You live near a major university and a community college. There are smart people that come here every week to talk to the general public about interesting topics. Perhaps you were not aware of this fact, or were overwhelmed by the sheer number of opportunities for possible enlightenment. If that’s the case, Smile Politely understands and is here to help. Here are several events going on in town this week. Check out one or more of them if you have time. Get your learn on, as they say, and join the cognoscenti. It’s free, you know. Plus, sometimes there’s free food, too!
If you have a community event, speaker, or film event that you’d like to see featured on Listen Up!, send the event information to joelgillespie [at] smilepolitely [dot] com by Friday the week prior to the event. Listen Up! runs on Mondays.
WHAT: “Slow Violence and the Drama Deficit of Climate Change,” Robert Nixon (Rachel Carson Professor of English, University of Wisconsin, Madison).
WHEN: Tuesday, March 9 @ 7:30 p.m.
WHERE: Levis Faculty Center, Third Floor
This lecture is part of the series “Climate Change and the Humanities.” “Drama deficit” seems like a good way to describe the climate change issue, currently. I’d be interested to hear what Prof. Nixon has to say.
WHAT: “The Rationalizing Voter: Empirical Tests of a Theory of Motivated Political Reasoning,” Professor Charles Tabor
WHEN: Wednesday, March 10 @ 12 noon
WHERE: 165 Everitt Lab
I don’t know much about this one beyond the title, but it piqued my interest for some reason.
WHAT: “Seeing the Twin Koreas Geopolitically,” Myongsob Kim (Visiting Scholar, Yonsei University, South Korea)
WHEN: Thursday, March 11 @ 12 noon
WHERE: Room 356 Armory Building, 505 East Armory, Champaign
From the event description: “Could Northeast Asia in the 21st Century be a late-20th Europe-like postmodern paradise or an early-20th Europe-like battlefield? While the answer is still uncertain, the twin Koreas, North Korea the nuke- and famine-maker and South Korea the Samsung-LG-Hyundai-maker, have become the faultline for the tectonic plates of a metastable Northeast Asia. What went wrong in North Korea and what went right in South Korea?”
WHAT: “Ugly Stories of the Peruvian Agrarian Reform,” Enrique Mayer, Professor of Anthropology. Yale University
WHEN: Thursday, March 11 @ 12 noon
WHERE: 101 International Studies Building, 910 S. Fifth Street, Champaign
I personally think agrarian reform is an awesome idea and continue to be disappointed when real life intervenes and real people screw up the idealized picture in my head. From Enrique Mayer’s web page: “Professor Mayer specializes in Andean agricultural systems and Latin American peasantries. His work has shown that regions characterized by diversity (such as mountainous environments, small islands, and “marginal” lands), not suitable for agribusiness, are exploited by peasants in strikingly similar ways. Worldwide, peasant forms of production predominate and persist in these environments. These agricultural systems are important to those concerned about world genetic resources, or about environmental conservation, and to scholars who seek an understanding of ancient and yet also very contemporary Non Western rural life-ways.”
WHAT: “Climate Change as a Security Risk: Water, Food and Health as Conflict Constellations in India,” Hans G. Bohle, Geography, Bonn University
WHEN: Friday, March 12 @ 2:30 p.m.
WHERE: 5602 Beckman Institute
“Professor Bohle’s teaching is focused on concepts in development geography, rural development in South Asia, famine and food systems, conflict research , and the political ecology of food, water and violence.”