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X-WR-CALDESC:Events for The Humanities Institute
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250421T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250421T130000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
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SUMMARY:Giuseppe Longo - From the Alphabet to AI: Discretizing the World
DESCRIPTION:The History of Consciousness department\, in collaboration with the Humanities in the Age of AI Cluster\, is pleased to present “From the Alphabet to AI: Discretizing the World” delivered by Giuseppe Longo. The talk will take place April 21st at 1pm in Humanities 1 Room 210\, with a virtual attendance option available. To attend virtually\, join here. \nThe invention of the alphabet marked a fundamental shift in our epistemic relation to the world. In particular\, the Greek alphabet played a crucial role in shaping our cultures\, leading up to today’s “term re-writing machines” that are transforming our lives. The vision of a world that can be fully described in elementary and simple components lies at the foundation of two techno-sciences of great interest and power. We informally compare the perspectives developed in cognitive and natural sciences through the lens of differing mathematical tools\, e.g. continuous vs discrete mathematics. Both historical and contemporary scientific alternatives will be briefly discussed. \nGiuseppe Longo is a Research Director CNRS (Emeritus)\, Cavaillès interdisciplinary center of Ecole Normale Supérieure\, Paris (ENS)\, formely in the Dept. of Mathematics and Computer Science\, at ENS (1990-2012). He has been Professor of Mathematics for Informatics\, University of Pisa (1981-1990) and adjunct professor\, School of Medicine\, Tufts U.\, Boston (2013-19). He spent three years in the USA (Berkeley\, M.I.T.\, Carnegie Mellon) as researcher and visiting professor\, and frequent visitor in Oxford (GB) and Utrecht (NL). Founder and editor-in-chief (1990-2015) of Mathematical Structures in Computer Science\, Camdridge U.P..\, he is (co-)author of more than 100 papers and six books. In the last 20 years\, he extended his research interests and work to the epistemology of mathematics and theoretical biology.
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/giuseppe-longo-from-the-alphabet-to-ai-discretizing-the-world/
LOCATION:Humanities 1\, Room 210\, 1156 high st\, Santa cruz\, CA\, 95060\, United States
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250422T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250422T193000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250318T220227Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250318T220227Z
UID:10007631-1745344800-1745350200@thi.ucsc.edu
SUMMARY:Deep Read Salon: The Craft of James
DESCRIPTION:Join us for a virtual Deep Read salon on Percival Everett’s James featuring UC Santa Cruz Professors of Literature and Creative Writing\, Micah Perks and Karen Tei Yamashita. Professors Perks and Yamashita will discuss the writing craft and techniques of the novel\, offering insights on the book from their perspective as novelists and memoirists. Their presentations will be followed by an audience Q&A period\, which will be moderated by Professor of Literature and Deep Read Faculty Co-Lead\, Vilashini Cooppan. \n \n\n \nThe Deep Read is an annual program of The Humanities Institute at UC Santa Cruz made possible through the generous support of the Helen and Will Webster Foundation. We invite curious minds to think deeply about books and the most pressing issues of our contemporary moment.
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/deep-read-salon-the-craft-of-james/
LOCATION:Virtual Event
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250423T121500
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250423T140000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250313T211719Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250424T191606Z
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SUMMARY:TechnoScience Improv
DESCRIPTION:This roundtable improv (12.15-2.00pm) brings together ten UCSC scholars working on social\, historical\, and cultural studies of science\, technology and medicine. The event will be structured around eight open\, improvised conversations\, each beginning with a question from a different panelist exploring emerging practices\, speculative transformations\, and critical imaginings of technoscience\, health and ecology. \nParticipants include: \nKaren Barad\, Distinguished Professor of Feminist Studies\, Philosophy\, and History of Consciousness. \nJames Doucet-Battle\, Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and Co-Director of the Science & Justice Research Center. \nKat Gutierrez\, Assistant Professor in the History Department. \nDimitris Papadopoulos\, Professor of History of Consciousness in the Department of History of Consciousness. \nMaria Puig de la Bellacasa\, Professor of History of Consciousness in the Department of History of Consciousness. \nJenny Reardon\, Professor of Sociology and the Founding Director of the Science & Justice Research Center. \nWarren Sack\, Professor of the Software Arts in the Film + Digital Media Department. \nKriti Sharma\, Assistant Professor of Critical Race Science and Technology Studies in Critical Race and Ethnic Studies. \nMatt Sparke\, Professor of Politics in the Politics Department and Co-Director of Global and Community Health. \nZac Zimmer\, Associate Professor of Literature in the Literature Department. \n\nCo-sponsored by History of Consciousness: earth ecologies x technoscience conversations\, Center for Cultural Studies\, Global and Community Health\, and the Science & Justice Research Center.
