Past Events

Come and see BPhil Candidate Tobin Richter present and defend his thesis. Tobin interprets the novels One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel García Márquez 1967) and The Old Drift (Namwali Serpell 2019) as decolonial texts which call for the dismantling of the cultural, political, and economic inequalities created by colonialism, which continue to relegate the Global South to a subordinate position in the modern world. He focusses on cultural decolonization which he defines as a practice of rejecting Eurocentric and racist interpretations of the history of the Global South and its people, asserting the value of histories, traditions, and forms of expression devalued by the Global North, and theorizing what an equitable world could look like. To show how this definition operates in the two novels, he reads them through the theories of decolonial thinkers like Aníbal Quijano and Ngugi wa Thiong'o. This research examines literature's role in contesting hegemonic narratives and imagining alternatives to dominant social, political and economic models.

Come see undergraduate student Juliana Geyer present and defend her thesis, which examines the limits of hegemony through the context the United States’ failure to change international physical integrity norms during the War on Terror. It provides possible explanations for US failure and comments on the resistance of the international human rights regime as well as the limits of hegemonic power that this case study uncovers!

In the fifth installment of the Global Issues Through Literature Series (GILS), educators will convene to discuss Daria: A Roma Women's Journey, a full graphic novel based on fieldwork conducted in Eastern Europe highlighting some of the issues that Roma women face everyday.
GILS is a reading group for K-16 educators to literary texts from a global perspective. Content specialists present the work and its context, and participants brainstorm innovative pedagogical practices for incorporating the text and its themes into the curriculum. This year’s theme is Graphic Novels in Global Context: Social Justice Through Illustration and Text. See registration for more information!

UCIS presents a national scholarship alumni panel to offer unique perspectives on international scholarship experiences such as the Fulbright and Boren programs. Students will gain information on these global opportunities, receive application tips, and more!

In this session of the UCIS Career Toolkit, our guest is an editor for Yen Press with experience working with some of the biggest names in tech. Join us for this discussion of how you can find your own career in publishing and/or translation. Co-hosted by the Asian Studies Center.

The Global Studies Center and Postindustrial, a multimedia outlet focused on reimagining industrial communities, is hosting a 4-part series that will allow a small group of students to develop journalism skills while learning about global issues in the context of Appalachia. Students will get the opportunity to learn about podcast production and journalistic writing from Postindustrial journalists that have a wealth of knowledge and experience in reporting on global issues as they relate to our region. By the end of the series, students will have the tools to produce narrative written work, created a podcast episode, and learned about other podcast production techniques. These skills will be situated in discussions about the impacts of the war in Afghanistan, slow violence, and extractive economies featuring conversations with individuals who experienced those impacts firsthand both at home and abroad. This event is solely in person.

This is the fourth event as part of the series Race, Rebellion, and Global Solidarity. Amidst the ruins of a dying order desperately trying to maintain its grip, we are living in an era marked by massive economic disparities, the rise of authoritarianism and explicit white nationalism, Black freedom movements and the calls for abolition, the normalization of the “War on Terror” and the unfinished projects of decolonization, amongst other repressive forces and insurgent voices. How did we get here? And how do we chart a course forward? This talk will explore the artists, thinkers, and movement builders who we can think with as we seek to create a world that does not yet exist. This is a hybrid event.