Department of History, UC Santa Barbara

Declarations of Dependence: Labor, Personhood, and Welfare in South Africa and Beyond
2009-05-19 00:00 (America/Denver) | CA
JAMES FERGUSON is Chair of the Department of Anthropology, Stanford University
South Africa has in recent decades gone through a wrenching transformation from a labor-scarce society to a labor-surplus one. Labor scarcity through most of the 19th and 20th centuries led to forms of social solidarity and social personhood that had significant continuities with the pre-colonial past (continuities that are obscured by conventional narratives that emphasize the rise of capitalism as a complete and comprehensive break with the past). It is suggested that the South African experience reveals, in an extreme and clarifying form, a set of processes that are occurring in many other parts of the world. Better understanding such processes may help us to find our way past some of the current impasses in progressive politics. James Ferguson is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at Stanford University. Ferguson’s most recent book, Global Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order, was published by Duke University Press in 2006. He is now beginning a new research project in South Africa, exploring the emergence of new problematics of poverty and social policy under conditions of neoliberalism.
Sponsored by the IHC’s African Studies RFG, the Department of History, and the Department of Anthropology.
hm 5/15/09

Edward Teller the Communist? American Scientists and the National Security State during the Cold War (4PM in McCune Room; 6th Floor HSSB)
2009-05-20 00:00
The recent release of the FBI files on Edward Teller has revealed the bureau’s suspicion and investigation of the “father” of the American hydrogen bomb as a possible communist. Almost certainly the result of a mistaken identity, the FBI’s case on Teller, one of the most outspoken anti-communist Hungarian-American scientists, nevertheless sheds lights on the complex relationships between American scientists and the national security state during the Cold War, especially when compared with the experiences of his political rivals J. Robert Oppenheimer and members of the President’s Science Advisory Committee. This paper is co-authored by Lawrence Badash who will be present at the talk and lead the question period.

The Stones of Famagusta: The Story of a Forgotten City
2009-05-21 00:00
The Mediterranean Research Focus Group of the IHC and the Medieval Studies Program present “The Stones of Famagusta: The Story of a Forgotten City” followed by a discussion with the director, writer, and presenter Allan Langdale of UC Santa Cruz. The film and discussion will be from 4-6pm in HSSB 6020.
In the film art historian and filmmaker Dr. Allan Langdale takes you on a bicycle tour of the once famous medieval city of Famagusta, Cyprus. Once considered the world’s richest city, Famagusta is now largely forgotten by the West. Explore the wonders of the gothic churches and monasteries, the ruins of Venetian palaces, the fabulous two-mile long walls and moat, Byzantine churches, Ottoman baths, and some of Famagusta’s unique and mysterious underground churches.
For more information contact Ed English.
jwil 13.v.09

Alone, Unattended and Unexplained: American Lenses and Mexican Subjects in the Borderlands, 1930-1945
2009-05-21 00:00
This presentation discusses the ambivalent attitudes of U.S. photographers regarding Mexican/Chicano subjects in the 1930-40s Borderlands. It analyzes the ways in which meaning was constructed in the visual representations of Mexican Nationals and Mexican American subjects in the United States, while incorporating the historical context of public policies regarding the presence of worker of Mexican origin/descent in the national agricultural landscape. Focusing on photographic materials by Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, and others, most of them unpublished, the presentation unveils the complex thread of photographing Mexicans while abiding by the long standing tradition of placing them against pre-conceived backgrounds and complying with the emerging rules of modern photography documentary practices.
Juan Javier Pescador (historian & photographer) teaches Chicano History and Mexican Cultures in the United States at Michigan State University. His recent publications include “Los Heroes del Domingo: Soccer Associations and Border Spaces in the Great Lakes Mexican/Chicano Barrios” in Jorge Iber and Samuel O. Regalado (eds.), Mexican Americans and Sports (College Station: Texas A&M, 2007) and Crossing Borders with the Santo Nino de Atocha: A History of the Holy Child of Plateros (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, forthcoming). His current research project analyzes the history of photography in Mexico and the United States and the process of racialization of Mexicans in the United States, in photography and the visual arts, from the Mexican-American War to the NAFTA-era.
jwil 18.v.09

