The Dean’s Forum comprises a series of sessions exploring the most important topics and questions facing the Humanities at UCLA and beyond, in an open and positive discussion involving both a panel of experts with diverse perspectives and faculty attendees. Most sessions will begin with a few brief initial presentations and then proceed to conversation and debate on the issues at hand. Please come and participate.
October 16th, 2014 3:00PM-5:00PM, Royce Hall 314 Panelists: Linda Nash is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Washington and Director of the Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest. Her research addresses the production and translation of environmental knowledge and the environmental history of the body. She is the author of Inescapable Ecologies: A History of Environment, Disease, and Knowledge (University of California Press, 2006), which won the American Historical Association’s John Dunning Prize and the AHA Pacific Coast Branch Book Prize. Ursula K. Heise is a Professor of English at UCLA and also teaches in our Institute of the Environment and Sustainability. She is a 2011 Guggenheim Fellow and served...
May 28th, 2014, 4:00PM-6:00PM, Royce Hall 314 How are the humanities and new technologies evolving in relation to each other? What does “digital humanities” consist of, and who should it affect our teaching and research? Three leading experts on these topics – Alan Liu from UCSB and Johanna Drucker and Willeke Wendrich from UCLA – will offer their perspectives and lead our discussion.
May 14th, 2014, 4:00PM-6:00PM, Royce 314 What form should undergraduate education in the humanities take in the 21st century? Panelists from UCLA and beyond, with contrasting views but a passion for teaching, will consider the prospects and pitfalls in our changing methods and curricula, in a wide-ranging discussion with the audience. Panelists: Patricia Turner is Dean and Vice Provost of UCLA's Division of Undergraduate Education, and a professor in both World Arts and Cultures and African-American Studies. Her research focuses on racial dynamics as they surface in folklore and popular cultures. She is also Chair of the UC Education Abroad...
February 5th, 2014, 4:00PM-6:00PM, Royce Hall 314 What is the future of graduate education in the humanities? A controversial outside speaker, the Chair of our Graduate Council, and a graduate student leader guide a debate about the proper size, duration, focus, and employment-training of our graduate programs. Professor Lenny Cassuto (American Literature, Fordham University), author of the “Graduate Adviser” column in the Chronicle of Higher Education, and widely in demand as a lively and informative speaker, will lead the session o ff with a brief argument for shortening and broadening the humanities doctorate. Joining Professor Cassuto on the panel will be UCLA’s Professors Maite...
January 22nd, 2014, 4:00PM-6:00PM, Royce Hall 314 Professor Ian Baucom of Duke University will be giving a brief introductory talk on “Humanities Method and Humanities Ethos: Four Models of the Citizen.” He will outline Enlightenment notions of the cosmopolitan subject, later ideas based in postcolonial/subaltern studies, and others from the quite recent new universalisms emerging from neuroscience and the environmental humanities. This will be followed by about 90 minutes of discussion among the audience and a panel consisting of Ian Baucom, Françoise Lionnet (Professor of Comparative Literature and Director of African Studies, UCLA), and Saree Makdisi (Professor of English and Comparative Literature, UCLA).
Inaugural Dean's Forum: "Narratives of the Humanities" - October 31, 2014 3:00PM-5:00PM, Royce Hall 314 What are the stories we can tell about the humanities? For the past several months...
