• Oct 22
    The Phantom Stockpile and Other Pernicious American Myths About China in World War II

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Judd C. Kinzley Resident Fellow (2018-2019) History, UW–Madison   The successful Japanese invasion of Burma in 1942 sealed off the easiest overland route for delivering desperately needed Allied wartime aid to China. With the roads closed, American goods piled up in wharves, godowns, and warehouses across Asia and North America even after the …

  • Oct 15
    Biographing Social Change: Dick Gregory in Recent American History

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Edward Schmitt UW System Fellow (2018-2019) History, UW-Parkside   Dick Gregory was a pivotal figure in modern American popular culture and a catalyst in the movements for social justice emerging out of the 1960s. This presentation will offer a brief overview of Gregory’s life and historical significance, along with a discussion of the …

  • Oct 12
    On Human Nature: Machiavelli’s “Mandrake” at 500

    Memorial Library, Room 126

    Symposium: Multiple Speakers (see below)   Niccolò Machiavelli’s political treatise The Prince (1513) casts its shadow far and wide across the humanities and social sciences. Often eclipsed by the scandalous, utilitarian ethics of the treatise – as well as by Shakespeare’s later elaboration of its themes – Machiavelli’s bawdy comedy, Mandragola (“Mandrake”, 1518) displays powerfully …

  • Oct 10
    The Insular-Real: Islands, Archipelagoes, and Questions of Scale

    Conrad A. Elvehjem Building, Room L140

    2018 Nellie Y. McKay Lecture in the Humanities: Michelle Stephens Professor of English and Latino and Caribbean Studies and Dean of the Humanities, Rutgers University   The question of scale has always been central to island studies. Whether through an engagement with relational and archipelagic forces, the employment of fractals, or the prominent positioning of …

  • Oct 8
    The African HipHop Movement: Youth Culture and Democracy in Senegal

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Damon Chandru Sajnani Race, Ethnicity, and Indigeneity Fellow (2018-2019) African Cultural Studies, UW–Madison   This seminar will introduce my book project demonstrating how Senegalese artist-activists are mobilizing HipHop to impact formal politics on an unprecedented scale. My core argument is that Senegalese rappers organically deploy an anticolonial notion of democracy that challenges orthodox …

  • Oct 1
    A History of Black Women in Higher Education from 1954-2014

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Rachelle Winkle-Wagner Race, Ethnicity, and Indigeneity Fellow (2018-2019) Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis, UW–Madison   This seminar will preview a portion of my book manuscript which is a historiographical project about how Black women have survived and thrived in and beyond higher education amidst formidable challenges. In the book, entitled, The Chosen We: …

  • Sep 24
    Getting by on Music: Re-scaling to New Circumstances in Recife’s Music Scene

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Falina Enriquez Race, Ethnicity, and Indigeneity (REI) Fellow (2018-2019) Anthropology; Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies (LACIS), UW–Madison   In the 2000s and early 2010s, musicians in Recife, the capital of the northeastern state of Pernambuco, were benefiting from federal and state multicultural policies, which enabled many of them to envision and execute …

  • Sep 17
    The Long, Glorious, and Unfortunate Life of Pompey the Great

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Jeffrey Beneker Resident Fellow (2018-2019) Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, UW–Madison   Young Pompey was “great” in the way that mattered most to the Romans: on the battlefield. He earned his title at a relatively young age and became greater as he grew older, achieving military victories against a variety of opponents …

  • Sep 10
    Abusing Science: The Case of Free Will

    University Club, Room 212

    Monday Seminar: Lawrence Shapiro Senior Fellow (2017-2021) Philosophy, UW–Madison   The tension between science and religion has increased in recent years with the rise of the so-called “New Atheists” and, as well, with the enthusiasm some scientists have displayed for pronouncing on concerns that have long resided within the domain of religion, e.g. the origin …