September
10, 2004
Weissman
Center Offers Fall Series on 2004 Presidential Election
In a
semester-long series of public conversations and events, the
Weissman Center for Leadership and the Liberal Arts has invited
journalists, scholars, and cultural figures to address the relationship
between the 2004 U.S. presidential election and the precarious
state of world affairs.
Titled The Road [Not] Taken: The Real Choices of the 2004
Presidential Election,the series will focus on questions not being asked elsewhere, especially in the
mainstream media, according to professor of German studies and Weissman Center
codirector Karen Remmler.
“We want Mount Holyoke students to have a better understanding of the complexity
of both domestic and global issues involved in this election,” Remmler
said. “We want to help students make more informed choices, and the broader
community to join us in public conversations and debate.”
The series will kick off with a voter registration drive, cosponsored with the
Office of Student Programs and The Network, during the Welcome Back Carnival
Sunday, September 12, on Skinner Green from 1 to 5 pm. There will be tables with
Massachusetts registration forms and information about polling places. For out-of-state
voters, there will be information about absentee ballots and deadlines for each
state.
Representatives from College Democrats, College Republicans, True Colors, and
People Opposing War plan to set up information booths at the drive. Doria Roberts,
an Atlanta-based singer/songwriter/political activist, will perform at 7:30 pm.
“The great thing about kicking off the election series in conjunction with
the Welcome Back Carnival is that it sets the tone for the rest of the events
as educational and really fun at the same time,” said Abby Ferguson ’03,
assistant director of the Weissman Center.
On Thursday, September 16, Theodore Lowi and Sean Wilentz will pick up where
they left off in their post-2000 election discussion at MHC. Lowi, senior professor
of American institutions at Cornell, and Wilentz, Dayton-Stockton Professor of
History at Princeton, will engage in a dialogue titled, “Winner Takes All?
The Effect of the 2000 Election on the 2004 Race to the Finish,” which
will take place in Gamble Auditorium at 7:30 pm.
Mary Renda, associate professor of history and women’s studies, will serve
as moderator. Lowi and Wilentz will tackle the following questions: What are
the myths that obscure the real issues of the 2004 elections? Will the present
political momentum affect voter turnout in this election? Was the outcome of
the 2000 presidential election a “profound shock to our system,” and
how do we view it now, four years later?
On Wednesday, September 22, Labor Party national organizer Mark Dudzic will discuss
the various agendas in U.S. party politics. Included in a cluster of discussions
during and after the overall series, his talk “Competing Social Visions
of the 2004 Presidential Election” will take place in the Stimson Room
in the library at 7:30 pm. Preston H. Smith II, associate director of politics
and associate director of the Weissman Center for community-based learning, will
moderate.
Switching gears, the next event in the series is a panel discussion that will
explore the meaning and impact of the images of war in Iraq that have circulated
in the mainstream and alternative media. Professor of politics Joan Cocks will
moderate “Visual Exposures: Media Images and the War in Iraq” Monday,
September 27, in the New York Room of Mary Woolley Hall at 7:30 pm. Panelists
include Dorit Naamen, Ford associate at the Five College Women’s Studies
Research Center and professor of film studies at Queen’s University in
Canada; Margaret R. Hunt, professor of history and women’s and gender study
at Amherst College; Sut Jhally, professor of communication at the University
of Massachusetts; and Remmler.
“Our discussion will focus on the way that images influence contradictory
public reactions and understanding of the war in Iraq,” Remmler said. “Two
of our panelists, Naaman and Sully, are documentary filmmakers and their insights
on critical documentary films, such as Fahrenheit 9/11, Control Room, and Hijacking
Catastrophe, will inform a broader discussion of the role of mainstream media
in conveying news and analysis of current events.”
The Weissman series will host an event every week leading up to election. A postelection
discussion with Frances Fox Piven, distinguished professor of political science
and sociology at the Graduate School and University Center of CUNY, and others
is scheduled for Thursday, November 4. All events are free and open to the public.
For more information on the series, go to www.mtholyoke.edu/go/wcl.
Schedule
of Events
The Road [Not] Taken: The Real Choices
of the 2004 Presidential Election
Sunday, September 12, 1–5
pm
Voter Registration Drive
Blanchard Campus Center and Skinner Green
Sunday, September 12, 7:30 pm
Folksinger Doria Roberts
Blanchard Campus Center
Thursday, September 16, 7:30 pm
Winner Takes All? The Effect of the 2000 Election on the 2004
Race to the Finish
Speakers: Theodore
Lowi, Senior Professor of American Institutions
at Cornell, and Sean Wilentz, Dayton-Stockton Professor of History
at Princeton
Gamble Auditorium, Art Building
Wednesday, September 22, 7:30 pm
Competing Social Visions of the 2004
Presidential Election
Speaker: Mark Dudzic, Labor Party national
organizer Stimson Room, Williston Library
Monday, September 27, 7:30 pm
Visual Exposures: Media Images and
the War in Iraq
Speakers: Dorit
Naaman, Ford associate at the Five College Women’s
Studies Research Center and professor of film studies at Queen’s
University in Canada; Margaret R. Hunt, professor of history
and women’s and gender study at Amherst College; Sut Jhally,
professor of communication at the University of Massachusetts;
and Karen Remmler, professor of German studies and Weissman Center
for Leadership and the Liberal Arts codirector
New York Room, Mary Woolley Hall
Thursday, October 7, 7:30 pm
Human Rights in the U.S. and Abroad:
Who Decides Which Rights Are Guaranteed?
Speakers: Elaine
Scarry, Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics
and the General Theory of Value at Harvard, and John
Shattuck,
chief executive officer at the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
and former assistant secretary of state for democracy, human
rights, and labor
Gamble Auditorium, Art Building
Thursday, October 14, 7:30 pm
The Significance of the Latino Vote
to the 2004 Presidential Election
Speakers: Rodolfo do la Garza, professor of political
science and vice president for research at Tomás Rivera
Policy Institute of Columbia University; Lisa Garcia Bedolla,
assistant professor of political science at University of California
at Irvine; and Andres Torres, professor and director of the Mauricio
Gastón Institute for Latino Community Development and
Public Policy at University of Massachusetts Boston
Gamble Auditorium, Art Building
Thursday, October 21, 7:30 pm
Views from Abroad: The International Implications of the 2004
Election Outcome
Speakers: Claude
de Renty du Granrut, deputy mayor of Senlis, France; His
Excellency Péter Balázs, Hungarian
representative at the European Convention, where he helped draft
the European Union’s first constitution; Janine
Zacharia,
Washington correspondent for the Jerusalem Post;
and Federick O. Wanyama, from the department
of history and political science at Maseno University
in Kenya
Gamble Auditorium, Art Building
Wednesday, October 27, 7:30 pm
Voting Matters: Who Votes and Why?
Speakers: Victoria Blom ’06, Heather Fraser ’06, and Amanda
Smith ’06
Room 305, Kendade Hall
Thursday, November 4, 7:30 pm
The Postelection Snapshot
Speaker: Frances
Fox Piven, distinguished professor of political
science and sociology at the Graduate School and University Center
of CUNY
Gamble Auditorium, Art Building
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