2020 Jun 01
U.S. Foreign Policy and China
6:00pm to 7:00pm
Location: 
Online Event
Join the Ash Center and John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum for a virtual event featuring:
• Lucy Hornby, a fellow at the Nieman Center for Journalism and former Beijing deputy bureau chief for the Financial Times
• Yasheng Huang, MIT professor of international management
• Anthony Saich, Daewoo Professor of International Affairs, HKS, Ash Center Director
...
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2020 Mar 05
The Khufu Boat
6:00pm
Location: 
Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford St., Cambridge
In 1954, Egyptian archaeologist Kamal el-Mallakh discovered a 144-foot ship buried next to the Great Pyramid of Giza. The Khufu boat—one of the oldest-known planked vessels from antiquity—was interred in honor of Khufu, the pharaoh who built the Great Pyramid. Bob Brier will discuss what is known about the design, propulsion, and function of this 4,600-year- old ship, based on recent tank tests conducted on a model. He will also highlight plans to build a full-scale replica of the vessel and to place it on the Nile.
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2020 Feb 27
The Ancient Maya Response to Climate Change: A Cautionary Tale
6:00pm
Location: 
Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford St., Cambridge
Ancient Maya civilization suffered a major demise between the tenth and eleventh centuries. The causes continue to be investigated and debated. Paleoenvironmental research over the past twenty years has revealed that the demise coincided with a prolonged, intensive drought that extended across the region, providing compelling evidence that climate change played a key role in the collapse of the Maya. Billie Turner will examine this evidence and the complex social and environmental conditions that affected Maya societies.
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2020 Feb 27
The New Geopolitical Order
4:15pm
Location: 
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Knafel Center, 10 Garden St., Cambridge
The new geopolitical environment taking shape in many parts of the world tends toward increasing authoritarianism and nationalistic competition. In this lecture, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, an international human rights advocate and the former United Nations high commissioner for human rights, will argue that the world’s people deserve better. Despite the demagoguery and isolationism that some leaders are pursuing, he believes it is possible to pursue thoughtful diplomacy and a system of connectivity, coalitions, and partnerships to reform institutions and change polices.
...
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2020 Feb 20
History Reconsidered: Poetry Reading and Discussion
4:15pm
Location: 
Knafel Center, 10 Garden St., Cambridge
Join the Radcliffe Institute for a poetry reading and discussion with Clint Smith.
Clint Smith is a doctoral candidate at Harvard University and an Emerson Fellow at New America. He has received fellowships from the Art For Justice Fund, Cave Canem, and the National Science Foundation, while his writing has been published in the New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, the Atlantic, Poetry Magazine, the Paris Review, and elsewhere. His first full-length collection of poetry, Counting Descent, was published in 2016. It won the 2017...
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2020 Feb 19
Where It Used to Be Home: Writing Russia and Ukraine under the Trump Administration
5:00pm to 6:30pm
Location: 
Woolley Room, Mary Lyon Hall, Wheaton College 26 E. Main Street, Norton, MA
Olga Livshin will discuss how culture, translation, history, current events and her own biography intermingle in her 2019 book of poems, A Life Replaced, which reflects on the experience of living as an immigrant under the Trump administration and with Putin's war on Ukraine looming. Raised in Odessa and Moscow, Livshin writes witness poetry about xenophobia, war, and strongmen at the helm on both sides of the world. The book braids original poetry in English with translations from Anna Akhmatova, the great poet of 20th-century Russia, and Vladimir Gandelsman, fellow immigrant...
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2020 Feb 13
Ancient Egyptian Culture and Its Continuity in Modern Egypt
6:00pm
Location: 
Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street, Cambridge
Egypt’s recorded history spans six thousand years and is therefore one of the longest and best known in the world. Today, Egyptians practice several religious, artistic, and social traditions that can be traced to ancient Egypt, demonstrating the power and longevity of cultural memory. Drawing on research in archaeology, Egyptian art, writing, and culture, Fayza Haikal will examine Egyptian society’s cultural expressions from antiquity to the present, focusing on language, spirituality, superstitions, funerary traditions, and folklore.
