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upcoming events
Spring 2009 events Friday, May 15th, 10:30AM - 5PM Part of the events inaugurating Olafur Eliasson's new permanent outdoor installation, the Parliament of Reality Music and Torture Conference Recent reports from journalists and human rights advocates have drawn attention to the use of music as a technique of interrogation and punishment by U.S. military forces and intelligence agencies. While music has traditionally been associated with pleasure, beauty, and enjoyment, these reports call on us to rethink many received ideas about both music and the infliction of pain. Despite widespread condemnation of these practices, many fundamental question about the relationship between music and torture remain unasked and unaswered. This conference gathers scholars of music, art history, and philosophy, as well as leading human rights organizations and journalists to investigate what links music to torture. Beyond the necessary condemnations, participants in the conference will develop a vocabulary for appreciating the entanglement of noise, pain, violence, cruelty, questionnning, and power. Participants, in alphabetical order, are: Suzanne Cusick, Department of Music, NYU http://www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/music/Cusick.html Mark Danner, Professor of Journalism at UC Berkeley and James Clarke Chace Professor at Bard College http://www.markdanner.com Chloe Davies, Reprieve and ZeroDB http://www.zerodb.org/ John Hamilton, Department of Comparative Literature and German, NYU http://www.nyu.edu/fas/dept/complit/faculty/index.html#Hamilton Branden Joseph, Department of Art History and Archaeology, Columbia http://columbiauniversity.org/cu/arthistory/html/dept_faculty_joseph.html Thomas Levin, Department of German, Princeton http://www.princeton.edu/german/people/display_person.xml?netid=tylevin&display=All David Peisner, staff writer SPIN magazine http://djpeisner.com/articles.html Detailed Music and Torture conference program here Parliament of Reality inauguration & conference details PDF of inaugural weekend program here Press: Group seeks support to ban use of music as torture article (Reuters May 19) ________________________________________ TUESDAY, APRIL 28 at 6:00pm in OLIN 102 The Guilt of Being Still Alive: Death as a Form of Muslim Universality a lecture by intellectual historian FAISAL DEVJI Author of acclaimed books Landscapes of the Jihad (2005) and The Terrorist in Search of Humanity: Militant Islam and Global Politics (2008) and Assistant Professor of Humanitites at the New School, Dr. Devji is an intellectual historian specializing in studies of Islam, globalization, violence and ethics (faculty profile) Further readings: The ideas interview: Faisal Devji (Guardian UK 10.17.2005) Faisal Devji's "Landscapes of the Jihad" ________________________________________ MONDAY, APRIL 20 at 6pm in Olin 102 Counter Geographies in the Sahara a talk by artist and theorist URSULA BEIMANN Looking at her video essays Europlex 2003 and Sahara Chronicle 2007, the artist's lecture addresses central questions of clandestine mobility today and the politics of containment which attempt to control it. The increased movement of people in the post-1991 era and the management of these people through border mechanisms have become two interconnected and very explicit aspects of globalization processes. Diverting the attention from the present fascination with power geographies and repressive border regimes, her video investigations explore the counter-geographies constituted by undercover operating systems, innovative practices of resistance and migratory self-determination. Entering clandestine, off-track and virtual spaces, Ursula Biemann's art practice visualizes a counter-geography and suggests ways in which artists may inscribe themselves in these symbolic and material spaces. ********** Ursula Biemann is an artist, theorist and curator who has in recent years produced a body of work on migration, mobility, technology and gender. In a series of internationally exhibited video projects, as well as in several books ("Been There and Back to Nowhere"(2000), "Geography and the Politics of Mobility"(2003), "Stuff It - The Video Essay in the Digital Age" (2003) she has focused on migrant labour from smuggling on the Spanish-Moroccan border to global migrant sex workers. She made space and mobility her prime category of analysis in the curatorial project "Geography and the Politics of Mobility" (2003) in Vienna, the recent art research projects "The Black Sea Files" on the Caspian oil politics (2005) in Berlin, or "The Maghreb Connection" on Mediterranean mobility, Townhouse Gallery Cairo/CAC Geneva (2006-07). Biemann researches at the Institute for Theory of Art and Design Zurich, lectures at the CCC program of esba Geneva, and teaches seminars and workshops internationally. Ursula Biemann's Gender and Geography Site ________________________________________
THURSDAY, APRIL 16 at 6pm in Olin 203 Investigating Violations of International Humanitarian Law: Gaza 2009 a talk by senior military analyst, Human Rights Watch Emergencies Division MARC GARLASCO Garlasco served for seven years as a senior analyst in The Pentagon where he was Chief of High Value Targeting during the Iraq War in 2003. In his current role as a senior military analyst for Human Rights Watch, he works in conflict zones where he assesses compliance with the Laws of Armed Conflict, focusing on weapons and military force. He reports on violations during the fighting in an attempt to influence warring parties and stop abuses and has worked in Afghanistan, Georgia, Lebanon, Iraq, and most recently in Gaza. Gaza Case Study: Weapons Use (BBC, Feb. 23, 2009) Guardian UK article on the use of White Phosporus in Gaza (Jan. 17, 2009) Fresh Air interview (NPR April 8, 2008) ________________________________________
TUESDAY, APRIL 14 at 6:30pm in Weis Theater The Eighth Day an evening with architect and artist TONY CHAKAR "The Eighth Day" is an ongoing investigation, currently taking the form of a lecture-performance series, that began in the aftermath of the Israeli attacks on Lebanon in July 2006, however not directly related to these attacks. During and after the Israeli military operation, images from Lebanon's recent past (the civil wars of 1975-1990) inundated public realms (space and psyche) as well as discourse – becoming, at times, very difficult to endure –, proving that the Lebanese wars (regarded as Catastrophic) are still cast in the unspoken.
