Category: Events

Arcus Center Invites Proposals for 2014 Conference “WITH/OUT – ¿BORDERS?”

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KALAMAZOO, Mich. [Oct. 23, 2013]: Kalamazoo College’s Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership (ACSJL) invites proposals for papers, workshops, roundtables, and think-tanks for “WITH/OUT – ¿BORDERS?” a conference to be held September 25-28, 2014 on the Kalamazoo College campus—including in the new home of the ACSJL currently under construction.

The deadline for submitting 150-word proposals is Jan. 15, 2014. Send entries to Karla.Aquilar@kzoo.edu. Entries selected for the conference will be notified by Feb. 15, 2014. For more information, email Arcus.Center@kzoo.edu or visit https://reason.kzoo.edu/csjl/withoutborders.

“Conference-goers will explore the very notion of borders both physical and theoretical,” said ACSJL Academic Director Lisa Brock, Ph.D. “Borders and boundaries of all kinds, whether intersectional, cartographical, ideological, political, cultural, and social, will be deconstructed.”

Confirmed conference speakers include award winning performance artist Guillermo Gomez Pena, 2011 National Book Award poetry winner Nikky Finney, artist Ashley Hunt, scholar Saree Makdisi, musician Ugochi, and scientist Jon Beckwith.

According to Brock, the 2014 WITH/OUT – ¿BORDERS conference aims to foster both theoretical discussion and practical problem-solving around key questions such as how individuals and groups can:

  • cross academic borders and break down organizational silos in order to embrace emerging disciplines and create interdisciplinary spaces;
  • remove or open seemingly fixed national and military borders such as the U.S.-Mexico border or the conflict between Palestinian and Israeli territories;
  • span cultural borders such as race, gender, religion, and sexual orientation; and
  • connect and combine historically separate social justice issues and work in solidarity across social justice movements.

“We are interested in creating conversations on emerging epistemologies, radical geographies, critical solidarities, and transgressive practices that transcend disciplinary and academic/activist borders,” said Brock. “We want conference attendees to show us how they would re-map the world—with and without borders.”

WITH/OUT – ¿BORDERS? builds on the ACSJL’s successful spring 2013 Global Prize for Collaborative Social Justice Leadership that drew more than 100 entries from around the United States and 22 other countries, and culminated in the awarding of three global prizes and one regional prize.

The Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership (www.kzoo.edu/socialjustice) was launched in 2009 with support from the Arcus Foundation (www.arcusfoundation.org), including a $23 million endowment grant in January 2012. Supporting Kalamazoo College’s mission to prepare its graduates to better understand, live successfully within, and provide enlightened leadership to a richly diverse and increasingly complex world, the ACSJL will develop new leaders and sustain existing leaders in the field of human rights and social justice.

Kalamazoo College (www.kzoo.edu), founded in Kalamazoo, Mich., in 1833, is a nationally recognized liberal arts college and the creator of the K-Plan that emphasizes rigorous scholarship, experiential learning, leadership development, and international and intercultural engagement. Kalamazoo College does more in four years so students can do more in a lifetime.

Legendary Pianist To Perform at K

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Pianist Frank Glazer
Frank Glazer

Pianist Frank Glazer will present a solo recital of works by Haydn, Beethoven, Barber, and Liszt on Wednesday, November 6, at 7:30 PM in the Dalton Theatre of the Light Fine Arts Building on Kalamazoo College’s campus. General admission is $5 for adults and $3 for students. Kalamazoo College community members are free. The event is sponsored by the Kalamazoo College music department.

Glazer’s artistry and longevity make him a singular figure in the music world. The 98-year-old musician was born in Chester, Wisconsin, in 1915. In 1932 he traveled to Europe to study with Artur Schnabel and with Arnold Schoenberg. He made his debut at Town Hall in New York City in 1936 with a program of Bach, Brahms, Schubert, and Chopin. He played this program again in 2006, to celebrate his seventieth anniversary of public performance.