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/technoscience-improv-2025/
LOCATION:Humanities 1\, Room 210\, 1156 high st\, Santa cruz\, CA\, 95060\, United States
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250423T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250423T200000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250304T212345Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250327T181001Z
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SUMMARY:Debbie Millman - Love Letter to a Garden
DESCRIPTION:Bookshop Santa Cruz presents Debbie Millman\, award-winning artist\, designer\, and the host of the podcast Design Matters\, will discuss her beautiful new book Love Letter to a Garden\, a visual story of falling in love with gardening—and the philosophies that work conjures. \n \nDebbie Millman always thought of herself as a bad gardener. Nevertheless\, she kept trying. Over the years she came to realize that no one is a bad gardener—a garden is a journey that develops over time\, through space\, and evolves along with our hearts. In Love Letter to a Garden\, Debbie Millman shares her journey to make and grow a garden—and the plants she has collected along the way—a process that started with handed-down houseplants from beloved friends and a lone peony. \nDebbie Millman has been named “one of the most creative people in business” by Fast Company\, and “one of the most influential designers working today” by GDUSA. Millman is an illustrator\, author\, educator\, and host of the podcast Design Matters. Broadcasting for 19 years\, Design Matters is one of the first and longest running podcasts in the world. The show won a Cooper Hewitt National Design Award in 2011\, and Apple has named it one of their “All Time Favorites” three times. In 2023 the show won two Webby’s\, three Communicator Awards\, a Signal Award\, three awards from The Academy of Interactive and Visual Arts\, and earned an Ambie nomination. \nMore information at: Debbie Millman\, Love Letter to a Garden | Bookshop Santa Cruz \nCo-sponsored by The Humanities Institute at UC Santa Cruz.
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/bookshop-santa-cruz-presents-debbie-millman-love-letter-to-a-garden/
LOCATION:Bookshop Santa Cruz\, 1520 Pacific Avenue\, Santa Cruz\, CA\, 95060\, United States
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250424T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250424T163000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250321T022539Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250409T202635Z
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SUMMARY:Connections to land with Mercedes Dorame\, joined by Aspen Mays\, Unseen California
DESCRIPTION:Mercedes Dorame uses her artistic process to examine and rebuild her relationship with the land. This talk will explore personal\, social\, and institutional connections to home\, site\, and land. These concepts intersect within her work as an Indigenous artist as she addresses both the taught and erased histories the land holds\, as well as its broader identity in relation to ideas of landscape photography. Centering on Indigenous relationships\, reciprocity\, and kinship with the land\, her work interrogates tangible\, centered\, and embodied experiences within lens-based practice. \nDorame will speak about her work and multi-year engagement with Unseen California. She will then be joined by Karolina Karlic\, Director and Founder of Unseen California and artist Aspen Mays\, part of the project’s first cohort for a round table discussion about the project and their publication\, Language Has No Weather: Field Notes from Unseen California. Copies will be available for sale. \nSponsored by: Art Department Environmental Art + Social Practice MFA Program\, American Indian Resource Center\, Unseen California\, Arts Research Institute\, The Humanities Institute.
