Unlike other American countries, Peru does not have a memory of its nineteenth-century civil wars. Peru's political confrontations lacked the clear-cut ideological contours that characterized civil strife in, say, the United States, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, or Uruguay, where nineteenth-century struggles created enduring memories that, in turn, shaped much of these countries? political identities and national […]

Award-winning author and journalist Ian Buruma will discuss the debates about Muslim radicalism, immigration, and the challenge from religion in several European countries where anti-immigrant populism is on the rise and Islam is the main focus – from the arguments about multiculturalism in Britain to the proposed burqa ban in France. Is the danger posed […]

History is replete with nations that declined because their leaders gradually undermined their own best institutions. The U.S. now appears to be doing this to its exemplary higher education system, with the University of California serving as Exhibit A. This lecture will look at the contradictions within the American funding model for higher education, and […]

talk in the Tequila Mondays series hm 4/8/10

Prof. Medina's research deals with the adoption of computer technologies in Latin America, especially cybernetics in Allende's Chile. From 1971 to 1973 Chilean and British engineers, working under the direction of the pioneering British cybernetician Stafford Beer, built a computer network to help make Chile’s socialist revolution a reality. The team called the system Cybersyn. […]

Presentations by Suzanne Levine, Seth Wulsin, Damian Nemirovsky and Kacey Link. hm 5/19/10

Sponsored by the Ancient Borderlands Research Focus Group and the Archaeology Research Focus Group. jwil 12.v.2010

Participants in the 2009-2010 History Senior Honors Colloquium, directed by Professor Hilary Bernstein, will present their research. Each student's presentation will be followed by a faculty comment. Refreshments will be served. Session I (9-10:30 a.m): Literature and Politics in Italy and America Christy Mason, “Valuing Virtue: Nineteenth-Century Sexuality and the Act of Seduction, 1818-1860” (Cohen) […]

"Risk, sustainability, and decision making: evaluating agricultural strategies in ancient Anatolia" Identifying how ancient societies made decisions regarding agricultural land use is important for understanding why some pre-industrial agricultural systems flourished and others collapsed. Local environmental and cultural factors influence how people balance goals of short-term profitability and long-term sustainability in agricultural decision making. The […]

A manuscript of the Old Tibetan Chronicle found in the cave library ofDunhuang represents one of the earliest attempts at Tibetan narrative history. The author-compilers draw on Tibetan inscriptions, Indian epics, Chinese histories, Tibetan ritual literature, and a legacy of composition in performance and song to create a narrative of Tibet's imperial period (c.600-866). This […]