Speakers and Events

Annual Department Seminar Series

Fall 2009
September
Wednesday, 9/30/09 at 4 pm., G. Rickey Welch, Professor & Joseph N. Tatarewicz, Associate Professor and Director, Human Context of Science & Technology Program, UMBC, speaking on C.P. Snow's _The Two Cultures_: A Fifty Year Perspective, at A. O. Kuhn Library, 7th Floor

While the issues C.P. Snow raised and the terms within which he analyzed them have changed since his 1959 lecture on “the two cultures” almost every discussion of the relationship between science, technology, and the humanities has used his characterizations as a starting point. The divide Snow identified has been evoked more recently in the "culture wars" and "science wars." UMBC Professors Welch and Tatarewicz initiate this C.P. Snow series by looking at Snow, his historical context, and his enduring influence.

October
October 7, 5:30 pm, A. O. Kuhn Library Gallery, Talk, Jonathan Fein: Objects and Memory
October 5, 5:30 pm, Lecture Hall 5, Film screening
Documentary Director, Jonathan Fein, will discuss his film, Objects and Memory, and share out-takes on Wednesday, October 7 at 5:30 in the Library Gallery. Fein is an artist who works in sculpture as well as film. His previous work includes the award-winning documentary, Journeys to Peace and Understanding; the Emmy Award-winning series, 4Stories; and the documentaries, The Competition, Death Row Diaries, and A Change of Heart. In anticipation of this event, the Department of History will host a screening of the film on Monday, October 5 at 5:30 pm in Lecture Hall 5.

October 13, 4:00-6:00 pm, Documentary Screening, Autumn Gem: China's First Feminist
A. O. Kuhn Library Gallery.

Annual Webb Lecture, Wednesday, October 14, at 4 p.m., Sandra Herbert, Professor Emerita speaking on Lincoln and Darwin" at A. O. Kuhn Library, Gallery.

Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin were each born on February 12, 1809. The enormity of their importance in their respective areas of interest– politics for Lincoln, science for Darwin– became apparent when each man was about fifty years old. They never met. Yet Lincoln was aware of and sympathetic to evolutionary views, and Darwin was keenly supportive of abolition. This lecture will consider their lives and accomplishments in juxtaposition.

Sponsored by the UMBC’s Department of History and the Phi Beta Kappa Chapter with support from the Dresher Center for the Humanities

November
Pedagogy Workshop, Wednesday, 11/04/09, 4 pm., in Admin. 711

December
TBA

Annual Lectures

The UMBC History Department presents special lectures open to the public during the school year.

The Robert K. Webb Lecture honors Professor Robert K. Webb, distinguished scholar of British history and former chair of the History Department.  The Department invites leading scholars to lecture on European history each Fall semester.

The W. Augustus Low Lecture is in memory of Professor Augustus Low, founder of the History Department.  In keeping with Professor Low's area of specialization, the Lecture brings historians of Civil Rights and Southern History to campus each Spring semester. 

The Social Science Forum presents topics and perspectives of vital interest to the social sciences community and beyond. Lectures are free and open to the public and will last approximately one hour, followed by a question and answer period and a reception. Events take place throughout the year.

The Humanities Forum The UMBC Humanities Forum offers a program of events that illustrate the richness of contemporary work in philosophy, history, culture, language, literature, and the arts. The Forum is particularly interested in demonstrating the links that bring the humanities, the social sciences, and the sciences together.