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/mercedes-dorame-connections-to-land/
LOCATION:Digital Arts Research Center #108
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250424T160000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250424T180000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250417T173155Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250506T214135Z
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SUMMARY:Amanda Batarseh - Rooted Movements: The Radical Poetics of Palestinian Space
DESCRIPTION:The Center for Racial Justice (CRJ) is proud to present Rooted Movements: The Radical Poetics of Palestinian Space with Amanda Batarseh\, Assistant Professor of Literature at UC San Diego. \nAnalyses of Palestinian poetics often expose the violent structure of ongoing-Nakba — the Zionist settler-colonial uprooting and removal of Palestinians (both physically from the land and physiologically from life) since 1948. Thinking beyond colonial epistemology\, however\, is not merely a task of refuting settler-colonial narratives but of dismantling the very ways of knowing that produce them. This talk re-centers a Palestinian analytic through the lens of “radicality\,” which encompasses both Palestinian rootedness and revolutionary movement. This radicality both predates and regenerates in contravention of settler colonialism’s violent uprootings/removals\, unsettling colonial-national constructs of spatial belonging\, and cohering the decolonization of literary analysis to then decolonization of our physical geographies. Palestinian writers navigate the dynamic tensions between rootedness and movement to forge liberatory pathways\, opening up alternative horizons of political and creative possibility. \n \nAmanda Batarseh (بطارسة / bah–taar–say) is Assistant Professor of Literature at UC San Diego. Her teaching and research focuses on Palestinian literature\, Arabic literature\, Arab American and Arab diaspora literature\, Indigenous studies\, Mediterranean studies and comparative literature. Her research has been supported by the UC Humanities Research Institute\, Hellman Fellowship\, Faculty Career Development Program and the UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program. \nCo-sponsored by Feminist Studies\, Critical Race and Ethnic Studies (CRES)\, Students for Justice in Palestine\, Faculty for Justice in Palestine\, Center for Cultural Studies\, Center for South Asian Studies (CSAS)\, Center for the Middle East and North Africa (CMENA)\, Anthropology Department\, Sociology Department\, Institute for Social Transformation\, and People’s University. \nPart of the year-long speaker series\, Possibilities of Palestinian Refusal: Against Disciplining Knowledge and Movement. For more information\, visit the CRJ website: https://crjucsc.com/.
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/amanda-batarseh-rooted-movements-the-radical-poetics-of-palestinian-space/
LOCATION:Virtual Event
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250424T170000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250424T200000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250313T194746Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250324T220118Z
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SUMMARY:Dr. Siva Vaidhyanathan - The High Cost of Outsourcing Thought: On the Ideology of Artificial Intelligence
DESCRIPTION:Each year\, the TLC hosts a convocation to bring together educators across the campus and from the local community to explore significant topics in teaching and learning in higher education. Each year’s keynote address is free and open to the public. \nThis year’s Convocation speaker will be Dr. Siva Vaidhyanathan\, who will present his talk\, The High Cost of Outsourcing Thought: On the Ideology of Artificial Intelligence. \nHis talk will examine the ideas that have motivated the rush to deploy both generative artificial intelligence and predictive artificial intelligence into our computer systems and our lives. It will consider the effects on our collective intelligence and our habits of creativity and collaboration. What problem do we hope to solve with this suite of technologies? What do we gain? What do we lose? And how should those questions shape how educators and students interface with these technologies? \nAfterwards\, Dr. Vaidhyanathan will be joined in conversation by THI Faculty Director and Linguistics Professor Pranav Anand. \n \nDr. Siva Vaidhyanathan is the Robertson Professor of Media Studies and director of the Center for Media and Citizenship at the University of Virginia. He is the author of Antisocial Media: How Facebook Disconnects Us and Undermines Democracy (Oxford University Press\, 2018)\, Intellectual Property: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press\, 2017)\, and The Googlization of Everything — and Why We Should Worry (University of California