Past Events

Temporal Shifts is a daylong symposium discussing questions of temporality in time-based art forms across China and Taiwan.

Stan Lai will be discussing his 1992 award-winning film Peach Blossom Land, which was chosen to represent Taiwan at the 1993 Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Film category.

Taiwanese playwright, Stan Lai will discuss the cultural landscape of contemporary China and Taiwan, and the economic and political forces that shape it, with Professor Wen-hsin Yeh (History).

Recent civil disturbances and political protests, from China and the Middle East to New York as well as university campuses throughout America, have been accompanied by a growing body of video and photography. Activists and observers can now capture events with inexpensive digital devices and cellphones and distribute the footage through social media sites such as YouTube, Vimeo, Ustream, and Facebook. How have these changes affected public perceptions and the way officials and police handle such events? What new standards are necessary for the use of video as legal evidence?

The Course Threads Symposium is a capstone forum for students who have completed all requirements of the Course Threads Program. Students will present on the topics they studied within their thread, discussing the ways in which interdisciplinary course work informed their knowledge of the topic.

Berkeley faculty discuss their experience with digital humanities. Speakers include Ronelle Alexander (Slavic Languages and Literatures), Laurie Pearce (Near Eastern Studies), Ronald Hendel (Near Eastern Studies), and Scott Saul (English). Followed by a poster session featuring digital humanities projects on campus.

Though Martin Scorsese has only a handful of documentary credits to his name, in this joint project with acclaimed author and social critic Fran Lebowitz, he demonstrates keen judgment in letting his subject steal the show. Confined for most of the film to the amber lit bar at New York’s Waverly Inn, Lebowitz takes viewers on a hilarious romp through a range of topics, holding forth on a variety of issues with her celebrated sardonic wit and sarcasm.

Wendell Berry is a conservationist, farmer, essayist, novelist and poet. He is the author of over forty books including The Unsettling of America: Culture & Agriculture, and the well-known “Port William" series. The master of many genres, Berry’s focus on farming, community, and agricultural and ecological thinking has remained a constant throughout his work.

Avenali Chair in the Humanities Wendell Berry in discussion with UC Berkeley faculty panelists Michael Pollan (Graduate School of Journalism), Robert Hass (English), Miguel Altieri (Environmental Science, Policy and Management), and Anne-Lise Francois (English and Comparative Literature).

The Berkeley Human Rights Seminar invites distinguished scholars across disciplines to present their recent research on human rights. This seminar features Benjamin Nathans (University of Pennsylvania), discussing "Civil Rights under Soviet Socialism: Revisiting the 1966 Sinyavsky/Daniel Trial."