WHAT: “Gangster, Guerilla, Soldier, Cop: The Many Faces of Transnational Violence between the U.S. and El Salvador,” Elana Zilberg, University of California
WHEN: Tuesday, February 28 @ 2 p.m.
WHERE: 101 International Studies Building, 910 S. Fifth Street, Champaign
I’ll be honest: I get El Salvador and Nicaragua mixed up in my mind. Dr. Zilberg would probably find that quite annoying, but I’d bet she’d be too polite to embarrass me in public about it.
WHAT: “Cities and Inequalities in a Transnational World,” a three-day symposium with various speakers
WHEN: Thursday, March 1 to Saturday, March 3
WHERE: Levis Faculty Center, 919 West Illinois Street, Urbana
This one requires registration, but it’s free and open to the public. From the event announcement: “Cities and Inequalities in a Transnational World symposium seeks to better understand aspects of these unfolding processes of urbanization and transnationalism that might prove similar or different from the past and across regions. Through this symposium we seek a global perspective grounded in the regional experiences of regions of Africa, South and South East Asia, Latin America, Middle East, European Union; Russia and Eastern Europe.”
WHAT: “Sex and Eroticism in Jorge Luis Borges’s Literature,” Ariel de la Fuente, Purdue University
WHEN: Thursday, March 1 @ 12 noon
WHERE: 101 International Studies Building, 910 S. Fifth Street, Champaign
According to Wikipedia: “With a few notable exceptions, women are almost entirely absent from the majority of Borges’s fictional output. There are, however, some instances in Borges’s writings of romantic love, for example the story “Ulrikke” from The Book of Sand. The protagonist of the story “El muerto” also lusts after the “splendid, contemptuous, red-haired woman” of Azevedo Bandeira and later “sleeps with the woman with shining hair”. Although they do not appear in the stories, women are significantly discussed as objects of unrequited love in his short stories The Zahir and The Aleph. The plot of La Intrusa was based on a true story of two friends. Borges turned their fictional counterparts into brothers, excluding the possibility of a homosexual relationship.” I just wanted to use “eroticism” in the front-page summary for this column to see if more that 20 people would read it this week. #fingerscrossed
WHAT: “Assisted Development: Foreign Aid in the New World,” Ashwini Chhatre, University of Illinois
WHEN: Friday, March 2 @ 12 noon
WHERE: University YMCA, Latzer Hall, 1001 S. Wright Street, Champaign
From the event announcement: “Official development assistance, or foreign aid, has had a contentious history during the second half of the 20th century. Beginning with the Marshall Plan for the reconstruction of Europe after the WWII, foreign aid has been central to debates not only around poverty and development, but also as a manipulative tool of geopolitics and neocolonialism. Since the end of the century, however, the nature and scope of development assistance has shifted considerably. Whereas project-based interventions by national or international agencies were the norm 20 years ago, these have ceded prominence to a focus on collaborative initiatives (The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria), the rise of consumer-driven non-governmental programs (Fair Trade), and an emphasis on universal values (human rights, environment, democracy). Three historical developments have contributed to this shift, and will be the focus of this lecture: 1) the end of the cold war; 2) the rise of ’emerging economies’ such as China, India, and Brazil; and 3) the globalization of production and consumption. I will end with a speculative assessment of the future of development assistance.”
WHAT: “Truth and Beauty: Guest Poet Lamont B. Steptoe Reads from His Work“
WHEN: Sunday, March 4 @ 2 p.m.
WHERE: Urbana Free Library, Lewis Auditorium
From the event announcement: “Lamont B. Steptoe is a poet, activist, Vietnam Veteran, photographer and founder/publisher of Whirlwind Press. He is the author of ten books of poetry and is the editor of two collections of poems by South African poet, Dennis Brutus. Steptoe has won many awards for his work, including the American Book Award, and he has performed around the world.”
You live near a major university and a community college. There are smart people that come here every week to talk to the general public about interesting topics. Perhaps you were not aware of this fact, or were overwhelmed by the sheer number of opportunities for possible enlightenment. If that’s the case, Smile Politely understands and is here to help. Here are several events going on in town this week. Check out one or more of them if you have time. Get your learn on, as they say, and join the cognoscenti. It’s free, you know. Plus, sometimes there’s free food, too!
If you have a community event, speaker, or film event that you’d like to see featured on Listen Up!, send the event information to joelgillespie [at] smilepolitely [dot] com by Friday the week prior to the event. Listen Up! runs on Tuesdays when classes are in session.