Let Them be Born in Wonder: C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien and the Necessity of Fantasy

Jake Aharonian

Monday, February 4, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Mahoney Library Reading Room,
Petaluma Campus

Monday, February 11, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Newman Auditorium, Emeritus Hall
Santa Rosa Campus

C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien are arguably two of the most well-known writers of children’s literature. Both men believed that cultivating a sense of the “fantastic” in the lives of children—and adults—was necessary for a flourishing life. This lecture examines the presence and function of wonder in their works, the influence that other writers had upon their work, and the usefulness of fantasy in our own lives.

Jacob Aharonian has long been a scholar of the works of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien and the literary group the Inklings. He has made reading and lecturing on Lewis, et al., a lifelong passion. Mr. Aharonian currently teaches English at Santa Rosa Junior College.

From Pages to Places: Readers’ Explorations of England

Jean Hegland and Melissa Kort

Monday, February 25, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Newman Auditorium, Emeritus Hall
Santa Rosa Campus

Ever wanted to visit Shakespeare’s Stratford-upon-Avon, Jane Austen’s Bath, Sherlock Holmes’s Baker Street address, or Harry Potter's Platform 9 ¾? You'd be joining a long chain of literary tourists— those who seek sites frequented by favorite authors or favorite characters in those authors’ works. Dr. Melissa Sue Kort and Jean Hegland, veterans of our London Semester program, will entice you with readings from famous literary tourists and photographs from their own travels. Explore the history of literary tourism as well as the pleasures available today. You may even be inspired to pack your bags!

Melissa Kort completed her Ph.D. in 2001. Her dissertation combined many interests: Dickens, the Victorians, photography, film, pop culture, feminist approaches to literature, hands-on research, and of course, travel! She has been teaching at Santa Rosa Junior College for over 30 years. Her experiences living abroad (including on a year-long Fulbright Teaching Exchange in York, England, and three times on SRJC's London Semester) have allowed her to explore literary sites throughout Europe. She has published extensively on subjects ranging from faculty development to children’s tooth care. Currently, she is a contributing blogger for Ms. Magazine.

Jean Hegland’s first novel, Into the Forest, has been selected for campus- or community-wide reading programs by a number of schools, including Santa Rosa Junior College and Bowling Green State University, and has recently been optioned for film development by a creative team that includes the actress Ellen Page. Her fourth book, about a Shakespearean scholar with Alzheimer’s Disease, is currently with her agent. Jean has been Writer in Residence at the College of York St. John in York, England, and has taught overseas at the Mediterranean Center for Arts and Sciences in Sicily, and for the Studienshiftung Sommer Akadamie program in the Austrian Alps. She has been both a full-and part-time instructor in the English Department at Santa Rosa Junior College since 1984.

Both presenters have much experience and scholarly activity related to English life, culture, history and literature.

Radiation Risk and Dr. Alice Stewart: Pioneer, Pariah, Prophet

Gayle Greene

Monday, March 4, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Newman Auditorium, Emeritus Hall
Santa Rosa Campus

When British physician and epidemiologist Dr. Alice Stewart discovered, in 1956, that x-raying a pregnant woman doubled the risk of a childhood cancer, she was defunded and defamed. Her efforts to alert the world to the dangers of low-dose radiation made her a pariah to mainstream radiation science, though ultimately revolutionized medical practice: her work is why doctors no longer do fetal x-rays. Meanwhile, Stewart’s major (male) detractor, Richard Doll, was knighted and celebrated, even after he was revealed to be taking large sums of money from Monsanto. This tale of scientific rivalry shows the way gender, personality, and politics shape scientific “knowledge” and public policy, and is especially timely in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear accident.

Gayle Greene is the author of The Woman Who Knew Too Much: Alice Stewart and the Secrets of Radiation (U of Michigan Press, 1999), and of a recent article, “Alice Stewart and Richard Doll: Reputation and the Shaping of Scientific ‘Truth’,” Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, Johns Hopkins Press, autumn 2011, 504-31.

The Light Labyrinth Project Presents “The Holotope”

Kirby Seid

Monday, March 11, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Doyle Library, room 4245
Santa Rosa Campus

Spectacular visual art, based upon multi-dimensional geometry of 20th century British-Canadian mathematician H.S.M. Coxeter (whose work influenced M.C. Escher), is combined with light and sound technology to support a powerful meditative experience. Surrounded by beautiful fractal patterns, the Holotope’s eight dimensional mandala is based on the E8 Polytope, the basis of physicist Garrett Lisi’s controversial “Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything”. Programmed stroboscopic and chromatic illumination sets the mandala in motion to musical accompaniment— a 21st century psychedelic light-show.

Kirby Seid has given this presentation at conferences and institutes including: The Omega Institute (NY); The Institute of Transpersonal Psychology (Palo Alto, CA); The Psycho-Acoustic Institute (San Francisco, CA); Nanaimo Metaphysical Conference (Nanaimo, B.C. Canada); Crystal Skull Conference (Mandeliu, France); Sound Healing Conference (San Francisco, CA); World Mysteries Conference (AZ). The presentation is the collaborative work of Randall Fontes, Darren Gibbs and Kirby Seid.

Cuba’s Literacy Brigade: Women on the Frontlines of Transforming a Nation

Susana Ackerman and Orlando Raola

Wednesday, March 27, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Newman Auditorium, Emeritus Hall
Santa Rosa Campus

Cuba, 1961: 250,000 volunteers taught 700,000 people to read and write in one year! Over half were young women, who found themselves deeply transformed in the process. SRJC instructors Susana Ackerman and Dr. Orlando Raola will share their own personal stories connected to this literacy brigade, which is considered the world’s most organized literacy campaign and one of the greatest educational accomplishments of the 20th century. The presentation will include footage from the film Maestra, a short documentary featuring moving interviews with members of the Cuban literacy brigadistas. 

Susana Ackerman coordinated literacy programs for Latino immigrants in Chicago, replicating the Cuban Literacy campaign of the 60’s. She is a Spanish instructor at SRJC, and recipient of the SRJC Outstanding Faculty of the Year award in 2012.

Dr. Orlando Raola is an instructor of Chemistry at SRJC and native of Cuba. Active in the Esperanto movement, he is currently the president of Esperanto League for North America, the US national organization in that field.

Women Writers in a Man’s World: Nella Larsen and the Hidden History of the Harlem Renaissance

Ajuan Mance

Monday, April 8, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Newman Auditorium, Emeritus Hall
Santa Rosa Campus

The life of Harlem Renaissance novelist Nella Larsen exemplifies the challenges faced by African American women writers during this legendary period in African American history. This presentation explores Larsen’s life and work and those of the other women writers, editors, and activists among whom she lived and wrote. Using photographs and documents from Jazz Age Harlem, this talk places Larsen’s popular novels about passing and the color line in their historical and cultural context.

Ajuan Mance is a Professor of English at Mills College in Oakland, California. She earned her bachelor’s degree in English at Brown University and her M.A. and Ph.D. in English Language and Literatures at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She is the author of two books, Inventing Black Women: African American Women's Poetry and Self-Representation, 1877-2000 (The University of Tennessee, 2007) and Proud Legacy: The "Colored" Schools of Malvern, Arkansas and the Community that Made Them (Henson Benson Foundation, 2012).

Del Monte Lecture

Monday, April 15, 2013, 12 noon - 1:00 PM
Newman Auditorium, Emeritus Hall
Santa Rosa Campus