********** Tony Chakar, is an architect, born in Beirut in 1968. his works include: A Retroactive Monument for a Chimerical City: Ashkal Alwan, Beirut (1999); All That is Solid Melts Into Air: Ashkal Alwan, Beirut (2000); Four Cotton Underwear for Tony: Ashkal Alwan, TownHouse Gallery, Cairo, also shown in Barcelona (Tapies Foundation) and Rotterdam (Witte de With) as part of Contemporary Arab Representations, a project curated by Catherine David (2001-02); Rouwaysset, a Modern Vernacular (With Naji Assi): Contemporary Arab Representations, the Sharjah Biennial and Sao Paolo, S.A.(2001-03); Beirut, the Impossible Portrait: The Venice Biennial (2003); The Eyeless Map: Ashkal Alwan, Beirut (2003); We Can Make Rain But No One Came To Ask (with Walid Raad), Frankfurt (2003); My Neck is Thinner than a Hair, a lecture/performance with the Atlas Group (Walid Raad and Bilal Khbeiz), shown in Beirut, Brussels, Paris, Berlin, London, Basel and Singapore (2004). He also contributes to Al Mulhaq (Annahar’s cultural supplement) and other European art magazines, and teaches History of Art and History of Architecture at the Académie Libanaise des Beaux arts (ALBA), Beirut. ________________________________________ MONDAY, APRIL 6 at 6:00pm in Weis Theater The Arabic Studies Program at Bard proudly presents: Extending America's Hand to Muslims a lecture by Dr. ANOUAR MAJID In his inaugural address, President Barack Obama, addressing Muslims promised to "extend a hand" if Muslims are "willing to unclench [their] fist." In this talk, Anouar Majid will make an attempt to chart out a path of genuine and constructive dialogue, one that takes into account the pitfalls of history, the delusions of power, and the shortcomings of politics as usual. ********** Anouar Majid is founding director of the Center for Global Humanities and Professor of English at the University in New England in Maine. He is the author several critically acclaimed books on Islam in the long modern period (after 1492), or what he calls the "post-Andalusian" age. His work has been profiled in the Bill Moyers Journal and in Al Jazeera's Date in Exile program, as well as by several national and international media organizations. His new book, We Are All Moors: Ending Centuries of Crusades Against Islam and Other Minorities (2009), traces the ideological origins of the concept of minority to the long wars of Islam and Christianity in medieval Europe. this event is co-sponsored by the Human Rights program and the Languages and Literature department. _______________________________________
MONDAY, MARCH 30 at 6:30 pm in Weis Theater On the human rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories Dr. Said Zeedani of Al Quds University, Jerusalem _______________________________________ TUESDAY, MARCH 10 at 6:30 pm in Weis Theater Journalism or Zoornalism? Encounters with the Afghan Media Mafia GREG WERNER Greg Werner is an independent journalist who has written stories for NPR's This American Life and All Things Considered, as well as Slate and The Paris Review. He reported from Afghanistan in 2007-08 and just returned from a reporting trip to Rwanda. He returns to Kabul in mid-March. Zoor is the Afghan Dari word for 'Force.' _______________________________________ WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 11 at 6:30pm in Olin 102 The Hannah Arendt Center for Ethical and Political Thinking & the Human Rights Project proudly present a round table discussion on Hannah Arendt and the Banality of Evil: Reflections on Moral Blindness Featuring: Jacob Dahl Rendtorff (Roskilde University, Denmark) Artemy Magun (Smolny College, St. Petersburg) Asma Abbas (Bard College at Simons Rock) Robyn Marasco (Williams College) Lori Marso (Union College)Laurie Naranch (Siena College) Chair: Roger Berkowitz (Bard College) Come participate in a spirited discussion of the modern significance of Hannah Arendt’s thesis about the banality of evil. _____________________________________ MONDAY, FEBRUARY 9 at 5:30pm in Olin 102 Professor Dmitry Dubrovsky, Associate Professor in the program of Human Rights NGOs in Russia and the War of Memories The issues of contemporary human rights NGOs as well as the human rights ______________________________________ TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 10 at 6pm in Olin LC 115 Professor Artemy Magun, Associate professor, Smolny Institute of
The Jewish Question of Karl Marx and Hannah Arendt Hannah Arendt's "Eichmann in Jerusalem" is a culmination of Arendt's life-long engagement in the "Jewish Question", her interest and participation in the political life of the Jewish people. Its immediate political content, in the context of Arendt's philosophy, is clear: it criticizes the traditional nationalism of the Israeli government and insists on the immanent, inherent danger of the Nazi "evil," as opposed to the mainstream exorcism and demonization of it. However, as I will try to show, the book has a hidden political theological agenda which continues the long tradition of the discussion of Judaism in the German philosophical tradition. The issue of the Jewish people is inseparable here from a religious and post-religious debate on Judaism and its heritage. This agenda
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