2011-12 Events

Fall Quarter 2011

Welcome back!

The focal theme of the ACGCC “Risk Society Series” this year is “uncertainty.” Classically uncertainty, the pathologized other of calculable risk, is precisely the terrifying face of a dynamic, unpredictable system of emergences. As a “condition,” it gains prominence at moments of crisis, amid spectacular financial crashes, environmental debacles, biological insecurity, and insurgent attacks; its social and psychological effects range from terror to precarity. More recently, risk theorists have argued uncertainty arises from a dynamic but constantly generative system whose potentialities are foreclosed by the risk calculus. Given the ensuing debate, perhaps it is time to revisit the risk-uncertainty dialectic.

The ACGCC participates a campus-wide dialogue on risk-uncertainty. The center will cosponsor several events hosted by the Critical Issues of America program on “Speculative Futures.” The calendar below includes these events (marked as “Risk Series”) as well as other fall quarter talks, lectures, discussions, and films relevant to the focal theme.

For updated information on ACGCC and related events, make sure to bookmark the ACGCC calendar.

ACGCC co-sponsors an East Asia Center Event

Prof. Pheng Cheah (UC Berkeley) Lecture: “Entering the World from an Oblique Angle: On Jia Zhangke as an Organic Intellectual”

Thursday, Oct. 6th at 6pm, 2252 HSSB

*Risk Series*
UCSB Arts & Lectures Hosts

Daniel Yergin (author of The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power) Lecture: “The Quest–Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World”

Wednesday, Oct. 12th, 8pm, Campbell Hall (free)
For details: UCSB Arts & Lectures

*Risk Series*
Critical Issues in America presents
A Symposium on Historical Perspectives

Prof. Wolf Kitler (UC Santa Barbara), “The Origin of Risk”

Prof. Colin Milburn (UC Davis), “Postmorten: The Necrosis of Nanotechnology”

Friday, Oct. 14 from 2-6pm, Wallis Annenburg Conference Room
For details: www.criticalissues.ucsb.edu

*Risk Series*
ACGCC co-sponsors Critical Issues in America and UCSB Arts & Lectures

Screening: Michael Madsen’s Into Eternity (2010)
Followed by Q&A with the director

Monday, Oct. 17th, 7:30pm, Campbell Hall ($6/free for students)
For details: www.criticalissues.ucsb.edu, UCSB Arts & Lectures

*Risk Series*
Critical Issues in America hosts

A conversation with Michael Madsen

Tuesday, Oct. 18th, 5-7pm, McCune Conference Room, 6020 HSSB
For details: www.criticalissues.ucsb.edu

*Risk Series*
UCSB Arts & Lectures hosts

Siddhartha Mukherkjee (Pulitzer-prize winning author of The Emperor of Maladies: A Biography of Cancer) Lecture: “Where We Are on the War on Cancer”

Saturday, Oct. 22nd, 3pm, Campbell Hall ($20/$10 UCSB Students)
For details: UCSB Arts & Lectures

*Risk Series*
Literatures and Mind presents
Colloquium on Care and Vulnerability

Fabienne Brugère, “What is an ethics of care?”
Guillaume Le Blanc, “Why are we so vulnerable?”

Friday, Oct. 28th, 1-5pm, South Hall 2635
For details: http://litandmind.english.ucsb.edu

*Risk Series*
ACGCC co-sponsors a Literature and Environment event

Prof. Rob Nixon (UWisconsin, Madison), “Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor.”

Friday, Nov. 18th, 2pm, McCune Conference Room, 6020 HSSB

Spring Quarter 2011

CCS Literature Symposium co-sponsored by the ACGCC

“Digital Publishing, Creative Possibilities”

Wednesday, May 25th at 4pm, Old Little Theater

As a founding member of the editorial team of the Journal of Transnational American Studies (JTAS), Martinsen will discuss how this online journal was formed and provide a glimpse behind the scenes to see how JTAS functions as an open-access forum for Americanists in the global academic community.  In addition, this talk will explore some of the creative possibilities and resources for digital publishing, particularly for groups of students and scholars on a limited budget.

Eric Martinsen is assistant professor of English at Ventura College.  In 2010, he completed his doctorate on “Global Moments: Spectatorship, Violence and Urbanization in Contemporary Fiction and Film” at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Please join us in this talk by a former ACGCC Fellow and UCSB alum!

Undergraduate Panel

“Special Topics in Research: American Literature, Global Literature and the ACGCC.”

Thursday, May 12th, from 2-3pm in the ACGC Center

Yanoula Athanassakis, Anne Cong-Huyen, Ryan Stodtmeister, and Sharon Tang Quan will be present to talk about their work, to hear about yours, and to answer your questions about what’s new, hot, and exciting in the fields of American and Global literatures; we’ll all also look forward to hearing about your research interests and your thoughts about the field.  Food and beverages provided.

CONFERENCE: RISK MEDIA AND SPECULATION

Friday, March 4 (10 am – 5:30 pm)**Mosher Alumni House – Alumni Hall

The conference analyzes how speculation shapes global connections and futures as it negotiates uncertainty. The speakers address how risk media domesticates dynamic, unpredictable emergences–accidents, biohazards, piracy, terrorism–in the name of control and profit.  They also explore critical, creative speculative approaches promoting common, more habitable worlds.

For more information click here.