Water Infrastructure and Regional Governance, September 29 - October 2, 2020

The Regional Studies Association’s Research Network on Infrastructural Regionalism (NOIR) is convening three online (Zoom) workshops to showcase empirical and conceptual research at the intersection of water governance, infrastructure, and regionalism. Water infrastructure performs a vital role in making and remaking regions. Watersheds and reservoirs, pipelines and ports, and storm water management and climate change mitigation represent complex political, economic, and environmental challenges. They are essential, if often black-boxed infrastructures that define how regional space is constructed, territorialized, and experienced. As critical urban infrastructures and contested political objects, water systems are fundamental to conversations about sustainability and economic development trajectories for communities across the global South and global North.

We are now accepting registrations for the NOIR Workshops on Water Infrastructure and Regional Governance. This event will assess how water infrastructure shapes formal and informal regional spaces, communities, and governance dynamics and explores how these shape how water infrastructure is developed. We are hosting four public panels that present research on what water infrastructure reveals about the politics and governance of metropolitan regions.

REGISTER: https://pitt.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_7amhh1MQpKV09Eh

TUESDAY, September 29 | 11am - 1pm ET
Water Infrastructure and Regional Governance in and beyond Western Pennsylvania

11 - 11:10am | University of Pittsburgh/CONNECT Welcome
CONNECT Executive Director Lydia Morin

11:10 - 11:20am | Regional Studies Association Welcome, Keynote Introductions
Michael Glass, University of Pittsburgh

11:20 - 11:50am | Keynote 1: Infrastructures of Inequality
Leila Harris, University of British Columbia

11:50am - 12:20pm | Keynote 2: Thinking Regionally, Acting Strategically: New Approaches to Governing Regional Water Infrastructures
Andy Karvonen, KTH Royal Institute of Technology

12:20 - 12:35pm | Discussant Response
Dan Bain, Pittsburgh Water Collaboratory

12:35pm - 1pm | Moderated Audience Q&A

WEDNESDAY, September 30 | 11am - 12pm ET
RESEARCH PANEL 1: Decision-Making and Engagement in Water Governance
MODERATOR: Jen Nelles; Q&A: JP Addie

Regional infrastructures are often taken for granted by the public, with the consequence that infrastructural management and planning is surrendered to experts and institutions that may not be representative of the region overall. By tracing the lines of authority and influence that shape city-region infrastructures, we hope to reveal opportunities for greater engagement of more diverse publics in the deliberations over infrastructural futures.

Anne Taufen, Lisa Hoffman, Ken Yocom (University of Washington-Tacoma): Unveiling Infrastructures
Ramazan Sayan & Nidhi Nagabhatla (UN University Institute for Water, Environment, and Health): An Infrastructure Turn in Water Sharing
Fenna Hoefsloot, Javier Martinez, & Karin Pfeffer (University of Twente): Speculative futures of Lima’s water infrastructure
Cat Button (University of Newcastle): Governing Water Infrastructure from our Homes

THURSDAY, October 1 | 1am - 12pm ET
RESEARCH PANEL 2: Regional Partnerships Under Threat
MODERATOR: Michael Glass; Q&A: Jen Nelles

Whereas regional infrastructures such as sewer lines, water treatment plants, and water transportation technologies (namely locks and dams) were constructed as part of earlier periods of urban and regional development, shifting patterns of demand threaten to diminish the utility of these assets. We need to ascertain how such changing dynamics are influencing (and being influenced by) the existing governance of those infrastructural networks.

Andrew Dick & Sara Hughes (University of Michigan): The Multi-City Growth Machine in Regional Governance Networks—the case of the Karegnondi Water Authority
Dayne Walling (University of Minnesota): Urban Geographies of Fragmentation and Distress: Government Planning, Development, Infrastructure, and Inequality around Deindustrialized US Cities
Sachin Tiwale (Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai): Grabbing Water Resources in Urban Agglomeration—The Case of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR)
Grete Gansauer & Julia Haggerty (Montana State University): Regionalizing the Rural through Large-Scale water Infrastructure
Karsten Zimmerman (TU Dortmund): Infrastructure Regionalism as Driver for Metropolitan Governance? The Case of the Ruhr Region in Germany

FRIDAY, October 2 | 11am - 12pm ET
RESEARCH PANEL 3: Emerging Complexities in Regional Water Governance
MODERATOR: JP Addie; Q&A Michael Glass

Health crises, Federal mandates, technological innovation, and exogenous shocks can all disrupt formal and informal governance structures. We seek empirical examples and theoretical advances that can help to conceptualize how city-regions across the Global North and Global South are affected by these complexities, and to seek out best practices whereby specific regions are confronting these complexities.