Ancient Map, Modern State: Toward a Geo-History of the Meiji Restoration
2009-05-26 00:00
The continuing career of Shinano Province as present-day Nagano Prefecture suggests that the reformers of the Meiji era (1868-1912) recruited classical geography to the cause of administrative reform. Under the guise of new toponyms, nineteenth-century oligarchs effectively reinscribed an ancient set of imperial boundaries on the landscape of modern Japan. This classicizing strategy was not altogether new; nor was it promoted solely by power-holders at the center. Dating from the era of the unification wars in the sixteenth century, the project of restoring the ritsuryo map was ultimately embraced and carried forward by local literati in the provinces themselves. This illustrated talk will explore these issues through an examination of maps and gazetteers from central Honshu. Kären Wigen is Associate Professor of History at Stanford University. A geographer by training, she brings a spatial sensibility to the Japanese past. Her research interests have ranged from economics to education, from mountains to the oceans, and from the local to the global. Her recent work centers on cartography, chorography, and regionalism in central Japan.
Sponsored by the East Asia Center, the IHC’s East Asian Cultures RFG, the IHC, and the departments of East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies, History, and Geography.
hm 5/19/09

From "State Interference to the 'Return to the Market': The Rhetoric of Economic Regulation from the Old Gilded Age to the New
2009-05-29 00:00
Professor Furner’s talk will be the final session in Spring quarter of the Seminar on Work, Labor, and Political Economy.
The public is invited to attend.
hm 5/22/09

The Shame of Survival: Working Through a Nazi Childhood
2009-06-01 00:00
Professor Ursula Mahlendorf, Professor Emerita of the Department of Germanic, Slavic and Semitic Studies and a founder of the Feminist Studies Department at UCSB, will offer a reading from her memoir published this spring about her childhood in Silesia and her early adolescent membership in the Hitler Youth. Publisher’s Weekly calls it “An eye-opening, honest and absorbing account of how evil takes root and flourishes among ordinary people.”
Sponsored by the Senior Women’s Council and the Department of Feminist Studies.
amazon.com page
hm 5/27/09

The global history of wax prints and its implications on female dress in urban South Ghana
2009-06-04 00:00
The Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies presents
“The global history of wax prints and its implications on female dress in urban South Ghana”
Silvia Ruschak
Global History Working Group
University of Vienna
WHEN: Thursday, June 4, 2009 — 12:00
WHERE: Orfalea Center seminar Room, 1005 Robertson Gym
This presentation will focus on the history of textiles – specifically, the
global history of industrially printed fabrics for the Ghanaian market
called wax prints. The usually colourful and manifold fabrics are nowadays
commonly known as traditional Ghanaian fabrics. However, their history is
rather young and the result of complex colonial, economic and cultural
interactions.
In the mid 19th century Dutch factory owners and merchants tried to conquer
the Indonesian batik market with industrially printed imitations of hand
made Javanese batik. They however were not successful in satisfying the
local market for various reasons. Entangled economic and colonial
interactions brought the fabrics to the former Gold Coast – today’s Ghana –
where they quickly got very popular. Especially since Ghana’s independence
from Britain in 1957 the fabrics have been carrying national as well as
gendered significances.
After giving a quick overview of the global history of wax prints in the
19th century and the adaptation of designs to the Ghanaian context I am
going to analyse their importance in contemporary urban South Ghana. How
are wax prints incorporated into everyday dressing? Who wears clothes made
of wax prints and when? What is the gender of wax prints? How do they
communicate different constructions of social status, sexuality and
nationality? Selected examples from oral history material and public media
serve as starting point for analysing these questions. They are
additionally read against mainly sociological and anthropological theories
of dressing and fashion. The aim of the presentation is to show how fabrics
and dressing can be used as rich historic sources to elaborate
socio-economic, cultural and gender related research questions.
Silvia Ruschak
Silvia Ruschak is a contemporary historian with a special focus on global
gender and fashion history. She is working at the Department of
Contemporary History at the University of Vienna where she also teaches and
is part of the Global History Work Group. She has recently submitted her
PhD with the title: Fabrics that create global history. Stations in the
cultural biography of wax prints in urban South Ghana for which she has
gathered archival material as well as oral sources in Ghana, Great Britain
and the Netherlands. During her stay at the Orfalea Center, Silvia Ruschak
is going to research into the question in how far fabrics produced in or
for West Africa are relevant for identity constructions of African
Americans. Thus she wants to follow the global history of the Ghanaian wax
prints within the US.
hm 5/28/09

