Events

Day 2:

Since February the US has been at war with the Islamic Republic of Iran, yet Americans know little about that country. This interdisciplinary conference hopes to demystify Iran by examining two central questions: How has the Islamic Republic gotten to where it is now--a regime facing significant domestic challenges while simultaneously exercising substantial influence abroad? And, what might the future hold for Iran, the broader Middle East, and the US in the coming years? By more deeply looking into Iran with the goal of placing recent events within their respective historical, social, and comparative contexts, we hope to offer a better understanding of the current situation and its future prospects.

The conference is open and free to the public.

This event is part of International Education Month (IEM) programming. View the full calendar of IEM events here: https://international.uoregon.edu/IEM.

Join the University of Oregon for the HSI Symposium: Building a Latinx-Thriving University. This two-day gathering brings campus and community together to explore how UO can strengthen support, deepen belonging, and expand opportunities for current and prospective Latiné students.

As UO explores its pathway toward becoming a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI), the symposium will build on the scholarship, student leadership, cultural initiatives, and community partnerships already shaping the university. Participants will learn from research and lived experiences and develop ideas to help shape what comes next.

Thursday, October 22 | 9 a.m.–5 p.m. Day One features a keynote address by Marcela Cuellar and panels on the HSI landscape, academic success, Latiné research, and community and belonging. Thursday offers flexible, drop-in participation—attend all or part of the program when it works best for your schedule. Join us afterward for a 5 p.m. reception with acoustic music by Ricardo Cárdenas and refreshments and bites from Sheild Catering.

Friday, October 23 | 9 a.m.–2 p.m. Facilitated by Abigail Leeder, Day Two is a collaborative planning workshop focused on recruitment and enrollment, retention and graduation, research, and culture building. Participants will identify priorities and develop initial action plans, including practical steps that could begin soon and longer-term strategies.

Day Two has limited capacity, requires organizer confirmation, and asks participants to commit to the full session from 9 a.m.–2 p.m. To express interest, email cllas@uoregon.edu with a brief description of the perspectives, experiences, or ideas you hope to contribute.

We especially welcome campus and community members with lived experience as Latiné college students, as well as those who work closely with current and prospective Latiné college students, youth, and their families and can speak to their experiences, needs, and aspirations.

Free to attend. Complimentary coffee and tea will be served in the mornings, and lunch will be provided both days.

🔗 Learn more and register 📅 View the symposium schedule

Join the Schnitzer School of Global Studies and Languages for Representing Central Asia in the Academy: Methodologies of Teaching and Scholarship

This gathering brings together scholars to discuss current research on Central Asia and approaches to teaching the region across disciplines.

Sponsored by REEES and the Global Studies Institute.

Lunch will be provided for participants and audience members from noon to 1:00 p.m., followed by two panels and a closing discussion.

1:00–2:30 p.m. | Current Research on Central Asia Moderator: Julie Hessler

• Christianna Bonin, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga: “The Loudest Void: Landscapes at KARLAG”

• Sangita Gopal, University of Oregon: “Decolonial Geographies: ‘Mendirman Jaloluddin,’ Television Coproductions and Geopolitical Realignments”

• Soonmin Kwon, University of Oregon: “Siberian Internment After World War II in Central Asia and its Legacies”

• Katya Hokanson, University of Oregon: “Russian Representations of Central Asia in 1900 Paris”

3:00–4:30 p.m. | Pedagogy in Relation to Central Asia Moderator: Katya Hokanson

• Naomi Caffee, Reed College: “Central Asia Everywhere”

• Julie Hessler, University of Oregon: “Integrating Central Asia into Soviet History”

• Lara Ravitch, University of Oregon: “Integrating Central Asian Cultures into Russian Language Pedagogy”

• Christianna Bonin, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga: “Central Asia: New Methods for Pedagogy”

4:30–5:00 p.m. | Wrap-up and General Discussion

Public Lands Justice: A Conversation with Midy Aponte-Vargas and Shandra Terry.