In 1939 Glazer performed with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Sergei Koussevitzky. During World War II he served in the US Army as an interpreter in Germany and France. In the early 1950s, Glazer had his own television show called “Playhouse 15” in Milwaukee. In 1965 he joined the Artist faculty of the Eastman School of Music. He left that position in 1980 to become artist-in-residence and lecturer in music at Bates College (Lewiston, Maine).

Frank Glazer’s recital program on November 6 will include the Sonata in E minor (Hob. XVI/34) of Haydn, the Phantasie and Op. 109 Sonata of Beethoven, Excursions by Samuel Barber, and three pieces by Liszt, including his Rigoletto paraphrase.

For more information, contact Susan Lawrence (269 337 7070).

Countless Malalas

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President and Chief Executive Officer of Pathfinder International Purnima Mane
Dr. Purnima Mane, President and Chief Executive Officer of Pathfinder International

“Empowering girls with information and giving them a voice enables them to say ’no’ to early marriage, ’no’ to dropping out of school, and ’no’ to an early pregnancy or unsafe sex that might cost them their future.” So wrote Dr. Purnima Mane, President and Chief Executive Officer of Pathfinder International.

Next week Mane will visit the Kalamazoo College campus to give a talk titled “Catalysts for Change: Empowering Youth through Sexual and Reproductive Rights.” The event will occur on Tuesday, October 22, at 7 p.m. in the Mandelle Hall Olmsted Room. It is free and open to the public.

Pathfinder International believes that people everywhere have the right to live a healthy sexual and reproductive life. For more than 55 years, The organization has worked to expand access to quality sexual and reproductive health care to enable and empower individuals to make choices about their body and their future. “When people take charge of their life choices–such as if or when and how often to have children–they gain confidence and strength,” said Mane. “They can better pursue their education, contribute to the local economy, and engage in their communities.”

Mane is a distinguished diplomat, leader, manager, academician, and social activist, as well as an internationally recognized expert on HIV, maternal health, behavior change, gender, and population. Pathfinder International has more than 1,000 staff around the world, an annual budget exceeding $100 million, and sexual and reproductive health programs in more than 20 developing countries.

Mane’s visit to Kalamazoo College is co-sponsored by the Center for Civic Engagement and the Office of Student Development.

Dream Approaches

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Alexander Ross and Emma Franzel rehearse for "A Dream Play"
Alexander Ross ’17 plays the Officer and Emma Franzel ’17 the Daughter in the Festival Playhouse production of August Strindberg’s A DREAM PLAY

Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College performs August Strindberg’s A Dream Play in the Nelda K. Balch Playhouse in November. The show opens on Thursday, November 7, at 7.30 PM (“pay-what-you-like-night”). A brief talk-back will follow Thursday’s performance. Additional evening performances are on Friday and Saturday, November 8 and 9, at 8 PM; a matinee concludes the run on Sunday, November 10 at 2 PM. Tickets are $5 for students with an ID, $10 for seniors, $15 for other adults.  A Dream Play is part of the Festival Playhouse’s Golden Anniversary season.

The play explores fundamental questions: Why do we exist, and why is life so difficult? The plot surrounds the daughter of the Hindu god, Indra, who leaves heaven to visit humans on earth. In living with humans as a human herself, her mission is to determine why humans suffer. Director Ed Menta says the production will attempt to create a theatre poem by interweaving Strindberg’s text with Festival Playhouse’s staging, performance, and design.

Senior David M. Landskroener, who serves as composer and music producer for the production, says that “creating live sound effects is such an interesting experience because I’m making sound to accompany a dream. Many times while tinkering around with effects I reject my initial thoughts about a certain sound in a scene and try out multiple options that may not at first sound completely congruent with the action onstage, but reflect the idea of associative links found in a dream.”