Department BBQ
2009-06-05 00:00
It’s that time again! The end of the year history department BBQ is Friday, June 5, from 4-6 pm at Stow Grove Park, 580 La Patera Lane,
Goleta. We will provide hamburgers, hot dogs, veggie burgers, buns, and
non-alcoholic beverages. There is a sign-up sheet on the mail room
door. It would be great if you could bring a bottle of wine and sign up
to bring an appetizer, side dish, or dessert (and accompanying serving
utensils). There will also be coolers with ice to chill the beverages.
Please RSVP by Monday, June 1, so we can get an accurate headcount for
food purchase. Partners, family members, children and anyone else all
welcome.
Colleen’s e-mail for RSVP: colleen_ho@umail.ucsb.edu
Tradition has it that we have a US vs. world historian softball game (and
since I’ve been here, world has dominated?at least, that’s how I remember
it). It doesn’t matter how we divide up teams, I just think it would be
great to play a game. Also let me know if you have any bats, balls,
gloves, helmets, etc.
hm 5/26/09

The Curious Encounter of Telstar and STARFISH PRIME, July 1962
2009-06-05 00:00
This talk is based on Schwoch’s book Global TV: New Media and The Cold War which examines the relationship of global television, diplomacy, and new electronic communications media. Beginning with the Allied occupation of Germany in 1946 and ending with the 1969 Apollo moon landing, this book explores major developments in global media, including the postwar absorption of the International Telecommunications Union into the United Nations and its impact on both television and international policy; the rise of psychological warfare and its relations to new electronic media of the 1950s; and the role of the Ford Foundation in shaping global communication research concepts.
James Schwoch conducts research and teaching in global media, media history, global security, international studies, ICT policy, and research methodologies. He has published five books, most recently Global TV: New Media and the Cold War, 1946-69 and is currently co-editing with Lisa Parks (UC-Santa Barbara) an anthology about satellites called Down To Earth for Rutgers University Press.
His research has been supported by, among others, the Fulbright Commission (Finland 2005, Germany 1997), the Ford Foundation
(1993-2000), the National Science Foundation (1998-2002), and the National Endowment for the Humanities (1985, 1986). During 1997-98, Schwoch was the Leonard Marks Resident Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC; he has held visiting faculty appointments in Finland on three occasions (Tampere 1994, Jyvaskyla 1996, Helsinki 2005.)
Schwoch is currently in residence at the new Northwestern campus in Doha, Qatar where he is building the curriculum and developing research projects in the broad area of global media. He continues to work with graduate students and advise dissertations on the Evanston campus during his Qatar residency.
hm 6/1/09, 6/2

