June 6 – Alexander Buzgalin – The Collapse of Socialism in the Soviet Union

Special Event: Alexander Buzgalin on
“The Collapse of Socialism in the Soviet Union”

Alexander Buzgalin will discuss “The Collapse of Socialism in the Soviet Union: A Russian Marxist Analysis” on Tuesday, June 6 (6:00 PM) at the Tamiment Library. A reception with wine and cheese will follow the lecture. This event is co-sponsored by the Tamiment Library, the Frederic Ewen Center, the Center for the United States and the Cold War, and Science & Society
.
Alexander Buzgalin is a Russian Marxist. He is a professor at Moscow State University and the coordinator of the Social Movement “Alternatives.”

RSVP: email tamiment.events[at]nyu.edu with guest name(s) & event title.

*CFP Deadline Extension* May 15 // “Mediated Populisms” // Keynote Zeynep Tufekci

DEADLINE EXTENDED TO MONDAY, MAY 15, 2017
Conference Date: Oct. 6, 2017
Keynote: Zeynep Tufekci

Submission Details

In this conference we will explore the relationship between “populism”, across ideological spectrums and national boundaries, and media—that is, the practices, economies, and politics of information circulation, production, and consumption through various industries, networks, and technologies. If we understand populism to be a political “logic” rather than orientation [1], how is this logic mediated differently across a range of political alternatives? In what ways does the conflation of political logic and orientation foreclose political possibilities? How are multiple techniques and technologies—old and new—leveraged to assert or deny populist discourse?

Crucially, this conference is interested in the relationship between the charge of “populism” perpetuated by information industries, its cultural and technological mediation, and the equating of divergent political platforms.

This conference invites scholars to interrogate the role of media in the ongoing global rise of populist leaders and movements. For example, how do we understand the similarities that bridge these groups—their anti-woman, anti-LGBTQ, and ethno-nationalist foundations—while each has emerged within distinct economic, racial, and religious contexts? How can these similarities hold when national media industries are shaped by distinct market pressures and degrees of government regulation? With the election, nomination, and/or rise of leaders from Modi to Erdogan, Trump to Berlusconi, Le Pen to Orban, and the implementation of nativist political maneuvers like Brexit and immigration bans, how have media represented these figures and actions as anti-establishment? As representative of the desires of “the people”? Can populism be said to have globalized? How have media promoted facile comparisons between leaders of opposing political movements, e.g., Castro and Chavez in Latin America to Trump and Erdogan in the U.S. and Turkey? As today’s right-wing populisms amplify anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant sentiment, what are mediaís responsibility to their viewerships?

We invite papers to address these themes broadly and/or from the perspective of particular movements or moments. Possible frames of analysis include (but are by no means limited to):

Media and Information Industries, ex: news; social media; national, transnational, and multinational political-economic and legal frameworks; governance; institutional transformations; big data; networks and circulation

Digital Inequalities, ex: power relations in technology; white supremacy; trolling; infrastructures and systems of control; labor; online performance; of code; algorithmic biases

Activist Media, ex: social movements and social justice; witnessing; networked protest; privacy and surveillance; feminist media; affect and politics

Political Futurity, ex: decolonization and settler colonial critique; indigenous futurity; queer of color critique; Black studies; feminist technoscience; speculative methods; migration; critiques of liberalism; complicity; vulnerability; imperialism and empire; crisis, risk, and precarity.

Notes: [1] Ernesto Laclau, On Populist Reason (New York: Verso Books, 2005), 117.

May 11 – Clarence Taylor – The Long Black Struggle Against Police Brutality

Cold War Seminar: Clarence Taylor on “The Long Black Struggle Against Police Brutality in New York City”

For the last Cold War seminar of the spring semester, Clarence Taylor (Baruch College) will discuss “The Long Black Struggle Against Police Brutality in New York City” on Thursday, May 11.  Alex Vitale (Brooklyn College) will comment.

