Pitt students and faculty are invited to join a group of key staff members from the Political, Economic, Defense, and Public Affairs divisions of the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv for an “off-the-record” question and answer session about the ongoing crisis in Ukraine:

- Press Attaché - Embassy uses of social media tools and the role of social media throughout Ukraine’s political crisis
- Economic Officer – Economic overview
- Politico-Military Affairs Officer – Political overview
- Energy Attaché – Energy issues effecting Ukrainian sovereignty

Every few years, important new material concerning Greek lyric poetry comes to light. The most recent is the announcement of some potentially extremely important new fragments of Sappho's poetic oeuvre. Unfortunately, there are also many questions associated with this; cf. Adrian Murdoch's blog, "Bread & Circuses", at this site.
The original posting of the new article was, however, still available (as of Feb. 4) here. *Scoll down the webpage, which is in French for the English text. (That site, dealing with literature "littérature" indeed uses the spelling "actualitte".)

Twice in the Iliad (4.370-418, 5.800-813), a rousing tale of Tydeus’s embassy to Thebes is told to his son Diomedes. Is it a coincidence that this rather obscure story should constitute Homer’s only extended allusion to the famous war of the “Seven against Thebes”? Does this choice merely reflect the rhetorical needs of Agamemnon and Athena, who seek to stir Diomedes to deeds of valor? I argue that the two passages, taken together, reveal a unitary conception and literary form that go well beyond the rhetorical needs of these speakers.

Do you consider yourself a very basic user of Facebook? Do you know the difference between Twitter and Tumblr? Have you tried to create a wiki for a class project, or does the very idea keep you up at night? Pitt’s international studies outreach program will host an interactive workshop to help teachers improve their use of social media websites and tools for education and personal use, including:

· Collaborative projects (for example, Wikispaces)
· Blogs and microblogs (for example, Twitter)
· Social news networking sites (for example, Reddit)

Professor O’Callaghan explores the role of collective memory in the Eurozone crisis from a lawyer's perspective. The idea of collective memory features prominently in several disciplines but rarely in legal scholarship. He argues that the idea of collective memory can help us to better understand fundamental aspects of the EU Treaty framework and secondary legislation, and may also provide instructive insights about the policy responses to the Eurozone crisis.

Medieval Arabic sources are replete with stories about Muslims traveling far and wide. The abundance of such examples tempts one to believe that these traveling individuals created and maintained the pan-Islamic cultural commonwealth. Yet the Islamic written legacy is so vast that drawing decisive conclusions that traveling was indeed as widespread as our sources suggest is hardly possible.

The Guardian first revealed the NSA's comprehensive surveillance program in early June of last year, working from information from the now-infamous Edward Snowden. Two weeks later, a series of articles exposed NSA and British spying on European and South American officials at a G20 meeting and by the end of the month, Der Spiegel had published details of America’s electronic surveillance and bugging of European Union offices and the embassies of France, Italy, Greece, and others.

The eighth edition of the Carnegie Mellon International Film Festival is dedicated to the legacy of world-renowned filmmaker, psychologist, and Carnegie Mellon professor, Paul Goodman, and to his professional focus on the human challenges and achievements of diverse groups of workers worldwide.

The History Department Work-in-Progress Seminar presents Madalina Veres, University of Pittsburgh. Lead discussants Elspeth Martini and Katja Wezel.

NOTE: Text will be circulated three weeks before event. All attending are urged to prepare to take full part in discussion.

The Department of History European Colloquium presents Emanuela Grama, Carnegie Mellon University. Presenters: Andrew Behrendt and Adelina Stefan. Emanuela Grama from Carnegie Mellon University will be the main commentator on their papers and presentations.