A Tale of Two Authors
2009-06-11 00:00
The public is invited to participate in a dialogue between Maria Segal, survivor of the Holocaust from the Warsaw Ghetto, and Dr. Ursula Mahlendorf, UCSB Professor Emerita and former member of Hitler Youth in Germany.
Both authors are active participants in the Portraits of Survival program.
Their recently published memoirs bring us two very different experiences of childhood during World War II.
Discussion/Q & A will follow.
Moderated by Professor Harold Marcuse, UCSB Professor of Modern German History
RSVP: 805-957-1115, E-mail: info@sbjf.org
The memoirs are:
Maria Segal, Maria’s Story: Childhood Memories of the Holocaust (Boehmgroup, 2009, 108 pages)(amazon.com with preview), and
Dr. Ursula Mahlendorf, The Shame of Survival: Working Through a Nazi Childhood (U. Penn. Press, 2009, 344 pages) (amazon.com)
Both authors are active participants in the Santa Barbara Holocaust memory program Portraits of Survival. Their recently published memoirs bring us two very different experiences of childhood during World War II.
Maria Segal was a child when she survived in the Warsaw Ghetto. She was born in Okuniew, Poland, a small town near Warsaw. Maria has three children, six grandchildren, and now lives in Santa Barbara, CA. She volunteers at the Santa Barbara Jewish Federation as a docent for the Portraits of Survival Exhibit and is one of the thirty-seven profiles of Santa Barbara Holocaust survivors in the permanent exhibit. She speaks about her experiences during and after the Holocaust to groups of adults and children, ranging from high school students to law enforcement agencies.
From Publishers Weekly about The Shame of Survival
A former German and women’s studies professor at UC Santa Barbara, Mahlendorf grew up in a small town in Silesia and was a squad leader in the Hitler Youth who embraced Hitler as a father substitute after the death of her own father, a former SS member, in 1935 and also in rebellion against her mother who disapproved of the Nazis. Her escape from a group suicide pact in the wake of Hitler’s suicide was a first step in her denazification and eventual acceptance of her culpability in the Holocaust, an open-ended process that gained a feminist twist as she realized how politics were personal under Nazism. An eye-opening, honest and absorbing account of how evil takes root and flourishes among ordinary people. Illus. (Mar. 28)
hm 5/11/09, 6/2/09

How the Irish Made Serra a Saint and Saved the California Missions
2009-06-11 00:00
Fr. Jack Clark Robinson, O.F.M., a Ph.D. candidate in the History Department, will speak on “How the Irish Made Serra a Saint and Saved the California Missions!” on Thursday, June 11 at the Santa Barbara Mission. Events will start at 5:30 p.m. with a tour of the archive library, followed by the talk at 6:30 p.m. and a social “with plentiful hors d’oeuvres and wine” at 7:30 p.m.
Fr. Jack’s talk is sponsored by the American Irish Historical Society. The cost is $20. Checks for reservations can be sent to American Irish Historical Society, 801 Riven Rock Road, Santa Barbara, CA 93108, or you can phone for reservations at (805) 965-2022.
jwil 29.v.09

Reception for Graduating Seniors
2009-06-14 00:00
The History department will host a reception for graduating seniors and their families on Sunday, June 14, from 11 a.m. to noon in the History Conference Room, HSSB 4020. The commencement ceremony will begin at 1 p.m. on the Faculty Club Green.
Of the 187 students receiving degrees this year, 40 completed their coursework at the end of Fall and Winter quarters and another 39 will finish after taking their last courses this Summer.
The total also includes students graduating with degrees in History of Public Policy and Medieval Studies.
Leading this year’s class are 10 students who received Distinction in the Major for completing the Senior Honors seminar. They are Katyn Evenson, Allison Fischer, Michael Hale, Mathew Hamula, Risa Katzen, Christopher Kindell, Damien Mimnaugh, Adrienne Minor, Craig Nelson and Celine Purcell.
Six History majors were among 119 students campuswide to be selected for Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious academic honor society. They are Alexandra Fish, Michael Hale, Mathew Hamula, Ethan Hartsell, Avian Johnson and Damien Mimnaugh.
hm 5/26/09, 6/4/09

Summer Session A Instruction Begins
2009-06-22 00:00
UCSB’s Summer Session A classes begin today.
hm 6/19/09