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2020 Feb 13
Opening Celebration: Painting Edo
5:00pm to 9:00pm
Location: 
Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge
Join the Harvard Art Museums to celebrate the opening of Painting Edo: Japanese Art from the Feinberg Collection, on view from February 14–July 26, 2020.
Be among the first to see over 120 works included in the Harvard Art Museums' latest show, which celebrates the rich visual culture of Japan's early modern era. The galleries are open late, and admission is free for...
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2020 Feb 12
Lev Rubinstein: Readings, Conversations about Russia Today
5:00pm to 6:30pm
Location: 
Davis Center, Knafel Building, Room K262, 1730 Cambridge St., Cambridge
Moscow writer Lev Rubinstein will read from his work and engage in a wide-ranging conversation in a special Davis Center seminar.
Rubinstein exemplifies a striking aesthetic response to life in repressive times, one that emphasizes the artist’s freedom of expression and the power of humor in the face of lies. He has won multiple prizes at home and abroad and has a readiness to push at the boundaries of literary norms. Author of more than a dozen books in Russian, Rubinstein has been more active as an essayist since the start of the 2000s. He has also emerged as a public figure...
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2020 Feb 12
Lecture: no noise disturbed the quiet of the morning
4:00pm
Location: 
Knafel Center, 10 Garden St., Cambridge
As a Radcliffe fellow, Anthony Romero (RI '20) is working on a multimedia research and visual art project that includes a collection of related but discrete works which attempt to articulate how indigenous populations, under European colonial rule in Australia, South Asia, and the United States, were controlled through the criminalization and legislating of native sound and music practices. Taken together, these histories reveal how carceral and criminalizing strategies sowed the seeds for the ongoing over-policing of black and brown communities.
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2020 Jan 23
Gallery Talk: Walk Like an Egyptian
12:30pm to 1:00pm
Location: 
Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge
Fellow Jen Thum explores the basics of ancient Egyptian representation, including why their bodies seem to "walk like an Egyptian."
Free with museum admission. Gallery talks are limited to 15 people and tickets are required. Ten minutes before each talk, tickets will become available at the admissions desk.
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2019 Dec 11
The Lost Book of Moses: The Hunt for the World’s Oldest Bible
4:00pm to 5:00pm
Location: 
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Knafel Center, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
Chanan Tigay is an award-winning journalist and nonfiction writer who has covered the Middle East, 9/11, and the United Nations for such outlets as AFP, the Atlantic, GQ, and the New Yorker. In this lecture, Tigay will talk about his first book, The Lost Book of Moses: The Hunt for the World’s Oldest Bible, which tells the story of the oldest Bible in the world, how its outing as a fraud led to a scandalous death, and why archaeologists now believe it was real—if only they could find it. In addition to the story of this controversial Bible, Tigay will speak about his own hunt for the...
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2019 Nov 19
Human Sacrifice and Power in the Kerma Kingdom
6:00pm
Location: 
Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford St., Cambridge
Join the Harvard Semitic Museum for a public lecture with Elizabeth Minor, Visiting Assistant Professor in Anthropology at Wellesley College. 
The Kerma Kingdom was an ancient Nubian civilization located in present-day Sudan. Its capital, the city of Kerma, had monumental architecture and religious art depicting deities in the form of lions, scorpions, and hybrid figures such as winged giraffes and hippopotamus goddesses. During the Classic Kerma Period (1700–1550 BCE), funerary monuments of Kerman kings could be up to one hundred meters long and included hundreds of...
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2019 Nov 07
James Sloss Ackerman Memorial Lecture: Guido Beltramini
6:00pm to 8:00pm
Location: 
Gund Hall, 485 Broadway Lecture Hall, 48 Quincy Street, Cambridge
This lecture, in memorium of James Sloss Ackerman, Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Fine Art Emeritus, is sponsored by the Department of History of Art and Architecture and the Harvard Graduate School of Design.
