George A. Miller
When George A. Miller died in 1951 he left an estate of almost a million dollars to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign "to be used . . . for educational purposes . . . other than current general operating expenses." More Information
Our guidelines have been extensively revised in order to streamline the application process. Application Site
Support for this series as a whole is provided by:
Office of the Chancellor, Office of Equal Opportunity and Access, Office of the Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, Office of the Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs, The Center for Advanced Study, George A. Miller Programs Committee and Peggy Harris Memorial Fund, The Council of Deans, and The Graduate College.
Other-Worldly and This-Worldly Piety and the Islamic Revival
January 31, 2005
Monday, 4:00 p.m. Third Floor, Levis Faculty Center
919 West Illinois Street, Urbana
Francis Robinson
Professor of the History of South Asia, Royal Holloway, University of London
Four centuries ago Muslim scholars began promoting a shift in Islamic piety from other-worldliness, associated with mysticism, toward a this-worldly faith. This-worldly activists emphasized God's transcendence, personal responsibility before God, and the need to create a righteous society on earth in order to achieve salvation. This shift became more pronounced in response to the assertion of western power throughout the Muslim world in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and has powerfully informed the modern Islamic revival.
In conjunction with: Center for Global Studies, Department of Anthropology, Department of Economics, Department of English, Department of History, Department of Landscape Architecture, Department of Linguistics, Department of Political Science, Department of Sociology, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Gender and Women's Studies Program, Global Crossroads Living/Learning Community, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, International Programs and Studies, Program for the Study of Religion, Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security, Program in Comparative and World Literature, Unit for Criticism and Interpretive Theory, Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program
David Graham DuBois
Founding President and CEO, W.E.B. DuBois Foundation, Inc.
Visiting Associate Professor, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Progress Toward Global Food Security: UN Development Goals for the Millennium
February 24, 2005
Thursday, 4:00 p.m. Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum 600 South Gregory, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Catherine Bertini
Under-Secretary General for Management, United Nations
The UN General Assembly's Millennium Summit in 2000 discussed challenges facing the United Nations in the new century. These goals, dubbed the Millennium Development Goals, outline targets for world health on issues ranging from child welfare to nutrition to disarmament.
Catherine Bertini, winner of the 2003 World Food Prize, reviews progress toward these global nutrition goals. During the 10 years she was Executive Director of the UN World Food Programme, Ms. Bertini was credited with assisting hundreds of millions of victims of wars and natural disasters throughout the world.
In conjunction with:
Center for African Studies, Center for International Business and Education Research, Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, College of Business, College of Medicine at Urbana-Champaign, College of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, Department of Animal Sciences, Department of Anthropology, Department of Crop Sciences, Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Studies, European Union Center, Food and Agribusiness Management Program, National Soybean Research Laboratory, Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security, Program in South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Spurlock Museum, Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program
The Past and the Internet
February 28, 2005
Monday, 4:00 p.m. Third Floor, Levis Faculty Center
919 West Illinois Street, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Geoffrey Bowker
Regis and Dianne McKenna Chair and Executive Director, Center for Science, Technology and Society, Santa Clara University
In the course of human history, it is rare enough for a significant technology for recording the past to develop: the past several millennia have given us writing, the printing press and now the Internet. What we can know about the past has changed dramatically with each such development. Geoffrey Bowker discusses the ways in which we are constructing new personal, intellectual and social pasts through the Internet and its attendant technologies.
In conjunction with:
Center for Global Studies, Department of Journalism, Department of Political Science, Institute for Government and Public Affairs, Global Crossroads Living-Learning Community, Russian, East European, and Eurasian Center, Spurlock Museum
From Midnight to the Millennium and Beyond: Democracy and Identity in Today's India
March 14, 2005 - Cancelled
Monday, 4:00 p.m. Third Floor, Levis Faculty
919 West Illinois Street, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Shashi Tharoor
Author of Nehru: A Biography (2003) and Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information, United Nations
When India became independent at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, its experiment in democracy was widely expected to fail. India has disappointed the Cassandras and is now known as the world's largest democracy. Issues of regional, social, and religious identity remain, however; and they raise questions about the future of India's democracy. Shashi Tharoor addresses these issues from the combined perspectives of an Indian citizen, acclaimed author and United Nations senior official.
In conjunction with: Department of History, Department of Linguistics, Department of Speech Communication, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, India Studies Distinguished Lecture Series, Global Studies Program, Political Science and Center for the Study of Democratic Governance, Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security, Program in Comparative and World Literature
The Real Meets the Imagined: Northwest Coast Art, Claude L?vi-Strauss and the Surrealists
March 31, 2005
Thursday, 7:30 p.m. Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum 600 South Gregory, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Marie Mauz?
George A. Miller Endowment Visiting Professor, UIUC and Senior Researcher, CNRS, Laboratoire d'Anthropologie Sociale, Paris
From the early 1920's on, French surrealists showed an elective sensibility toward Northwest Coast art. The great moment of real discovery of this art in Europe, however, occurred as a result of the exile to New York of many prominent European artists and intellectuals fleeing German occupation during World War II. This is the period when the anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss, the surrealist André Breton and their friends developed in the course of various cultural activities an emotional rather than an aesthetic attitude toward Northwest Coast art, which expressed the surrealists' poetic vision of the world.