Launch of New Public History Website
2009-06-25 00:00
All students, faculty and members of the public at large with an interest in UCSB’s public history program, please stop by HSSB 4020 to see Julia Brock & Mira Foster’s presentation of the PHS website & join in general end-of-academic year, start-of-summer conviviality. We have one more new Doctor — Bonnie Harris — to toast, too.
hm 6/25/09

Summer Session A Instruction Ends
2009-07-31 00:00
Click the link below for the calendar for all Summer sessions.
hm 6/24/09

Summer Session B Instruction Begins
2009-08-03 00:00
Click the link below for a schedule of all Summer sessions.
hm 6/24/09

Summer Session B Instruction Ends
2009-09-11 00:00
Click the link below for the full schedule of all Summer sessions.
hm 6/24/09

Exhibition: Ancient China
2009-09-19 00:00
Noble Tombs at Mawangdui: Art and Life in the Changsha Kingdom, China (3rd Century BCE – 1st Century CE)
More than 2,000 years ago, a Chinese marquis and his family began their plans for the afterlife with three lavish tombs in Hunan Province which were excavated in the 1970s. For the first time in the U.S., their extraordinary existence will come to life in this exhibition. Nearly 70 treasures including lacquer ware, wood carvings, jade ornaments, bronze sculptures, seals, and silk costumes and textiles from the Hunan Provincial Museum will be on view at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art after an exhibition at the China Institute in New York City earlier this year.
The excavation at Mawangdui in southeastern China is considered one of the major archaeological discoveries of the 20th century. Containing the remains and possessions of the Marquis of Dai and his wife and son, the tombs were found between 1972 and 1974 in the archaeological site of Mawangdui, which is located in a suburb of the modern city of Changsha, Hunan Province. More than 3,000 objects from the Western Han dynasty (206 BCE to 25 CE) were found in extraordinary condition representing the highest levels of workmanship. The tomb that housed the wares most represented in the exhibition, also held the remarkably well-preserved body of the noblewoman of the family, known affectionately as “Lady Dai”. “People during the Han dynasty regarded death as birth and longed for immortality,” notes Willow Hai Chang, Director, China Institute Gallery. “To prepare for the afterlife, they constructed their tombs to be eternal residences. As a result of this landmark excavation, we now have a rare window into the fascinating Han civilization through these remarkable objects of the highest artistry.”
The extraordinary significance of this assemblage is not only apparent in the variety and quality of objects, but also the time period and place from whence these artifacts originated. The Changsha Kingdom was heir to the Chu culture in southeastern China. It played a significant role in the cultural formation of the Han dynasty (202 BCE–220 CE), a defining period in Chinese history that shaped the artistic, intellectual, political, religious, and social foundations of Chinese civilization. The objects preserved in the Mawangdui tombs give a visual dimension to early Han dynasty beliefs, design, and technology, while the body of material culture challenges us to re-evaluate our current understanding of early China.
The above text is excerpted from the full exhibition description.
For more information visit the Santa Barbara Museum of Art web site, or call the Museum at 805.963.4364.
jwil 28.ix.2009, hm 10/3/09