James Sloss Ackerman was born in 1919 in San Francisco. At Yale University his professor, Henri Focillon, wrote to him “Remain faithful to our studies for which you are so well suited.” Ackerman's graduate work focusing on Renaissance architecture was guided by Richard Krautheimer and Erwin Panofsky at the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University. His...
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2019 Nov 06
Great Russian Jews: Solomon Mikhoels (1890–1948)
4:30pm to 5:45pm
Location: 
CGIS South Building, Room S010 (Tsai Auditorium), 1730 Cambridge St., Cambridge
This panel discussion with two leading Jewish cultural historians examines the remarkable contributions and tragic death of the great actor, theater director, playwright, visionary of Yiddish culture, and Jewish activist Solomon (Shloyme) Mikhoels (1890–1948).
Born Shloyme Vovsi in Dvinsk (now Daugavpils, Latvia), the genius actor Mikhoels became the chief director of the State Jewish Theater in Moscow. During World War II, he served as chairman of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. Mikhoels’ assassination by Stalin’s secret police, although officially billed as an accident,...
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2019 Oct 17
Life and Death in Ancient Egypt: Biomedical Analysis of Mummies and Canopic Jars
6:00pm
Location: 
Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford St., Cambridge
Egyptian mummies and the remains found in ancient canopic jars can now be studied in great detail using noninvasive medical imaging techniques such as X-rays and computerized tomography, and chemical analysis using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry.
Drawing from interdisciplinary research conducted in the Valley of the Kings and Egyptian museum collections, Frank Rühli will discuss the value of using state-of-the-art technologies for understanding the life conditions, pathologies, death, and mummification procedures of ancient Egyptians. He will also address ethical...
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2019 Oct 17
Judy Chicago Research Portal Launch
4:00pm
Location: 
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Knafel Center, 10 Garden St., Cambridge
This event is to celebrate the launch of a collaborative project, the Judy Chicago Research Portal, and to discuss the role of portals in providing access to feminist art archives.
The Judy Chicago Portal will be presented, challenges in the technology of portal development will be discussed, and Christina Schlesinger and Judy Chicago will discuss the importance of preserving feminist art archives.
...
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2019 Oct 11
Writing Black Lives
4:15pm
Location: 
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Knafel Center, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
Tomiko Brown-Nagin, Imani Perry, and Robert Reid-Pharr will join in conversation to discuss how their work as biographers speaks to key contemporary discussions about black politics, community, identity, and life.
Perry will consider her recent book, Looking for Lorraine: The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry (Beacon Press, 2018), while Reid-Pharr and Brown-Nagin will share perspectives from their own research, writing, and forthcoming books on, respectively, James Baldwin and Constance Baker Motley.
...
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2019 Sep 26
Lecture: Breaking the Noses on Egyptian Statues
6:00pm
Location: 
Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford St., Cambridge
Why are the noses broken on Egyptian statues? Why were other sculpted body parts, including eyes, mouths, arms, and feet, purposely shattered in antiquity? Focusing on the ancient world of the pharaohs and on the Late Antique world that emerged following Egyptian conversion to Christianity, Edward Bleiberg (Senior Curator of Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Near Eastern Art at Brooklyn Museum) will examine the patterns of damage inflicted on Egyptian images for personal, political, religious, and criminal reasons. He will also highlight how close inspection of statue damage can...
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2019 Sep 13
Lecture: Bauhaus Bashing: Looking Back and Looking Ahead
12:00pm to 2:00pm
Location: 
Harvard Graduate School of Design, Gund Hall, Stubbins Room 112, 48 Quincy Street, Cambridge
Join the Harvard Graduate School of Design for a lecture delivered by Philip Ursprung, Professor of the History of Art and Architecture at ETH Zürich, Switzerland. 
For the 100th birthday of Bauhaus, the German State supports two new museums, several exhibitions, and many celebrations. However, the current celebrations repress the fact that the Bauhaus in the late 20th century was criticized for its formalism and dogmatic design education. And while a...
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