Mark Usher (University of Manchester): Hydraulic Territory: Internal colonization through urban catchment management in Singapore
Filippo Menga & Michael K. Goodman (University of Reading): The Good Samaritan: Capitalism, Religion and the Political Economy of Care in International Water Charity
Mike Finewood (Pace University), Marissa Matsler, Olivia Pierce, Zenya Lederman, & Ruthann Richards: What does it mean to empower communities? Green infrastructure incentive programs as a form of neoliberal governance
Scott Raulerson, Richard Milligan, & Ellis Adams (Georgia State University): Urban Water and Hydrosocial Inequalities

Speak with a student ambassador from the Center for Latin American Studies to learn about their certificate offerings, programs, and more.

Virtual Office Hours:
Mondays 11AM-12PM
Tuesdays 12-1PM
Thursdays 11:30AM-12:30PM

Zoom link: https://pitt.zoom.us/j/98550944503

For over five decades from the moment of their appearance in 1817 and 1818, the Queen’s Court and Green Mountain Manuscripts were considered by the vast majority of the international scholarly community to be genuine monuments of medieval Czech literature. How were so many of the best minds of the period fooled for so long? Drawing on research for a monograph in-progress entitled “The Czech Manuscripts: Poetics, Faith, Scholarship,” this presentation will examine the qualities of the manuscripts themselves, both as physical and as literary objects, their effective use in the Czech cultural revival of the period, and the cultural and intellectual horizons of the period that made the manuscripts (seem) real.

WATCH LIVE via https://illinois.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIvcuuorzwjGdIv2KwrisgUx65NNT...

David L. Cooper is Associate Professor at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and a specialist in both Czech and Russian literatures. His research is in the areas of nationalism in literature, forgery and mystification, translation history and translation studies, and history of criticism. His monograph Creating the Nation: Identity and Aesthetics in Early Nineteenth-century Russia and Bohemia (Northern Illinois University Press, 2010) examined the emergence of the new paradigm of “national literature” and the role of literary intellectuals in developing new conceptions of national identity. David has published translations of Slovak folktales and poetry and recently published a new translated edition of the poems of the Czech 19th-century forged manuscripts (The Queen’s Court and Green Mountain Manuscripts with Other Forgeries of the Czech Revival, Michigan Slavic Publications, 2018). His current book project, under the working title of The Czech Forged Manuscripts: Poetics, Faith, and Scholarship, examines this notorious case of literary forgery for what it can contribute to ongoing scholarly reevaluations of forgery in literature and history.

This event is part of the Area Studies Lecture Series presented by the 2018-2021 U.S. Department of Education Title VI National Resource Center and Foreign Language and Area Studies grant recipients for Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia.

This course provides students with an opportunity to think about the most recent wave of brutal police violence in the United States in a global perspective. Expanding on our summer series, students will focus on topics such as racial capitalism, colonialism and settler colonialism, and transnational trends in militarized policing and police violence. Students who complete the course will appreciate how policing in the USA shapes and is shaped by global processes.

The pop-up course will kick off on September 15!

Practice your French with instructors and students in a casual environment! Tuesdays from 4-5PM ET on Zoom. Register to receive access: https://pitt.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIpc-mtqTkiG9LWrvpHBRqIiStR58e6fWpH

Considering graduate school? Preparing your application materials?

Join us as Pitt graduate program experts and current graduate students from the School of Public Health, GSPIA, Economics, History, and Asian Studies share expertise on crafting strong applications in a Zoom discussion. Learn tips on writing effective personal statements, securing letter writers, and submitting desired credentials. Ask admissions professionals and students individual questions for successful preparation.

Dr. Kevin Broom, Director of MHA and MHA/MBA Programs, Vice Chair, Associate Professor, Pitt Public Health
Dr. Emily Rook-Koepsel, Asst. Director for Academic Affairs, UCIS Asian Studies Center
Dr.Michel Gobat , Director of Graduate Studies, Associate Professor of History
Dr. Daniele Coen-Pirani, Director of Graduate Studies, Professor of Economics
Ms. Kelly McDevitt, Admissions and Enrollment, GSPIA
Accompanying Graduate Students

Don’t miss out on an opportunity to hear from the experts. Click the link below to secure a spot today!
Tuesday, Sept 29th, 6:30pm
Online Discussion

Zoom Link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/9238996364

Sign up today at:
https://signup.com/go/ffYmFVe

Stammtisch is the German Club's weekly conversation table for speaks of all levels from absolute beginners to fluent speakers. Here we practice our language skills while also learning about German culture through fun games and activities!

Zoom Meeting ID: 988 3897 9763
https://pitt.zoom.us/j/98838979763