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“Surf’s Up! But Where and How High?” Measuring and Riding Waves

It may mean Beach Boys and wood-paneled station wagons to you, but surfing today is more a matter of wave prediction data and real time animated film about key surf spots, published on surfing websites. Take a break from your taxes and come join us at noon on Sunday, April 15 at Moby Dick Restaurant […]

Holocaust and Genocide

Prof. Bauer will discuss why humans are the only living creatures that kill their own kind in large numbers, and the essential similarities and difference between the Holocaust and other genocides. What do we mean by “genocide”? Why are humans the only living creatures that kill their own kind in huge numbers? What place does […]

Waves of Resistance: Surfing and History in Twentieth-Century Hawai’i

The author of Waves of Resistance: Surfing and History in 20th Century Hawaii will be speaking, following an introduction by Dr. Teresa Shewry (UCSB, English) of the Center for Literature and the Environment. Surfing has been a significant sport and cultural practice in Hawai'i for more than 1,500 years. In the last century, facing increased […]

Race and Immigration in the Era of Decolonization

This talk will examine debates surrounding immigration in the United Kingdom, South Africa and Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in the 1960s and 1970s. South Africa in 1961 and Rhodesia in 1965 broke away from the British Empire and Commonwealth in order to continue to pursue racially-­‐based settler colonial rule. This was reflected in their immigration policies, […]

The Role of Maya Catholic Health Networks in Guatemala’s Armed Conflict, 1966 – 1996

Dr. Susan Fitzpatrick-BehrensCal State Northridge Thursday, April 26 11:00-12:15 HSSB 2252 In the 1960s, paraprofessional health programs proliferated in the Maya regions of Guatemala’s western highlands.. The programs responded to medical needs in rural highland communities and coastal coffee plantations where there were neither hospitals nor doctors. By the 1970s, Maya leaders prepared through these […]

Dams, Displacement and the Delusion of Development: The Case of Cahora Bassa

The history of Cahora Bassa reveals the persistence of “colonialism’s afterlife.” Under the 1974 Lusaka Peace Accord, which set the stage for Mozambique’s independence, in return for assuming the US$550 million debt incurred in building Cahora Bassa, Hidroeléctrica de Cahora Bassa (HCB), a Portuguese para-statal, received 82% of the shares, with the remainder going to […]

Muslims in Georgia and Morocco

NOTE THE ROOM CHANGE! In this Public History First Thursday meeting Julia will discuss her current work on an international public history project: an online exhibit based on the lives and experiences of Muslims in the exchange communities of Kennesaw, Georgia, and Casablanca, Morocco. She would love questions and comments from us! Please join us! […]

Digitize, Democratize: Libraries and the Future of Books

Openness may seem self-evident as a principle of library policy, but libraries have often been closed and the world of knowledge in general has been fenced off by commercial interests intent on making profit at the expense of the public good. Commercialization and democratization run through the history of copyright right up to the present, […]

American Democracy in an Era of Rising Inequality

Pearson is the author, with Jacob Hacker, of both Off-Center: The Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy (2005) and Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer and Turned its Back on the Middle Class (2010). He is also the author of numerous other books and essays including Politics in Time: History, Institutions […]

Public History Book Sale

The Annual Public History Book Sale has arrived!!! We have more than a thousand used and new books. Used books are from the shelves of Professors Sears McGee, Laura Kalman and Randall Garr (Religious Studies). We have everything from comic books and MAD Magazines to translation guides for ancient Egyptian. Three days only! Tues/Weds/Thurs, May […]