Spring 2002: Building Meaning: Architecture and Public Space
In The Third Millenium
Architecture is about building. But this is also about the entire
fabric of human interaction and expression. And architects-whether
Elizabeth Diller in her design for the "Blur Building"
in Yverdon-les-Bains, Switzerland, or Daniel Libeskind with his
remarkable Jewish Museum in Berlin-are among our most eloquent
and forceful purveyors of ideas about where we are going in the
new millennium. How do buildings and their surroundings get built
amid competing claims of utility, cost, beauty, and politics?
How can the design of buildings and public spaces shape society
and culture? In a year-long series of lectures and events, timed
to coincide with the implementation of a campus master plan at
Mount Holyoke College, students and faculty will engage these
issues with leading architects, critics, urban planners, and specialists
in adaptive reuse and historical preservation. The fall events
will focus on shaping the public realm. In the spring, when Diller
and Libeskind will be among the featured speakers, the focus will
shift to the architect as visionary.
February 4, 2002
"The 1960 Smith College Homosexual Scandal: A Crucial Episode in
the History of American Repression"
Barry Werth, author of "Scarlet Professor: Newton Arvin, A Literary Life
Shattered by Scandal," will discusss the events in his volume.
February 28, 2002
"New York"
Elizabeth Diller
Recipient of the first MacArthur Foundation "Genius"
Award given in the field of architecture, Elizabeth Diller is
among the most exciting architects working in the world today.
Diller, a professor of architecture at Princeton, and her partner,
Ricardo Scofidio, established the interdisciplinary firm of Diller
+ Scofidio, which fuses architecture with the visual and performing
arts. They designed the Blur Building in Switzerland-built primarily
of water vapor, and recently won the design competition for Boston's
new institute for Contemporary Art.
March 7-8 , 2002
Afghanistan and Beyond: Women's Activisim in Times of War
Sponsored by the Five College Women's Studies Research Center,
the Weissman Center for Leadership, and the "Crossing Borders:
Rethinking Area Studies Initiative" funded by the Ford Foundation.
This forum will address the dilemmas that women's rights, human
rights, and antimilitarist activists confront in the new world
order that has emerged since September 11. It will explore different
forms of transnational activism, ranging from grassroots movements
to institutionalized initiatives. Our objectives are to increase
awareness and understanding of the complexities surrounding
questions of women's rights in Afghanistan in the global context.
Among the most animated, urgent debates among women activists
is how to assess the relationship between global and local forms
of activism.
To what extent are women's interests best served by appeals to
universal rights as opposed to more culturally-and possibly religiously
grounded-conceptions? How fruitful are transnational alliances
to women's groups working at the community level? To what extent
do local groups benefit from the additional resources, publicity,
support, and legitimacy that transnational networks can provide?
Are women's groups in the Global South often forced to compromise
or reorder their priorities as a result of transnational alliances?
These questions have acquired unprecedented significance in addressing
the oppression and activism of Afghan women.
March 7 - The Dilemmas of Women's Human Rights: Afghanistan
and Beyond
Beverly Daniel Tatum, acting president, Mount
Holyoke College
Amrita Basu, director, Five College Women's
Studies Research Center.
Radhika Coomaraswamy, United Nations Special
Rapporteur on Violence Against Women for the United Nations
Human Rights Commission; director, International Centre for
Ethnic Studies, Colombo, Sri Lanka.
March 8 - Women's Activism in Afghanistan
This plenary explores the response by women's groups to the tumultuous
history of Afghanistan from the period of Soviet occupation to
the present. We will discuss women's responses both to Soviet
and to U.S. influence and later to the repressive Taliban regime.
We will ask about women's responses to the Taliban's collapse
and to the war that brought about its demise.
Moderator Nafisa Hoodbhoy, journalist, former
Ford Fellow at Amherst College, and producer for WFCR radio
Sahar Saba, member of RAWA, Revolutionary Association
of the Women of Afghanistan.
Amita Kulkarni, Program Assistant at The Women
& Public Policy Program, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard
University.
Fahima Vorgetts, an Afghan woman who was involved
in the Women's Democratic Organization, the first formal women's
rights movement in Afghanistan in the 1960's.
Roxanne Euben, Associate Professor, Department
of Political Science Wellesley College.