TA Training
2009-09-21 00:00
WHAT & WHEN:New and returning 2009-2010 History TAs must attend the TA Initial
Training Day on Monday, September 21, from 9 am to 3 pm, as part of
the Department’s year-long TA Training Program.
WHERE:
TA Initial Training will take place on campus in the Humanities and
Social Sciences Building (HSSB), room 4020.Â If needed, see this
webpage for directions to the HSSB.
WHO:
Graduate students who have never TA’d in the History Department,
despite prior TA experience in other departments, must attend the full
day of History TA Initial Training (9 am to 3 pm).Â Experienced
History TAs will attend only the afternoon session (noon lunch to 3
pm; see below for lunch info). Graduate students TAing in other
departments on campus are welcome to attend the History TA Initial
Training Day, as are students on the alternate TA list.
FIRST TA 500 MEETINGS:
Please note that professors often hold their first 500 meetings with
new and experienced Fall TAs after 3 pm when the Initial Training Day
concludes. Professors that choose to do so will contact you
separately; please plan accordingly.Â
LUNCH ON INITIAL TRAINING DAY:
The unifying theme for this year’s History TA Training Program is
accessibility: accessibility to community networks, accessibility to
teaching resources, and accessibility to campus resources.Â In order
to help build our community networks this year, we hope to have
experienced History TAs contribute to a pot-luck lunch for all the
History TAs to share at noon during the Initial Training Day.
Experienced TAs, please contact either Colleen Ho
(colleen_ho@umail.ucsb.edu) or Roger Eardley-Pryor
(pryorrw@umail.ucsb.edu) with a dish you are able to contribute to
lunch.
New History TAs: we look forward to seeing you at 9 am on Monday,
September 21. For those new graduate students who have never TA’d at
UCSB in any department, please note that you must also attend the
Campus-wide TA Orientation in Campbell Hall on Tuesday, September 22,
from 9 am to 1 pm.
Experienced History TAs: we hope to hear from you before then to
learn what you can contribute to the pot-luck lunch at noon that day,
prior to the afternoon session.
If you have questions regarding the History Department TA Initial
Training Day or the year-long TA Training Program, please contact
either Colleen or Roger.
Enjoy the remainder of your summer and see you soon!
Your Lead History TAs 2009-2010,
Colleen Ho
and
Roger Eardley-Pryor
hm 8/20/09

Fall Classes Start
2009-09-24 00:00
For the full Fall 2009 calendar, go to:Fall 2009 calendar.
For information on the First Day of Class, go to the Information announcement on the homepage under NEWS, or directly via this link:
Information regarding September 24.
For information on Waiting lists for full classes, go to the WAITING LIST POLICY announcement on the homepage under NEWS, or directly via this link:
Waiting List Policy.
hm 8/20/09, 8/24, 8/27, 9/23, 10/4

Mawangdui and Its Roaming in the Celestial Realm: Immortality and the Imagination in Han Dynasty China
2009-10-04 00:00
Among the motifs decorating Han dynasty mortuary objects, including those found in the tomb of the noblewoman at Mawangdui, are clouds and creatures representing an “other world” through which the soul journeys after death.
These motifs are especially prevalent in tombs of the first half of the Han dynasty and are clearly relatable to the growth of what has been labeled the immortality cult–a melding of longstanding religious notions of what happens after death with a popular fascination with the idea of attaining everlasting life. Expansion of the Han empire during this time further fueled the imagination of what lay beyond. This lecture will survey and contextualize many of the exquisite objects found in Western Han tombs, including the famous painted banner and coffins of Mawangdui, to demonstrate the creative burst of artistic imagination that accompanied the speculative flights of Han dynasty belief.
Lecturer Peter Sturman is Professor of Chinese Painting and Calligraphy in the Department of the History of Art and Architecture at UCSB.
This event description is excerpted from the web page of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s special exhibition web page on The Noble Tombs at Mawandui. For more information visit the Santa Barbara Museum of Art web site, or call the Museum at 805.963.4364.
jwil 29.ix.2009

Wal-Mart and the Future of US Business
2009-10-06 00:00
The “Big Box” Phenomenon: Wal-Mart and the Future of American Business
UCSB History Associates event, $10 members, $12 non-members.
See the UCSB Daily Nexus, Wednesday, October 7, 2009:
Lichtenstein Lectures on Retail Giant
According to UCSB labor historian Nelson Lichtenstein, judgment day may be fast approaching for revolutionary retail giant Wal-Mart.
hm 9/11/09, 10/7

