CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Fears about monsters and artificial life, the struggles of China’s rural-urban migrants, and what we can trust and not trust about our memories will all be among the topics early this fall in lectures sponsored by the Center for Advanced Study at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Other lecture topics will include female sexuality, stereotypes of Jews in the movies, the future of Russian-U.S. relations and family/state relations in the Middle East and South Asia.
The lecture on memory is part of a yearlong “Memory Project” sponsored by CAS. The other lectures are part of the center’s MillerComm series, begun in 1973 and supported with funds from the George A. Miller Endowment and several co-sponsoring campus units. The MillerComm lectures provide a forum for discourse on topics spanning the university’s many disciplines.
All CAS talks are free and open to the public.
The first lecture of the fall semester will come on Aug. 31, with “Stereotypes of Jews in Twentieth Century Cinema,” presented by Omer Bartov, a professor of history and German studies at Brown University, as well as a George A. Miller Endowment Visiting Professor at Illinois. Through the use of still images, Bartov will discuss the many ways that Jews have been represented on the screen: as perpetrators, victims, heroes and even Nazi-like, the latter mainly in Israeli films. His talk begins at 7:30 p.m. on the third floor of the Levis Faculty Center, 919 W. Illinois St., Urbana.
Subsequent lectures through mid-October:
• Sept. 8, “What’s the Matter With Memory,” by Elizabeth Loftus, Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Social Behavior at the University of California, Irvine.
Loftus, the author of books on eyewitness testimony and repressed memory, will discuss studies showing the power of imagination and suggestion to make people believe they have had experiences that they didn’t have. Her lecture begins at 4 p.m. in the Knight Auditorium at the Spurlock Museum, 600 S. Gregory St., Urbana.
• Sept. 9, “Kinsey and the Future of Female Sexuality,” by Elizabeth Grosz, a professor of women’s and gender studies at Rutgers University. Grosz will explore the research on female sexuality by Alfred C. Kinsey and relate it to developing understandings about the relations between sexuality, power and knowledge. Her talk begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Knight Auditorium at the Spurlock Museum.
• Sept. 21, “China’s Rural-Urban Migrants: Equal Opportunities?” by Wu Qing, a professor emerita at Beijing Foreign Studies University, People’s Deputy to the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress, and a George A. Miller Visiting Professor at Illinois. Qing will talk about her efforts to see that the millions of children who have migrated to China’s cities have opportunities for schooling, especially in light of laws against migration that still limit those opportunities. Her lecture begins at 4 p.m. on the third floor of the Levis Faculty Center.
• Sept. 23, “Russian-U.S. Relations in the Coming Decade,” by Susan Eisenhower, chairman and senior fellow at The Eisenhower Institute in Washington, D.C. Eisenhower, an expert in Russian studies, will talk about how the relationship between the two countries is being transformed around new areas of agreement and conflict. Her talk begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Knight Auditorium at the Spurlock Museum.
• Sept. 28, “The Uncanny, the Queer and the Creepy: Fictions of Artificial Life,” by Ross Chambers, a professor of French at the University of Michigan and a George A. Miller Endowment Visiting Professor at Illinois. Chambers will discuss how the “fictions of artificial life” connect with concerns about cloning, genetic modifications, monsters, vivisected animals and the like. His lecture begins at 7:30 p.m. on the third floor of the Levis Faculty Center.
• Oct. 7, “Family, Gender and State in the Middle East and South Asia,” by Suad Joseph, a professor of anthropology at the University of California, Davis.
Joseph will discuss the state of relations between the family and the state in this part of the world, looking in particular at the active women’s movements there. Her talk begins at 7:30 p.m. on the third floor of the Levis Faculty Center.
For additional information, or to confirm scheduling details prior to a lecture, check the MillerComm page on the CAS Web site.
Details on CAS lectures scheduled for later this fall will appear in a forthcoming news release.