March 8 - Transnational Women's Activism
This plenary explores the efficacy of varied forms of transnational
activism. What makes some forms of transnational activism more
successful than others? Panelists will analyze tensions among
transnational groups around universal human rights. To what extent
do women's groups in the Middle East, South Asia, and the United
States differ in assessing certain universal rights for women?
Moderator Ali Mirsepassi, professor of sociology
and Near Eastern studies, Hampshire College.
Valentine Moghadam, 2001-2002 Woodrow Wilson
Center Fellow, director of women's studies, and associate professor
of sociology, Illinois State University.
Zoya Hasan, professor of political science, Centre
for Political Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Dehli,
India
Simona Sharoni, executive director, The Consortium
on Peace Research, Education, and Development (COPRED) and the
Peace Studies Association (PSA).
Marie-Aimee Helie Lucas, founder and coordinator,
Women Living Under Muslin Law.
March 8 - Democracy in Times of War
This plenary focuses on the challenges women have faced in seeking inclusion in peace negotiations. This in turn raises important questions about women's relationship to democratic processes that are governed by states. Panelists will reflect on the ways in which North American activists and scholars can support women's insertion into democratic processes in Afghanistan and examine challenges to democratic rights in the U.S. during this time of war.
Moderator Lucas Wilson, associate professor,
African American studies and economics, Mount Holyoke College
Sunera Thobani, assistant professor of women's
studies, University of British Columbia.
Mervat F. Hatem, professor of political science,
Howard University
Shala Haeri, director of Women's Studies, Boston
University
May 3, 2002
"The Jewish Museum"
by Michael Blumenthal
May 3, 2002
"Proof of Things Invisible"
by Daniel Libeskind
Daniel Libeskind is an international figure in architectural
practice and urban design. He is well-known for introducing a
new critical discourse into architecture and for his multidisciplinary
approach. His practice extends from building major cultural institutions
including museums and concert halls, landscape and urban projects,
to stage design, installations and exhibitions.
Born in postwar Poland in 1946, Libeskind became an American
citizen in 1965. Daniel Libeskind studied music in Israel (on
the America-Israel Cultural Foundation Scholarship) and in New
York becoming a virtuoso performer. He left music to study architecture
receiving his professional architectural degree at the Cooper
Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in 1970 in New York
City and a postgraduate degree in History and Theory of Architecture
at the School of Comparative Studies at Essex University in 1972.
Daniel Libeskind won the competition for the Jewish Museum Berlin
in 1989, which opened to the public in January 1999. His museum
for the city of Osnabrück, Germany, The Felix Nussbaum Haus,
opened in July 1998. Daniel Libeskind has lived in Berlin and
worked on numerous buildings and landscape projects around the
world. He is registered as an architect in Germany with the Bund
Deutscher Architekten (BDA). He is presently designing and constructing
The Spiral Extension to the Victoria & Albert Museum, London;
The Imperial War Museum - North, Manchester; The Jewish Museum
in San Francisco, U.S.A; the JVC University - Colleges of Public
Administration, Education and Art & Architecture, Guadalajara,
Mexico; Maurice Wohl Convention Centre, Bar Ilan University, Tel
Aviv; Atelier Weil, a private atelier/gallery in Mallorca, Spain;
the Extension to the Denver Art Museum, Denver, Colorado and most
recently a Post-Graduate Centre at the University of North London.
Libeskind has taught and lectured at many universities worldwide.
Currently he is a Professor at the Hochschule für Gestaltung,
Karlsruhe, Germany and the Cret Chair at the University of Pennsylvania.
He is a member of the European Academy of Arts and Letters, and
has been a member of the Akademie der Kunst since 1990. Libeskind
has been the recipient of numerous awards, most recently the Hiroshima
Art Prize, given to an artist whose work promotes peace;1999 Deutsche
Architekturpreis (German Architecture Prize) for the Jewish Museum
Berlin; in 2000 the Goethe Medaillon; in 1996 the American Academy
of Arts and Letters Award for Architecture and in the same year
the Berlin Cultural Prize; in 1997 an Honorary Doctorate from
Humboldt Universität, Berlin; and in 1999 an Honorary Doctorate
from the College of Arts and Humanities, Essex University, England.
His work has been exhibited extensively in major museums and galleries
around the world and has also been the subject of numerous international
publications in many languages. His ideas have influenced a new
generation of architects and those interested in the future development
of cities and culture.
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