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History Seminar Fall 2018 Schedule
November 28, 2018
Presented by Diego Luna
The decades leading up to the Civil War were fraught with conflict, and the American discovery of gold in California in 1848 saw hundreds of thousands of would-be prospectors descend on California to
strike it rich. Amidst these Massachusetts Anglo settlers, Cantonese businessmen, and German dairymen, several thousand Californios attempted to eke out a living.
The potential for gold brought big money from the East Coast, and that big money instigated immense social, political, and demographic upheaval in the newly minted Golden State. Californios resisted these
changes, through labor strikes, civil disobedience, the courts, and banditry, ultimately laying the historical groundwork for the largest Latinx community in the United States: Mexican Americans.
November 14, 2018
Presented by Tommy Kim
Citizen Kane ... Sure it's good but best ever? What does that even mean? According to whom?
November 7, 2018
Presented by Yarinid Velez-Hernandez
When we hear the word “cannibalism,” we think either of the sensationalized portrayal of Hannibal Lecter (the charming, refined cannibalistic serial killer of the movies) or our worst nightmare
(Jeffrey Dahmer, for example, a real American cannibal). Most humans have always regarded cannibalism as taboo, which is part of what makes it so fascinating. But to understand this phenomenon and our fascination with it,
we need to investigate its roots and understand how cannibalism came to be part of human history.
Come and have a bite of history!
October 31, 2018
Presented by Rachael Bledsaw
Don’t believe in vampires? You will. They are not beautiful, they are not seductive, they absolutely do not sparkle, but they do think you look pretty tasty. Learn the folklore origin of the
blood-sucking monster we are at once drawn to and terrified of: the figment of our imagination(?) that represents our deepest fears of death and life. You will look at the historical “real life” accounts of vampire attacks
starting with their roots in Eastern Europe. Then you will learn how difficult it is for a corpse to NOT be labelled a vampire. Finally, you will see through recent vampire scares just how deep and real this fear is.
This seminar will teach you how to:
- Identify a vampire’s attacks
- Identify a vampire before AND after they’ve died (It’s trickier than you think)
- Protect yourself from them
October 24, 2018
Presented by Ann Korn
This year marks the 100-year anniversary of one of the deadliest disease outbreaks ever. Worldwide, over 500 million people (estimated) became infected with influenza, and perhaps as many as 50 million died. In the U.S. alone, an estimated 675,000 people died. The death toll was so catastrophic that the average life expectancy in the U.S. dropped by 12 years between 1917 and 1918.
Politics and the human condition played huge roles. Government officials, for example, believed that the best way to handle the pandemic was to downplay its severity so as not to cause panic. Not surprisingly, this made a bad situation exponentially worse.
Unlike most strains of the flu, this variation, H1N1, struck young adults 20-40 years old, instead of the most vulnerable: the old and the very young. Those lucky enough to survive were often left with debilitating lung disease. During the illness, the lungs actually liquefied. Patients bled from every orifice--including their ears.
And guess what: H1N1 is still around today. Like all viruses, it was here before us and it will be here after us . . .
October 17, 2018
Presented by Jennifer Jones
How big was the world’s population in past eras? Why is the world population so large today? How does immigration affect a country’s population? Will the world’s population keep growing forever? Whatever
happened to Paul Ehrlich’s “population bomb” scare of the 1960s? And what is the deal with population policy in China?
These and other burning questions will be answered in this presentation on demographics—the history of everyone.
October 10, 2018
Presented by Justin Taillon
The modernization of indigenous groups in South America’s Amazon region has been led by colonialization, capitalism, and globalization. Traditional attempts to preserve social and cultural attributes of such groups
during these times of change have been spearheaded primarily by a set of ideologies known as the ‘noble savage’ dichotomy. Yet, research has consistently evidenced a lack of support from indigenous communities for the preservation of their
lifestyle that is the foundation of the noble savage model. Rather, a movement from preservation to conservation is being undertaken by some individuals. One example of such a project is a lodging business operated by the Ese’Eja community
of Infierno in Madre de Dios, Peru. This indigenous community has instituted a model of modernization called market-based socio-cultural conservation in response to the influences of capitalism, globalization, and colonialism. In this model
the tribe’s heritage, their thousands of years of nature-based knowledge, and their way of life is conserved through business models of hospitality and tourism. This approach to business has exhibited political, economic, socio-cultural, and
technological successes and may offer a set of best practices for other indigenous groups who wish to modernize through a conservation, rather than preservation, model.
October 3, 2018
Presented by Lonnie Somer
In the mid-1800s, Charles Darwin began to publish his theories concerning the evolution of life on earth, resulting in a revolution in the way biological scientists viewed and interpreted the natural world. It also
immediately spawned controversies between its supporters and detractors that show no sign of letting up to the present day. What were the influences that led to Darwin’s model of the development of the diversity of life, and just what is it
about this view of life that causes it to be unacceptable to so many people?
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