Before 1901, plays may have contained a dream sequence, but Strindberg created a new genre with a play that is entirely a dream. In the play’s foreword Strindberg wrote: “Everything can happen, everything is possible and probable. Time and place do not exist; on an insignificant basis of reality, the imagination spins, weaving new patterns; a mixture of memories, experiences, free fancies, incongruities and improvisations.”

Given such source materials, one can understand why “It has been a challenge to make all of the 30+ characters come to life,” according to K senior Michael Wecht, assistant director for A Dream Play. “It is my goal, through movement coaching and exercises emphasizing physicality, to help the cast discover each of their roles. This is especially pertinent because most of the actors are playing multiple roles.”

For reservations or more information about Festival Playhouse’s Golden Anniversary season (stay tuned for The Firebugs and Peer Gynt) call 269.337.7333.

Jazz Band Concert Honors Freddie Hubbard

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Freddie Hubbard playing trumpet
Freddie Hubbard

The Kalamazoo College Jazz performs a concert titled “A Tribute to Freddie Hubbard” on Saturday, November 2, at 8 PM in Dalton Theatre, located in the Light Fine Arts building on the Kalamazoo College campus. The concert is free and open to the public. Hubbard (1938-2008) was an American jazz trumpeter whose musical career spanned 50 years.

The 18-member Kalamazoo College Jazz Band will perform selections composed by Hubbard and by other jazz greats with whom he played. Included are: “A Nasty Bit of Blues,” “Ready Freddie,” “Little Sunflower,” “Povo,” “Alianza,” “Red Clay,” and “Out of the Doghouse.” The Kalamazoo College Jazz Band is directed by Professor of Music Tom Evans. Featured performers include Jon Husar ’14, trombone; Ian Williams ’17, piano; Riley Lundquist ’16, tenor sax; Kieran Williams ’16, trumpet; Chris Monsour ’16, drums; and Curtis Gough ’14, bass.

Phi Beta Kappa Lecture on K’s Campus

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David Forsythe
David Forsythe

David Forsythe will deliver the annual Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Lecture at 8 PM on Tuesday, November 5, in the Mandelle Hall Olmsted Room at Kalamazoo College. The title of his address is “The United States and Torture after 9/11.” The event is free and open to the public.

Forsythe is University Professor and Charles J. Mach Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Emeritus at the University of Nebraska (Lincoln). His work focuses on international human rights, international law and organization, American foreign policy, and international relations.

His books include The Humanitarians: The International Committee of the Red Cross, Human Rights in International Relations; The United Nations and Changing World Politics; American Foreign Policy in a Globalized World; and The Politics of Prisoner Abuse. He is the general editor of The Encyclopedia of Human Rights and the recipient of many awards for scholarship. In 2008 he held the Senior Fulbright Distinguished Research Chair for Human Rights and International Studies at the Danish Institute for International Studies.

Since 1956, the Phi Beta Kappa Society’s Visiting Scholar Program has been offering undergraduates the opportunity to spend time with some of America’s most distinguished scholars. The purpose of the program is to contribute to the intellectual life of the institution by making possible an exchange of ideas between the Visiting Scholars and the resident faculty and students. The 13 men and women participating during 2013-2014 will visit 100 colleges and universities with chapters of Phi Beta Kappa, spending two days on each campus to meet informally with students and faculty members, participate in classroom discussions and seminars, and give a public lecture open to the entire academic community.

 

 

Love Opens Bach Season

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Lyric soprano Rhea OlivaccéLyric soprano Rhea Olivaccé is the featured performer in the Kalamazoo Bach Festival Society’s opening concert,“The Many Facets of Love,” featuring romantic music of Strauss, the alluring charm of French opera, and the musings of new American composers. Olivaccé has performed on the stages of Carnegie Hall, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and multiple sites other throughout the United States. “The Many Facets of Love” occurs October 20, 2013, at 4 PM in Dalton Theatre (Light Fine Arts Building) on the Kalamazoo College campus. In the first half of the concert Olivaccé sings works by Donizetti, Strauss, and “The Jewel Song” from Charles Gounod’s opera Faust. Contemporary composers are featured in the second half of the concert, including Hundley, Bolcom, Mechem, Adams, and emerging Michigan composers Logan Skelton and Michael Lauckner. Olivaccé is accompanied by pianist Gunta Laukmane. Tickets are $15 if purchased by October 11.  After October 11, tickets are $18 for general seating.  Student tickets cost $5!  For tickets, visit the Bach Festival Society website or call 269.337.7407. The event is a collaboration of the Bach Festival Society and the Kalamazoo College Department of Music.

