Events

Academic Year 2023/2024

Julie Klinger’s talk “Waste in Space: Mines, E-Waste, Launch Sites, and Asteroids in Outer Space Geographies” will be held on November 20, 2023, at 4:00 PM in Kilachand Center Colloquium Room.

This talk examines the material relations through which contemporary human engagements with outer space are being produced across four constitutive sites: mines, discarded electronics, launch sites, and asteroids. Drawing together literatures on waste, discard, supply chains, and frontiers with fieldwork in several mining and launch sites in China, Sweden, the United States and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, it argues that waste-making is constitutive of a set of contemporary space activities and shapes the manner in which the immensity of the cosmos is understood and engaged by diverse publics. The talk presents a conceptual architecture and also reflexively examines the potential epistemic violence of waste-making as a spatial analytic to link Earthly and outer space geographies.

Veronika Kusumaryati and Ernst Karel’s film screening with Q&A, “Expedition Content,” will be held on April 3, 2024, at 4:00 PM in the College of Communication (room B05).

This nearly imageless film documents the strange encounter between the 1961 Harvard-Peabody expedition to Netherlands New Guinea, and the Hubula people. This is a unique opportunity for undergraduate and graduate students and faculty members to engage with the work of an anthropologist and a sound artist in their collaborative artistic expression.

Academic Year 2022/2023

Charles Hirschkind’s talk, “Embodiment, Theology, and Anthropology,” originally scheduled for March 16, 2022, was held on December 13, 2022 at 4:00 pm in CAS Room 132, 725 Commonwealth Avenue. Read more about Hirschkind’s recent work here.

Also, in 2022/2023, Seeing and Not Seeing was pleased to provide support to two more events that align with the spirit of the Seminar:

Mothers of False Positives from Soacha and Bogotá World Tour: Truth, Justice, Integrity, No Repetition, Memory.  November 8, 2022. Speakers were Jacqueline Castillo, sister of a victim; Carlos Mora, ex-military and human rights leader; and Lilian Calvache. This visit included a screening of Hijos del Viento.

A residency by Brazilian poet and performer Ricardo Aleixo. The week of activities included a live poetic performance, a screening of his audiovisual work, and a meeting with students. Aleixo is currently considered one of the most important living artists in the country, integrating avant-garde poetry with Afro-Brazilian culture.

Dylan Robinson’s talk, originally scheduled for April 20, 2022, has been postponed until further notice. Read about Robinson’s work here.