OUR NEXT EVENTS
Lecture: February 7
4 p.m.
Cramer Hall 124
As part of PSU’s annual “Canada Days” events, the Portland Center for Public Humanities and Canadian Studies present Renisa Mawani “Specters of Indigeneity in British Indian Migration, 1914″
“‘Specters of Indigeneity’ focuses on the 1914 Vancouver arrival of the Komagata Maru, a Japanese steamship carrying 376 Punjab migrants, to track the changing conceptions of Indigeneity appropriated and deployed in early 20th century legal struggles over British Indian migration to Canada.”
Lecture: February 15
4 p.m.
Smith Memorial Student Union 296
The Portland Center for Public Humanities presents Sarah Sentilles “Art, Religion, and Torture: Constructing an Ethical Response to Violence against Others″
“The photographs of torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq have been read in a variety of ways—as pornography, as comedy, as lynching photography, and as the newest addition to the colonial archive. They have been read as crucifixion images, too, which has played a role in motivating many Christian individuals and communities to act against torture in concrete, political ways. The photographs have also been reimagined by artists around the world. In this lecture, I will bring the work of three contemporary American artists to the conversation. Together we will explore what their artwork illuminates about ethical responses to images of torture and to torture itself—and whether religion might have a constructive role to play in this ethical work. “
Workshop: February 16
10-11:30 a.m.
English Department Lounge, Neuberger Hall 407
Join us for a workshop with Sarah Sentilles. We will be discussing the chapter “Seeing Other People” from her book Breaking Up with God
Lecture: March 1
7 p.m.
Smith Memorial Student Union 333
The Portland Center for Public Humanities presents Rob Nixon “Slow Violence and Environmentalism of the Poor”
“How, in an age that venerates the instant and the spectacular, can writers turn slow-moving environmental calamities into stories dramatic enough to rouse public sentiment? What are the imaginative and strategic challenges of exposing the forces of slow violence that inflict exponential environmental damage? This talk connects an analysis of slow violence to a vision of sustainable security with a focus on activism in the global South.”
Workshop: March 2
10 a.m. – 12 p.m.
English Department Lounge, Neuberger Hall 407
Join us for a workshop with Rob Nixon. We will be discussing his forthcoming article “Neoliberalism, Genre, and the Tragedy of the Commons.”
Lecture: March 15
4-5:30 p.m.
Smith Memorial Student Union 298
Until very recently, American universities were led mainly by their faculties, which viewed intellectual production and pedagogy as the core missions of higher education. Today, as Benjamin Ginsberg warns in his controversial book, The Fall of the Faculty, “deanlets”–administrators and staffers often without serious academic backgrounds or experience–are setting the educational agenda.
The Fall of the Faculty examines the fallout of rampant administrative blight that now plagues the nation’s universities. In the past decade, universities have added layers of administrators and staffers to their payrolls every year even while laying off full-time faculty in increasing numbers–ostensibly because of budget cuts. In a further irony, many of the newly minted–and non-academic–administrators are career managers who downplay the importance of teaching and research, as evidenced by their tireless advocacy for a banal “life skills” curriculum. Consequently, students are denied a more enriching educational experience–one defined by intellectual rigor.
As troubling as this trend has become, there are ways to reverse it. The Fall of the Faculty outlines how we can revamp the system so that real educators can regain their voice in curriculum policy.
Benjamin Ginsberg is the David Bernstein Professor of Political Science, Director of the Center for the Study of American Government, and Chair of the Government Program of Advanced Academic Programs at Johns Hopkins University.
Please RSVP to the events below so they can be accurately catered
Friday, February 24
12-1:30 p.m.
English Department Lounge, Neuberger Hall 407
The Portland Center for Public Humanities is pleased to welcome Kateřina Bohadlová to February’s Faculty Lunch and Lecture. She will be presenting:
Everything you always wanted to know about Commedia dell’Arte
(but were afraid to ask)
Friday, March, 9
12-1:30 p.m.
English Department Lounge, Neuberger Hall 407
The Portland Center for Public Humanities and the Middle East Studies Center are pleased to welcome Laura Robson to March’s Faculty Lunch and Lecture. She will be presenting:
Migration and Resettlement in the Assyrian Experience
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