Press\, 2011). After five years as a professional journalist\, he earned a Ph.D. in American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin. He is a fellow at the New York Institute for the Humanities and a Faculty Associate of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. He was born and raised in Buffalo\, New York\, and resides in Charlottesville\, Virginia. \nPranav Anand is Professor of Linguistics and Faculty Director of The Humanities Institute at UC Santa Cruz. His research investigates how context mediates the interpretation of language\, and has explored the interpretation of subjectivity\, persuasive tactics\, bias\, evidence\, belief\, time\, and narrative structure. \n  \nTo view past convocations visit: TLC | About Convocation
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/tlc-convocation-2025/
LOCATION:Cultural Center at Merrill\, Merrill Cultural Center\, UC Santa Cruz\, Merrill College\, Santa Cruz\, CA\, 95064\, United States
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250425T132000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250425T132000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250424T210941Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250424T211041Z
UID:10007673-1745587200-1745587200@thi.ucsc.edu
SUMMARY:Linguistics Colloquia: Matt Wagers - Setting Healthy (mnemonic) Boundaries
DESCRIPTION:The Department of Linguistics is pleased to present Matt Wagers\, speaking on Setting Healthy (mnemonic) Boundaries. \nThis is an in-person event. You can also join virtually via Zoom. \nNearly 20 years ago\, Lewis & Vasishth (2005) applied the ACT-R modeling framework to language processing by creating an English parser fragment embedded in an associative memory. McElree (2000) and McElree\, Foraker & Dyer (2003) informed this development by providing earlier arguments in favor of such a content-addressable memory. This proved to be hugely influential because it offered a general theory of dependency resolution which could be made precise by reference to any particular theory of linguistic features. Both strands of thought reoriented thinking in the field away from models of working memory that required serial search procedures and\, generally\, the discovery of widespread interference effects has vindicated that shift. \nMuch recent research has made progress in delineating what the representations are (Yadav et al. 2023\, Keshev et al. 2025) and how they can be learned in an unsupervised manner (Ryu & Lewis\, 2021). Relatively unexplored is how to characterize the information that can be attended to simultaneously\, sometimes called the “focus of attention” (Oberauer & Hein\, 2012). This is an important commitment of models like ACT-R and provides an attractive point of articulation to theories of locality or linguistic domains. In this talk\, I will survey what we know (and don’t know) about the focus of attention in language processing (Wagers & McElree\, 2013\, 2022) and relate it to recent thinking about the dynamics of context encoding (Healey\, Long & Kahana\, 2019; Balachandran\, Wagers & Rich\, 2025). \nOver the course of each year\, the Linguistics department hosts colloquia by distinguished faculty from around the world. For more information: https://linguistics.ucsc.edu/news-events/colloquia/index.html
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/linguistics-colloquia-matt-wagers/
LOCATION:Humanities 1\, Room 202
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250426T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250426T100000
DTSTAMP:20260618T153712
CREATED:20250409T175417Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250409T180425Z
UID:10007657-1745661600-1745661600@thi.ucsc.edu
SUMMARY:Saturday Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night's Dream
DESCRIPTION:Saturday Shakespeare in Santa Cruz Presents A Midsummer Night’s Dream\, featuring a series of readings and conversations held Saturday mornings from April 26 to May 24\, 2025. The 1st hour will be spent in conversation with a guest speaker\, and during the 2nd hour volunteers will read aloud part of the play. During the final session\, on May 24th\, a film will be presented. Meetings will take place in the Aptos Library Community Room (in person) and over Zoom (virtual). \nFor more information\, Zoom link\, or to be a reader\, contact: saturdayshakespeare@gmail.com \nThe guest speaker on April 26 is Michael Warren\, Emeritus Professor of Literature\, UC Santa Cruz\, former dramaturg for Santa Cruz Shakespeare. Readings: Act 1\, Scenes 1 & 2 \nAll Scheduled Meetings \n\nApril 26: Michael Warren\nMay 3: Julia Lupton\nMay 10: Charles Pasternak\nMay 17: Sean Keilen\nMay 24 (Film Screening)
URL:https://thi.ucsc.edu/event/saturday-shakespeare-a-midsummer-nights-dream/
LOCATION:Aptos Library\, 7695 Soquel Dr\, Aptos\, 95003\, United States
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