Global Community Engagement - Current Initiatives
- Storytelling in oral, visual, and performance traditions
- Legacies of colonialism and war
- Peace and human rights
- Migration and diaspora
Fall 2024- Spring 2025
We’re thrilled to present a second year of unique, creative, informative, and timely programs that bring to campus exchanges of views about and approaches to responsible global citizenship. From Mali to Ukraine to the Indian diaspora in Singapore; and from centuries-old epic stories and antiquities imbued with spiritual potency to contemporary public art calling attention to urgent crises, and museums heeding calls to return objects stolen long ago, we’ll engage with scholars, artists and art specialists, as well as activists for justice.
March 30, 2025
Documentary Screening
3:00 -5:00 pm
Wasserman Cinematheque, inside Sachar International Center (International Business School)
Free and open to the public
Directed by Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev
Academy Award Nominee, DGA Winner, PGA and ASC Nominee
Under roaring fighting jets, Ukrainian artists Slava, Anya and Andrey stay behind, defiantly finding beauty amid destruction. Armed with art, cameras and for the first time in their lives, guns, they show that while it’s easy to frighten people, it’s harder to destroy their passion for living.
Wassa Kouyaté
October 9, 2024
A Residency Featuring World renowned Malian musicians Wassa Kouyaté and Balla Kouyaté with Professor Cherif Keita
Class visits: October 7-8
Open class: Wednesday, October 9
Time: 6:00 pm
Slosberg Hall
Please join us for a residency featuring Wassa Kouyaté and Balla Kouyaté, internationally renowned Malian traditional musicians. These musicians are part of a Mande jaliw (generally known as the griots) who are oral historians, musicians, and performers who keep alive and celebrate the history of the Mandé people of Mali, Guinea, Senegal, and other West African countries. They are descendents of musicians who took an oath to continue the family’s oral tradition and musical heritage which dates back to the 13th century, the time of Sunjata Keita, founder of the Mali empire. The residency will consist of class visits as well as a live performance of the Sundiata fasa (epic) of the Mande people, with an English translation by Professor and descendent of Sundiata, Cherif Keita.
Head of Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara - Cambodia 9th century
November 4, 2024
A Panel Discussion
12:00 Lunch
12:15 - 1:30 Program
Mandel Center for the Humanities Reading Room (303)
The past few years have seen the global expansion of debates and action regarding the return of ‘art’ that was forthrightly looted or acquired in colonial contexts in which consent is in question. A stellar panel featuring individuals with expertise in museums and provenance, the history of art, and law and philosophy, will discuss processes, policies, and promises and pitfalls related to the restitution of 'art' all over the world. Panelists will talk about how research on the origins and history of looted or otherwise unethically acquired objects is conducted, and how the objects’ return might contribute to the reweaving of social fabrics torn apart by violence. Conversely, they will also ask how restitution might feed into problematic nationalisms and other systems of division and inequity.
Daria Pugachova, 2023
Photo Credit: Hosein Danesh
November 12, 2024
A Presentation by Ukrainian Artist Daria Pugachova
2:20-3:40
Sherman Hall, Hassenfeld Conference Center
Daria Pugachova is an interdisciplinary artist and art activist from Ukraine. Her artistic approach prioritizes the presence of the artist and direct interaction with audiences in public spaces. Daria studied architecture at the Kyiv National University of Construction and Architecture, and played drums for many years in the band Panivalkova.
Daria’s work has been featured in exhibitions in Ukraine, Bulgaria, Germany, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, Switzerland, and the United States. Her latest projects are based on her experiences of war, exploring topics of freedom and limitation, and this is what she’ll focus on in her artist talk here.
Chowk Productions, Variations on a Theme 2021
Photo Credit: Bernie Ng
November 18, 2024
An artist visit
Open dance class hosted by Adagio Dance Club: Sunday, November 17, 4:00 pm, location TBD
Class visit: Monday, November 18
Dancer and choreographer Raka Maitra, the founder and artistic director of Chowk Productions, based in Singapore, and Principal dancer Caroline Chin will teach a dance class on Sunday, November 17, hosted by Adagio Dance Club, and give a guest lecture-presentation on Monday, November 18, in the anthropology class, “Contemporary South Asia,” taught by Professor Brian Horton.
Defying the conventional dichotomy of 'classical' and 'contemporary,' the basis of their movement is in both the martial arts (Chhau) and Odissi, a classical Indian dance.