In conjunction with:
Art History Program, Department of French, Krannert Art Museum, Lorado Taft Lectureship on Art Fund/College of Fine and Applied Arts, Native American House, Spurlock Museum Board, Spurlock Museum Guild
New Challenges, New Opportunities: For African Americans the Struggle
Continues
April 4, 2005
Monday, 4:00 p.m. Third Floor, Levis Faculty
919 West Illinois Street, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Mary Frances Berry
Geraldine R. Segal Professor of American Social Thought, University of Pennsylvania and Former Chair, U.S. Commission on Civil Rights
African Americans have historically faced considerable challenges to their goal of achieving equality of opportunity. These challenges become multiplied as members of the global population—for example, those fleeing repressive regimes, those in search of a better economic situation, those displaced by civil war or national disaster—arrive in the United States with hopes of attaining this very same goal. Dr. Berry will discuss these challenges, examining the allocation of domestic resources within the context of the global struggle for human rights.
In conjunction with:
Asian American Studies Program, Bruce D. Nesbitt African American Cultural Program, Center on Democracy in a Multiracial Society, College of Education, College of Law, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Department of Anthropology, Department of English, Department of Geography, Department of History, Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program, Student Organization Resource Fee (SORF), Urban League of Champaign County
Before Columbus? The Mystery of the Vinland Map
April 12, 2005
Tuesday, 4:00 p.m. Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum 600 South Gregory, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
In the 1950s, a parchment map depicting "Vinland," near present-day Labrador or Newfoundland, surfaced in Europe. Now housed at Yale University, this map has been the subject of intense controversy: is it the earliest map of North America or is it a modern forgery? Using radiocarbon dating, scientists offer convincing evidence of authenticity and a date of 1434 A.D., nearly sixty years before the arrival of Columbus.
A recent NOVA program on the Vinland Map called "The Viking Deception" presents an opposing view on this topic.
In conjunction with:
Campus Honors Program, Department of Anthropology, Department of the Classics, Department of Geology, Department of History, Department of Physics, Illinois Transportation Archaeological Research Program, Materials Research Laboratory, Medieval Studies Program, School of Chemical Sciences, Spurlock Museum
The Celebration of the Word: Maya Confront the Military as They Define Their Future
April 14, 2005 Thursday, 7:30 p.m. Third Floor, Levis Faculty
919 West Illinois Street, Urbana
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
June Nash
Distinguished Professor Emerita of Anthropology, City University of New York, Graduate Center
June Nash is an internationally recognized scholar of social movements in Latin America. Her publications focus on identity, cultural traditions, resistance, women's rights, popular movements, and community organizations. After fifty years of studying indigenous communities in Mexico and Guatemala, she is a leading authority on Mayan activists and leaders in Chiapas, one of the poorest and most indigenous states in Mexico.
In conjunction with:
Center for Global Studies, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Department of Anthropology, Department of Geography, Department of History, Department of Political Science, Department of Sociology, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, International Programs and Studies, International Council, Latina/Latino Studies Program, Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security, Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program, Amnesty International, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Chapter, Center for Latin American Studies - University of Chicago
Living and Thinking About It: Experience, Memory and Well-Being
April 19, 2005
Tuesday, 8:00 p.m. Foellinger Auditorium
South End of the Quadrangle
University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign
Daniel Kahneman
Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology and Professor of Public Affairs, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University and Nobel Laureate for Economics, 2002
Recent research indicates the importance of distinguishing between the quality of people's experiences as they are remembered and as they are lived. People evaluate their experiences as they occur, but their later recall of these experiences often differs from the original, and influences evaluations of their lives, as well as many of the choices they make. The distinction between on-line experience and retrospective evaluation sheds light on the understanding and measurement of happiness, as well as on defining concepts such as "utility" and "well-being."
In conjunction with:
Beckman Institute of
College of Business, Department of Business Administration, Department of Economics, Department of Educational Psychology, Department of Human and Community Development, Institute of Labor and Industrial Relations, Department of Political Science, Department of Sociology, Department of Statistics
The Chain of Command: From 9/11 to Abu Ghraib
May 10, 2005 Tuesday, 5:00 p.m. Foellinger Auditorium
South End of the Quadrangle
University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign
Seymour Hersh, whose New Yorker stories uncovered details of torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, discusses his work and addresses the state of U.S. journalism in an age of rampant media consolidation. An investigative reporter since 1969 when he broke the My Lai story and subsequent cover up during the Vietnam era, Hersh continues to be a controversial and insightful commentator on American foreign policy.
You can now view streaming video of the keynote address given by Seymour Hersh by clicking on the 'video archive' link found here.
In conjunction with: Center for Global Studies, College of Law, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, Department of Journalism, Department of Political Science, Department of Sociology, Department of Speech Communication, Institute of Government and Public Affairs
This lecture is held in conjunction with the conference Can Freedom of the Press Survive Media Consolidation? May 10-11 organized by the Illinois Initiative for Media Policy Research. This conference is free and open to the public. For more information visit http://www.iimpr.org/
Check back often for the latest details about these upcoming events. Athough we make every effort to insure the accuracy of these materials, all information is subject to change.
