Dr. Urbansky discusses the challenges faced by Chinese immigrants during the late Tsarist Empire and early Soviet Union, highlighting the racial and cultural prejudices that fueled hostilities in urban settings. His analysis explores how these early interactions shaped the experiences and perceptions of Chinese communities in a rapidly changing socio-political landscape.
Join EESA for their exciting auction event, featuring traditional art, clothing, jewelry, and more! They are partnering with Brighter Generation, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting students in Ethiopia, which all proceeds from the auction will go towards.
Enjoy plenty of cultural snacks and finger foods, along with a jazz performance by students from EESA and other showcases of art and talent.
Reserve your ticket: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfesb3MJ9aUrTE5oDjb86T963hH7g3c...
Join us for a lunch and learn event with Nina Sajić.
Dr. Sajić served as the ambassador of Bosnia and Herzegovina to France, UNESCO, Algeria, Monaco, Andorra, and Romania. She was also a foreign policy advisor in the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. She will be at Pitt to discuss her diplomatic experiences with students and the wider community.
Light lunch will be provided.
Are you an international student at Pitt looking to connect, or interested in connecting with international students? Stop by the Nook in the Global Hub on Tuesdays, between 2 and 4 pm during Spring semester, to chat with OIS Outreach Coordinator Zharia White from the Office of International Services!
Topics covered in this information session include how to creatively design and highlight curricular and co-curricular learning experiences in a professional manner. They will learn how to use Digication, how to add tabs, add photos, papers, research projects etc. and will consider what curricular and co-curricular experiences to include.
Join the French Club on Tuesdays and Wednesdays during Spring semester for conversational meetings and to practice French speaking and listening skills and create a francophone community on campus!
Still searching for a summer global experience? Come by the Pitt Global Experiences Office between 10am-12pm and 1pm-3pm on February 19th to speak with Zac and Nikki from WorldStrides about studying abroad with ISA and TEAN!
Dr. Yi-tze Lee will explore the cultural and environmental connections of the indigenous Amis people of Taiwan, focusing on their interactions with animal kin such as pigs, birds, and fish. Drawing from his research and recent publication
(Environmental Shift in the Entangled Anthropocene: Use of Birds in Amis Ritual Practices of Taiwan, UBC Press, 2024), this lecture delves into Amis rituals and ceremonies, their adaptation to modern environmental governance, and the broader implications for human-species relationships in an urbanized context.
The talk will feature three unique stories: The use of pigs in funerary rituals during COVID-19. The interplay of bird hunting for ceremonies and animal protection laws. Amis fishing strategies amidst changing river environments.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Yi-tze Lee earned his Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Pittsburgh in 2012. He is currently an Associate Professor at National Dong Hwa University in Taiwan, where he served as department chair from 2021–2024. His research focuses on indigenous revitalization, food sovereignty, ritual performance, and multispecies networks.
Dr. Lee’s work has been widely published, including contributions to Feathered Entanglements (UBC Press, 2024) and Environmental Teachings for the Anthropocene (2020).
Join us on Wednesdays in the Global Hub for casual Portuguese conversation!
Bate-Papo meet on Wednesdays, during Spring 2025, starting February 12 and ending April 16, EXCEPT on March 5.
Join the German Club on Wednesdays during Spring semester for conversational meetings and to practice German speaking and listening skills.
Join the French Club on Tuesdays and Wednesdays during Spring semester for conversational meetings and to practice French speaking and listening skills and create a francophone community on campus!
Swahili Level 4 students: Join Swahili instructor Faraja Ngogo on Thursdays at 11 am-12 pm in the Global Hub to practice Swahili.
Mangia con noi! Bring your lunch and chat with us! Pitt students only, all levels welcome! On February 20, students of Italian will meet to watch the Italian music festival San Remo.
Swedish Speaking Club is a space for practicing Swedish and deepening cultural understanding alongside others who are learning.
Was socialist China's fatal blow to the Tibetan theocracy in 1959 an atheist assault? Peng Hai examines how Chinese cinema justified the People's Liberation Army's dismantling of institutional Tibetan Buddhism. In the Chinese cultural war on religion, Mao and the People's Liberation Army surpassed the Dalai Lama, the pontiff of Tibetan Buddhism, and the old Lamaist establishment as the new icons of salvation and values.