Kreisler at K

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The Kreisler TrioThe Kreisler Trio will present a concert of works by Mozart, Beethoven, and Hummel–performed on period instruments–on Sunday evening, October 20, at 8 PM in Dalton Theatre of the Light Fine Arts Building on the Kalamazoo College campus. The event is sponsored by the Kalamazoo College Department of Music; admission is free.

The Kreisler Trio was founded in the Royal Conservatory of the Hague and brings together three musicians from around the world: Keyboardist Shin Hwang, a prize-winner of the 1st International Westfield Fortepiano Competition; Violinist Yuki Horiuchi, a graduate of the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music and performer with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra; and cellist Fernando Santiago García, a graduate of the Koninkljk Conservatorium in The Hague and member of the European Union Youth Orchestra and the Gustav Mahler Academy in Bolzano.

For their concert at Kalamazoo College, the Trio has programmed sonatas by Mozart (for solo fortepiano and for violin and fortepiano), and trios by Beethoven and Hummel.

 

What the Dickens?! K on the Art Hop

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Advertisement for What the DickensK on the Art Hop
October 4, 2013  / 5-8 p.m.
“What the Dickens: Victorian England in the A.M. Todd Rare Book Room”
A.M. Todd Rare Book Room
Upjohn Library Commons — 3rd Floor

England was an incredibly rich and diverse society during the reign of Queen Victoria. Authors of the era included Charles Dickens, the Brownings, Oscar Wilde, and John Ruskin. Artists such as James McNeill Whistler, William Blake, William Morris, and Aubrey Beardsley all were creating works in very different styles. Charles Darwin completed his voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle and began to develop controversial theories on evolution. Phrenology, physiognomy, and séances all were popular. It also was an era of collecting, following the age of exploration. Travelers were covering the globe to bring back to England rare and exotic plants and animals. Examples of these various aspects of the Victorian Era are included in the “What the Dickens: Victorian England in the A.M. Todd Rare Book Room.”

Can′t attend Art Hop? “What the Dickens” exhibit remains on display through Nov. 26 (closed Nov. 4-17), Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, 1-3 p.m. or by appointment. Call Paul Smithson, 269-337-7147.

Cheerio!


 

Homecoming and Reunion Weekend

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Buzz the Hornet with a family of three at HomecomingWelcome back, Orange and Black, on October 18-20. Homecoming registration is open NOW! Please check out the schedule of events to view all of the opportunities to connect. Highlights from the weekend will include: reunion activities for the classes of 1963, 1968, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1988, 1993, 1998, 2003, 2008 (as well as special gatherings for the Class of 2013 and emeriti alumni); a student film festival featuring works created in K’s introductory and advanced documentary film production classes; family friendly activities on the Quad, featuring the Fresh Food Fairy, Cirque Du K, and the College’s three a cappella groups; the Hornet football game vs. the Albion Britons at the new Kalamazoo College Athletic Field Complex; and an opportunity to tell your K story or record a favorite memory at the Story Zoo booth in the library. There is so much to share, and alumni relations staff members are looking forward to seeing you and your family. Kalamazoo area hotels are filling up fast so please do not forget to book your hotel and mention “Kalamazoo College Homecoming” to receive a special rate. If you would like a registration form mailed to you or need assistance with online registration, please contact the Office of Alumni Relations at 269-337-7300 or aluminfo@kzoo.edu. All alumni, faculty, staff, students and K friends are invited.