UW News

April 5, 2021

ArtSci Roundup: Borders and Blackness: Communicating Belonging and Grief, Drop-in Session: Meditation Inspired By Nature, and More

During this time of uncertainty and isolation, find solace in digital opportunities to connect, share, and engage. Each week, we will share upcoming events that bring the UW, and the greater community, together online. 

Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All UW faculty, staff, and students have access to Zoom Pro via UW-IT


Curating in Conversation: A Panel Series on Sharing Northwest Native Art and Art History with the Public

April 12, 7:00 – 8:30 PM | Online

In the second of a three-part series sponsored by the Simpson Center for the Humanities and the Canadian Studies Center, this panel discussion features Kathryn Bunn-Marcuse, Curator of Northwest Native Art at the Burke Museum, in conversation with Tlingit artist and co-curator of the Northwest Native Art Gallery Alison Bremner and Karen Duffek, Curator of Contemporary Visual Arts & Pacific Northwest at the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia. The program will include an overview of Bremner’s work as an artist and curator followed by a larger discussion on the state of contemporary Northwest Coast art and the issues involved in ethical curation.

Free | More Info


Drop-in Session: Meditation Inspired By Nature

April 12, 6:00 – 7:00 PM | Online

Join the Center for Child and Family Well-Being for a series of short meditations inspired by the book Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer and two poems – “Rise Up Rooted like Trees” by Rainer Maria Rilke and “You Have Become a Forest” by Nikita Gill. Using nature as inspiration, participants will be guided to focus on resourcing, releasing stress, refueling and connection. Presented by Blaire Carleton.


Transcultural Approaches to Europe: A Conversation with Fatima El-Tayeb

April 13, 3:00 PM | Online

In this lecture, Professor of Literature and Ethnic Studies at the University of California, San Diego Fatima El-Tayeb and director of study abroad and part-time lecturer for the Comparative History of Ideas Department Nicolaas Barr discuss how European identities are constructed through “racial amnesia” and how the concepts of whiteness, gender, and religion are mobilized in European politics. They might address questions such as: can you decolonize Europe? Why do white Europeans believe they are colorblind? What is the relationship between the so-called refugee crisis and Europe’s colonial legacy? How are religion, gender and sexuality connected to the rise of right-wing movements? What role do trans-community coalitions play in movements of resistance? Is a multi-religious Europe possible? What is queering ethnicity?


Borders and Blackness: Communicating Belonging and Grief

April 14, 3:30 – 5:00 PM | Online 

Black women imagined and orchestrated #Me Too, Black Lives Matter, Bring Back Our Girls, and Say Her Name campaigns in the U.S. and globally. Recently, the importance of Black women’s experiences, interventions, and contributions to Black life and societies at large has crystalized for non-Black audiences in the U.S. and mixed audiences abroad; the ongoing and public response to deaths made increasingly visible on social media plays a significant role in the ways in which communities in the U.S. and abroad regard Black women.

In the second COM Spring colloquium, sponsored by the Department of CommunicationDr. Manoucheka Celeste will address the different ways Black women tend to Black life and death. Specifically, she situates the popularity of representations of Black suffering across media, alongside counter-narratives and communication practices by these communities, in transnational contexts. She explores how Black women respond to existing concerns in emotional and political ways in the public sphere. Using a transnational Blackness framework, Dr. Celeste articulates continuities and ruptures in identities and experiences across geographies to consider the connections between life, death, and social belonging, and what it means for Black women to represent belonging through expressions of grief.

Free | Register and More Info


Changing Global Connections: New Formations of Identity, Place and Region: Facing the New Geopolitics: China at the Poles

April 15, 4:30 – 6:00 PM | Online 

Join Anne-Marie Brady, professor of China Studies at the University of Canterbury, in conversation on how today’s changing geopolitics is creating new configurations across regions and in the field of international studies. This talk explores international relations between China and the Arctic and is sponsored by the Jackson School for International Studies, the Center for Global Studies, the Canadian Studies Center, the China Studies Program, and the East Asia Center.

Next in the series:

  • April 29, 4:30 – 6:00 PM: Indigenous Blackness in Américas: The Queer Politics of Self-Making Garifuna New York
  • May 13, 9:30 – 11:00 AM: How Emerging Technology is Changing International Security

Free | Register and More Info


American Christians and the Holy Land: Before, During and After Contemporary Pilgrimages to Israel/Palestine

April 15, 4:00 – 5:15 PM | Online 

Since the 1950s, millions of U.S. Christians have traveled to the Holy Land to visit the places where Jesus lived and died. Why do these pilgrims choose to journey halfway around the world? How do they react to what they encounter, and how do they understand the trip upon return?

Drawing on five years of ethnographic research with groups of pilgrims before, during, and after their trips, Dr. Hillary Kaell (McGill University) frames the experience as both ordinary — tied to participants’ everyday role as “ritual specialists,” or religious practitioners — and extraordinary, since they travel far away from home, often for the first time.

This talk, sponsored by the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies, will examine the kind of Christian education and personal experiences that compel individuals to take the trip, and cover a few key examples of what they find once they arrive. Taking the rare step of following pilgrims after they return home, the talk will also examine whether the trip makes an impact in Christians’ lives over a longer term.

Free | Register and More Info


E.U. Democracy Forum: Kristina Weissenbach – The Formation and Institutionalization of New Parties in EU Member States

April 15, 12:00 – 1:15 PM | Online 

Affiliate Professor for Political Science Kristina Weissenbach (Ph.D. Political Science, 2012, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany) will present the third lecture in the E.U. Democracy Forum series. Sponsored by the Center for West European Studies and E.U. Center.

Next in the series:

  • May 20, 12:00 – 1:15 PM: Phillip Ayoub – Pride amid Prejudice: The Impact of the First Pride in Sarajevo

Free | Register and More Info


Seattle Art Museum Virtual Saturday University: The Memory of the Ancients in Modern Iranian and Parsi Architecture

April 17, 10:00 – 11:30 AM | Online 

In 1822 six fire temples adorned the cityscapes of West India. By the end of the century, Parsis had augmented that number tenfold. Many of these structures were erected in what they dubbed the “Persian Style,” on floor plans described as “open.” From the 1830s to the 1930s, the Persian Revival style evolved simultaneously and codependently in two different geo-cultures: the western coast of the Indian subcontinent, with large Parsi urban populations, as in Bombay and Surat, and the major cities of Qajar and Pahlavi Iran, in particular Shiraz and Tehran. These were interpretative “copies” of “originals,” not necessarily of archeological sites but European and native fantastical travelogues as “authentic” memories and national resilience.

This lecture will be presented by Talinn Grigor, professor and chair of the Art History Program in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of California, Davis. Co-sponsored by the South Asia Center.

Free | Register and More Info


Looking for more?

Check out UWAA’s Stronger Together web page for more digital engagement opportunities.

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