Paradise Now film screening
2009-10-07 00:00
A 2006 Golden Globe winner for best foreign language film, Paradise Now intensely and powerfully tells the story of two lifelong friends that are tapped by an unidentified Palestinian resistance organization to carry out a suicide bombing together in Tel Aviv. Hany Abu-Assad, 91 min., Arabic and English, 2005, Palestine.
In the MultiCultural Center’s Cup of Culture series.
hm 10/2/09

Archaeology in Sri Lanka: Challenges and Prospects for the Future
2009-10-07 00:00
The island of Sri Lanka has been known by many names throughout its history: Ratnadipa, or the “land of gems” in Buddhist Sanskrit literature, Taprobane among Greeks and Romans, Serendib to the Arabs, and Ceylon under the British Empire. This small island, only 25,000 square miles in size, lies off the southern tip of India. Early Iron Age culture was introduced to the island, presumably from South India, at the beginning of the First Millennium B.C., but few sites of this period are known, except for cemeteries with megalithic graves. Archaeological work in Sri Lanka has concentrated instead on large monastic settlements which were established in the Early Historic Period, ca. 300 B.C. – 300 A.D. and mark the spread of Buddhist influence over the island. Little attention has been paid to secular sites, nor have the lower levels of most monastic sites been probed to determine the nature of earlier occupation. Also neglected have been the remains of Hindu, Islamic and Christian sites and structures. The challenge that lies ahead for the next generation of Sri Lankan archaeologists is the investigation of sites and regions that will provide a broader and more balanced picture of the island’s past.
Nancy Wilkie has a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota where she studied classics and prehistoric Greek archaeology. At Carleton College she is the William H. Laird Professor of Classics, Anthropology and the Liberal Arts; her areas of specialization are prehistoric Greece, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, and cultural property issues. Her publications include “Governmental Agencies and the Protection of Cultural Property in Times of War” in Lawrence Rothfield (ed.), Antiquities Under Siege. Cultural Heritage Protection After the Iraq War (2008). She is past president of the Archaeological Institute of America, and the 2009/2010 Charles Eliot Norton Lecturer for the AIA.
This lecture is sponsored by the Santa Barbara Society of the Archaeological Institute of America.
For more information please call (805) 893-3556.
jwil 08.ix.2009

Campuswide Teach-In on UC Budget Crisis
2009-10-14 00:00
This teach-in explores the origins and character of the current crisis at the University of California. The program is as follows; for more information see the Keep California’s Promise website.
2:30 p.m. Welcome from the Campbell Hall Steps
Reginald Archer, President, Graduate Student Association, UCSB
Jessie Bernal, Student Member of UC Regents
Amanda Wallner, Campus Democrats, UCSB
3:05 p.m. Student Voices
Erica Stenz, Exercise and Sports Studies Campaign
Nayra Pacheco, IDEAS (Improving Dreams, Equality, Access, & Success)
Joel Mardujano, Associated Students Legislative Council Representative
3:25 p.m. Meaning of the Teach-In
Dean David Marshall, UCSB
Nelson Lichtenstein, Professor of History, UCSB: Clark Kerr’s forgotten legacy
3:40 p.m. The Crisis at the University of California
Chair: Michael Brown, UCSB, Gevirtz School of Education (invited)
Stan Glantz, Professor of Medicine, UC San Francisco, past chair of UC Committee on Planning and Budget: UC’s budget blunders
Robert Samuels, President, UC-American Federation of Teachers: Why the furloughs are unnecessary
Christine Petit, President, UAW Local 2865, (The union for TAs, readers and tutors): The teaching experience under stress
Robert Meister, Professor of Political Science, UC Santa Cruz, President, UC Faculty Associations: What is faculty governance?
5:30 p.m. California Politics: What Reforms Do We Need?
Chair: Aranye Fradenburg, Professor of English, UCSB
Lenny Goldberg, California Tax Reform Association 25
Ruth Gilmore, Professor of Ethnicity and Geography, University of Southern California: The Budget-draining prison complex
Kent Wong, Director, UCLA Labor Center: A “Dream Act” for Undocumented students
Sharde Davis, UCSB: Stop rising fees!
7:00 p.m. Breakout Workshops and Panels at Various Locations on Campus.
A light dinner will be available outside of Campbell. See program for location of workshops and panels in nearby classroom buildings
8:30 p.m. Where Do We Go From Here?
Chair: Hannah Beth Jackson, former South Coast Assemblywoman
Janelle Mungo, Human Rights Coalition, UCSB: What students can do.
Loni Hancock, Chair, Elections, Reapportionment, and Constitutional Amendments Committee, California State Senate: Ending the Sacramento deadlock
George Lakoff, Professor of Linguistics, UC Berkeley: Framing the issues
Open Mike
———————————
The Sept. 14 UC Budget Crisis Teach-In at UC Berkeley is available on Youtube: See this playlist of 5 presentions (they are each 12-19 mins. long).
hm 8/31/09, 9/22, 10/5, 10/8, 10/9

