erotic, sexual, and psychological flows and exchanges between parents, children, and their partners and spouses. Xinjing will be here read in conversation with a wide array of other sources, first and foremost the mid - and late - Qing literary heritage that so greatly occupied and influenced Eileen Chang’s own literary ...

This talk will examine the roots of the American system for electing its president and explore the possibility—as well as the feasibility—of changing the existing system. The origins of the Electoral College lay in a series of tumultuous conflicts at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. At stake was not only what the presidency should entail but how the new chief executive should be elected. Memories of George III's abuses of power haunted delegates. Fears of ...

The capacities of Artificial Intelligence (AI) are growing rapidly and new technologies are impacting society in a variety of ways, all of which raise significant ethical issues. LeRon Shults (University of Adger, Norway) argues that the Humanities are needed to help guide the ethical conversations around AI by becoming more engaged in “Human Simulation,” a new interdisciplinary approach to simulating human futures (as well as studying the past) that requires the expertise of historians, philosophers, ...

William Germano, Professor of English at Cooper Union, is the author of Getting It Published: A Guide for Scholars and Anyone Else Serious about Serious Books; From Dissertation to Book; Eye Chart, among others. Prof. Germano will present a part of his current project tentatively titled, Shakespeare at the Opera: A History of Impossible Projects. *Prof. Germano will also hold a publication workshop on revising academic writing, which is mostly tailored for junior faculty who ...

In 1876 American and English newspapers reported the extraordinary will made by an American woman living in London. Inspired by Bentham’s 1832 bequest of his body, Susan Fletcher Smith approached the Royal College of Surgeons with the proposal that, upon her death, her body be “completely dissected in the most thorough manner known to science.” Moreover, she stipulated that preference be given to persons of the female sex who wished to inspect the body in ...

Linda Gregerson is the Caroline Walker Bynum Distinguished University Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of Michigan. She is an internationally recognized scholar in American and British literature, and she is also the author of six award-winning books of poetry. She was named as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and she was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Her creative and scholarly works have ...

The Sal Castro conference will bring together 28 participants to present their research on a variety of topics on the Chicano Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. The Chicano Movement was the largest and most widespread civil rights and empowerment in the history of Mexican Americans. There is a renewed interest in the Chicano Movement by historians and other scholars and this will be showcased at the conference. Sponsored by Office of the Chancellor, Office ...

The UCSB Early Modern Center (EMC) warmly invites you to our upcoming annual conference, “Queer Crossings, Unruly Locales, 1500-1800,” scheduled for Friday, February 28th and Saturday, February 29th here at UCSB in Alumni Hall of Mosher Alumni House. The conference is free and open to the public, and all are welcome! Our keynote speakers are Dr. Melissa E. Sanchez (University of Pennsylvania) and Dr. Rajani Sudan (Southern Methodist University). Visit the following link to view ...

Aggressive criminal prosecution of unwed mothers who killed their newborns in early modern Europe (1550-1750) has led historians to assume that Europe was less tolerant of illegitimacy and infanticide than other pre-modern societies, including China and Japan. New research throws this assumption into question. In early modern Geneva, authorities often turned a blind eye to the untimely deaths and abandonment of unwanted bastards. These findings suggest that Europeans took a more practical approach to managing ...