China's recent achievements in artificial intelligence, exemplified by DeepSeek's breakthrough LLM, represent more than just technological advancement - they signal a fundamental shift in global innovation dynamics. While Chinese companies have demonstrated remarkable capabilities in areas from EVs to social media to AI, U.S. responses continue to follow a predictable pattern: disbelief, anger, accusations of theft, and blame. This recurring cycle reveals both China's evolved capacity for coordinated technological development and deep-seated American anxieties about what this means for U.S. technological primacy. Drawing on his extensive experience analyzing both societies, Sinica Podcast host Kaiser Kuo explores how China's innovation ecosystem has matured, why its successes continue to surprise Western observers, and what this tells us about the structural, cultural, and epistemic barriers to understanding China's technological transformation. The talk examines how China's rise has challenged core assumptions about the relationship between political systems and innovation, market economies and state guidance, and ultimately, about American exceptionalism itself — and whether it can accommodate China's own brand of exceptionalism.
Join us for a thought-provoking screening of A Day Without a Mexican, a satirical film imagining the sudden disappearance of Mexican immigrants in California. What would happen to the economy, society, and culture if this essential workforce vanished overnight?
The film explores how borders—whether physical, societal, or metaphorical—create divisions that impact labor, local economies, and community life. The film forces us to confront the human and societal costs of exclusion and reminds us of the vital role immigrant populations play in our everyday lives.
After the screening, join a discussion on the film’s themes and the complex ways borders divide us—beyond just lines on a map.
This will be an in-person event. Refreshments will be provided.
Sponsored by the Center for Latin American Studies (CLAS), the Center for Ethnic Studies Research (CERS)and the Hispanic Latino Professional Association (HLPA) at the University of Pittsburgh.
This event is supported by CLAS OEDI Mini Grant.
Join the Persian Club for a general board meeting.
Moderated by Sarah Phillips, with speakers Bolaji Balogun, Cassandra Hartblay, Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, and Daria Krivonos.
11:00 am - 12:30 pm (EST) | 10:00 am - 11:30 am (CST) | 8:00 -9:30 am (PST)
This six-part virtual event series will examine body matters within Eurasia through a variety of disciplines and themes. The body-as-method has emerged recently to provide novel insights on society, culture, and identity by foregrounding alternatives to Western traditions that marginalized the corporeal dimensions of social and personal existence.
Why is the body good “to think with” on both intellectual and professional matters?
How do classed, diversely abled, gendered, and raced bodies interact in the daily lives we study or inhabit through our avocations?
What is the continuously evolving relationship between the body and the body politic, whether the nation, empire, the EU, or NATO?
Is research and teaching disembodying and can recentering “embodied and uncomfortable knowledge” therefore move liberation in East European and Eurasian Studies forward?
To address these questions, "Bodies in Focus" will have six virtual, recorded panels featuring speakers from various disciplines and institutions. Panelists and the audience will explore how bodies matter for the study and teaching of East European and Eurasian social and material environments, our understanding of power and equity, and for the cultivation of human capacities in our field.
For more information, visit this site https://www.ucis.pitt.edu/creees/content/bodies-focus
A weekly podcast about current affairs in China, hosted by Kaiser Kuo and featuring in-depth conversations about books, ideas, new research, intellectual currents, and cultural trends that can help us better understand what’s happening in China. A conversation between Sinica Podcast host and co-founder Kaiser Kuo and Professor Benno Weiner.
Kaiser Kuo is the host and co-founder of the Sinica Podcast, a weekly discussion of current affairs in China that has run since April 2010 — for its first six years from Beijing, and since 2016 from the U.S. as part of SupChina. The show features in-depth conversations with scholars, journalists, diplomats, analysts, and others who work to better understand China in all its complexity.
Benno Weiner is Associate Professor of History at Carnegie Mellon University where he specializes in the ethnopolitics of twentieth-century state and nation making along China’s ethnocultural borderlands. He is the author of The Chinese Revolution on the Tibetan Frontier and co-editor of Conflicting Memories: Tibetan History under Mao Retold.
Join Pitt Russian to learn about Eastern European craft of embroidery, where you will also get to choose a design and craft your own piece.
Join us to learn about Eastern European craft of embroidery, where you will also get to choose a design and craft your own piece! Come to unwind after a busy week adn let your creativity run wild. No skills or materials necessary.
Join undergraduate Pitt students for a conversation hour to practice speaking in Hindi and Urdu and connect over shared cultural experiences.
Kya Baat Hai will meet weekly, on Fridays, during the 2024-2025 academic year, EXCEPT on March 7.
Swahili Level 2 students: Join Swahili instructor Faraja Ngogo on Fridays at 4-5 pm in the Global Hub to practice Swahili.
Join Addverse, a transcultural, multilingual, and intergenerational poetry organization, for weekly meetings in the Global Hub.
Addverse will meet weekly, on Fridays, during Spring 2025, EXCEPT on January 24 and March 7.
Join VSA for a showcase of Vietnamese culture through lesser known Vietnamese foods.