Aponte-Vargas is the founding Executive Director of the American Latino Heritage Fund at the National Park Foundation. Terry is the former USDA Forest Service National Communications and Engagement Lead for the National Equity and Engagement Office.

Co-sponsors: Just Futures Institute, Tierra Viva, Center for Environmental Futures, Oregon Humanities Center, the Barbara and Carlisle Moore Professor in English, Environmental Studies, English, Climate Justice league, Environmental Storytelling Lab, and FUSEE.

Join the Department of Cinema Studies for a cup of coffee or hot apple cider every week on Tuesdays during fall term!

Environmental concerns—from nature conservation to air and water quality—are often associated with progressive politics. But under Fascisms past and present, ecological ideas have also animated authoritarian projects. This speaker series examines how dictatorships mobilize nature as both metaphor and material resource. As a metaphor, agrarianism evokes Fascism’s foundational mythos: the dictator will restore the country’s glorious national past. To live a rural, old-fashioned lifestyle was to be a more patriotic citizen. “Italy must be ruralized!” proclaimed Benito Mussolini in 1927. As a material resource, nature is often put to use in service of eugenics and racial hygiene.

Our speakers will examine the professional biographies of the scientists, industrialists, and entrepreneurs hired by Fascist regimes to determine the limits of biological possibility. Case studies from empire and the colonies will investigate the Fascist programs for experimental plant nurseries, animal breeding, and chemical trials. Rather than treating eco-fascism as a contradiction in terms, our speakers will situate it within longer histories of environmental planning, population management, and technocratic governance. They will explain how dictatorships use the tools of authoritarian governance to modify the environment in their pursuit of more Fascist futures.

Please join us for these illuminating discussions.

Talk details:

Blood and Soil: Race, Gender and Food in Nazi Ideology

Speaker: Prof. Alice Weinreb, Loyola University

This talk will explore the ways in which Hitler’s ‘blood and soil’ ideology raced and gendered the natural environment. According to Nazi ideology, ‘natural’ food was necessary for the maintenance of a pure and healthy Volk. Food thus was a way of constructing (and potentially of threatening) gender and racial identities. Weinreb’s talk will explore the ways in which nature was transformed into something to be consumed, which in turn naturalized Aryan supremacy and radical gender hierarchies. In Nazi Germany, racial and gender identity was performed through daily acts of food production (farming and cooking) and food consumption (shopping and eating). The talk also discusses the ramifications of linking the protection of the environment with the protection of racism and misogyny, discussing connections to contemporary far-right discourses linking environmental contamination, impure food, and racial and gender hierarchies.

For more information, please contact Prof. Diana Garvin, dgarvin@uoregon.edu.

Supported by: Department of Romance Languages, Italian Sector.

Please join us Thursday mornings for a free cup of coffee, pastries, and conversation with your history department community! We’re excited to continue this tradition for our history  undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, and staff. We hope to see you there! 

Join us for a spooky season-themed open house, trick-or-treat style! Meet the faculty, ask questions, learn about winter term classes, and grab candy as you go.

Free and open to all IRES students.

The Oregon Humanities Center hosts weekly Work-in-Progress Talks to showcase the humanities research of its many fellows. This week, Naomi Sussman presents her research on "Peoples of the Heartland: Native Nations, Sovereign Acts, and the Making of California."

Sussman's research maps how small Indigenous polities in California used relationships with human neighbors and the natural world to enact their sovereignty between 1769 and 1930. Indigenous peoples’ sovereign acts made the California interior into a Native heartland that survived and shaped four waves of Native and Euro-American invasion: first a Native confederacy on the Colorado River and the Spanish Empire, then Mexico and United States. Their story is an epic of Native power and adaptiveness in the face of enslavement and genocide. 

Join us for this Work-in-Progress Talk in the OHC Conference Room (Prince Lucien Campbell Hall 159) at noon on Fridays. These events are free and open to the public. Please register for this event online at ohc.uoregon.edu.

Get your costume on and join us for a free family event. Spooky decor...Halloween crafts...face painting...photo booth...costume parades!