Rethinking Early China in Light of the Mawangdui Finds
2009-10-18 00:00
Many of the archaeological discoveries at Mawangdui have great artistic merit and aesthetic appeal. Beyond these qualities, however, the Mawangdui finds suggest that certain of our assumptions about early China, until now based on Confucian canonical texts, need serious reconsideration. As such the archaeological finds at Mawangdui are a powerful reminder of the narrowness of the elite textual tradition and the important place that should be given to evidence of material culture in our reconstructions of ancient civilizations. This talk examines the ways that the Mawangdui finds challenge us to rethink our understanding of early China.
Lecturer Ron Egan is Professor of Chinese Literature and Aesthetics in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies at UCSB.
This event description is excerpted from the web page of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s special exhibition web page on The Noble Tombs at Mawandui. For more information visit the Santa Barbara Museum of Art web site, or call the Museum at 805.963.4364.
jwil 29.ix.2009

The California Missions: History, Art, and Preservation
2009-10-18 00:00
Julia Costello will be talking about her newly published book, The California Missions, History, Art, and Preservation (Edna E. Kimbro and Julia G. Costello with Tevvy Ball), as the Norman Neuerburg Memorial Lecture on Sunday October 18 at 2:00 pm in the Santa Barbara Mission Archive-Library conference room.
The lecture is free.
Copies of the book will be available for purchase and refreshments will be served. For more information, see the web page for the book.
Please feel free to call Monica Orozco at 682-4713 ext. 152 or email her at
director@sbmal.org if you have any questions.
hm 10/12/09

The Medicalization of the Maya: Ethnicity, Culture and Morality in Postrevolutionary Yucatan
2009-10-19 00:00
This presentation will examine how the medical establishment in Mérida and medical student brigades from the Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán interpreted the health conditions of rural Maya communities and prescribed solutions to the “Indian problem” in the 1930s and 1940s. In general, physicians identified Maya customs as the primary cause for the high incidence of endemic disease in rural Yucatán and suggested the modernization of Maya households through scientific domesticity and the moral reformation of the Maya family unit as the way to achieve rural development in the region. However, medical students trained in the postrevolutionary era simultaneously introduced social explanations for Maya degeneration that challenged the dominant cultural and ethnic frameworks of medical thought about indigenous health. Consequently, as Maya customs and mores became relevant subjects of medical inquiry among “revolutionary” doctors, medical students paved the way towards the rise of a social medicine that more directly heeded the call by President Lazáro Cardenas for the social uplift of campesinos.
This talk is co-sponsored by the Badash Speakers’ Series Fund
hm 10/4/09, 10/15

Too Many Temples: Interpreting the Evidence at Omrit in Northern Israel
2009-10-19 00:00
Daniel Showalter is co-director of the Omrit Excavations project.
This event is sponsored by the Ancient Borderlands Research Focus Group.
jwil 04.x.2009