The seminar will take place from 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM in the Tamiment Library conference room on the tenth floor of the Bobst Library, 70 Washington Square South. A reception with wine and cheese will follow the Q&A session. This seminar is sponsored by the Center for the United States and the Cold War.

RSVP: email tamiment.events[at]nyu.edu with guest name(s) & event title.

*Deadline Extension* May 15 // “Mediated Populisms” // Keynote Zeynep Tufekci

In this conference we will explore the relationship between “populism”, across ideological spectrums and national boundaries, and media—that is, the practices, economies, and politics of information circulation, production, and consumption through various industries, networks, and technologies. If we understand populism to be a political “logic” rather than orientation [1], how is this logic mediated differently across a range of political alternatives? In what ways does the conflation of political logic and orientation foreclose political possibilities? How are multiple techniques and technologies—old and new—leveraged to assert or deny populist discourse?

Crucially, this conference is interested in the relationship between the charge of “populism” perpetuated by information industries, its cultural and technological mediation, and the equating of divergent political platforms.

This conference invites scholars to interrogate the role of media in the ongoing global rise of populist leaders and movements. For example, how do we understand the similarities that bridge these groups—their anti-woman, anti-LGBTQ, and ethno-nationalist foundations—while each has emerged within distinct economic, racial, and religious contexts? How can these similarities hold when national media industries are shaped by distinct market pressures and degrees of government regulation? With the election, nomination, and/or rise of leaders from Modi to Erdogan, Trump to Berlusconi, Le Pen to Orban, and the implementation of nativist political maneuvers like Brexit and immigration bans, how have media represented these figures and actions as anti-establishment? As representative of the desires of “the people”? Can populism be said to have globalized? How have media promoted facile comparisons between leaders of opposing political movements, e.g., Castro and Chavez in Latin America to Trump and Erdogan in the U.S. and Turkey? As today’s right-wing populisms amplify anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant sentiment, what are mediaís responsibility to their viewerships?

We invite papers to address these themes broadly and/or from the perspective of particular movements or moments. Possible frames of analysis include (but are by no means limited to):

Media and Information Industries, ex: news; social media; national, transnational, and multinational political-economic and legal frameworks; governance; institutional transformations; big data; networks and circulation

Digital Inequalities, ex: power relations in technology; white supremacy; trolling; infrastructures and systems of control; labor; online performance; of code; algorithmic biases

Activist Media, ex: social movements and social justice; witnessing; networked protest; privacy and surveillance; feminist media; affect and politics

Political Futurity, ex: decolonization and settler colonial critique; indigenous futurity; queer of color critique; Black studies; feminist technoscience; speculative methods; migration; critiques of liberalism; complicity; vulnerability; imperialism and empire; crisis, risk, and precarity.

Notes: [1] Ernesto Laclau, On Populist Reason (New York: Verso Books, 2005), 117.

** For more details and to submit, click here !**

May 16 – Richard Wormser – American Reds

Film Screening: Richard Wormser on American Reds

Richard Wormser will screen and discuss his documentary American Reds on Tuesday, May 16 (4:00 PM) at the Tamiment Library. A reception with wine and cheese will follow the discussion. This event is sponsored by the Frederic Ewen Center.

Richard Wormser has written, produced and/or directed over fifty programs for television, foundations, educational institutions, and government. He is the originator, series producer, co-director/writer of a four-part television series, The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow. The series received national acclaim and has won the prestigious Peabody Award for excellence in television programming, three national Emmy nominations, the International Documentary Association Best Series award, Cine Gold Eagle and the Chris Award.

Wormser has also written ten books for young adults on social issues including The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow, Growing Up Muslim, Hoboes: Wandering in America, and Lifers: Learn the Truth at the Expense of our Sorrow. He teaches at Fordham University and the University of New Haven.​

RSVP: email tamiment.events[at]nyu.edu with guest name(s) & event title.