Author: egrubman

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Staring at the Stars – A Conclusion

This week’s lecture in the series, Presence of the Past was fitting as it culminated a semester of interdisciplinary lecture with a topic that we had not yet thought about: space and astrological processes. Professor Elizabeth McGrath addressed the process in which stars in the galaxy move from blue to red shift processes through their lifetime, and how this process can help us to better explain our universe and all of the galaxies within it.

While this lecture was arguably one of the lectures that contained the least amount of warning that the global climate (both environmental and social) was approaching a dangerous point in time where a serious intervention would be needed, it was not far off from the general purpose of the lecture series as a whole. It did seem however, that the broadening of our sights on the strict humanities came as a surprise for other members of the audience.

Having been in the class titled Extraterrestrial Life all spring with Professor Kocevski (whom professor McGrath has also worked with on some other projects, similar to those she spoke about in the lecture), this topic was something that I have been working with and thinking about for a while, therefore resulting in more reflection of the year. At the end of the lecture, one student asked Professor McGrath if working in this field was discouraging or frustrating due to the intangible nature of the things and ideas that she was working with. I found this to be nearly the perfect question, and one that took great confidence to ask; as it is not easy or comfortable to question one’s passion for their field of study (and profession).

Professor McGrath responded with great excitement (seemingly she gets this question more often than one would think) and explained that this was part of the field that she really enjoyed more than was it something that made her frustrated. She explained that looking up towards the night sky as a kid was something exciting for her, and that following this passion into her career was something that brought her great joy. She also explained that while her work is far from tangible, the discoveries that she has been able to contribute in making have had profound impacts on the way in which we view the universe and that in itself is extremely pleasing.

I found her response to this question interesting and applicable not only to the field of astronomy and physics, but also important when tying this lecture to the greater theme of the series. Going back to the ideas of climate change and social changes as well, it is important to take Professor McGrath’s answer to heart when thinking about how we interact with these issues as they continue to pop up on the dashboard of our daily lives. While long term issues such as climate change may feel intangible (although it is certainly becoming more tangible as we continue onwards), it is crucial to take passion similar to that of Professor McGrath when looking at ways to help. While this lecture was more pointed than others, it did serve as a nearly perfect ending to such an interdisciplinary lecture series; reminding all of us that there are limitless possibilities for innovation, exploration and betterment of the world we live in.

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A Shifting Baseline

On April 29th, Loren McClenachan from the Colby, Environmental Studies Department, gave a lecture to our series titled, “Turning Back the Clock on Ocean Declines: Using Historical Ecology in Marine Conservation”. Shifting back from last week, the focus this week returned to the presence of the past in relationship to our planet and climate; addressing ways in which our perceptions have changed as we have continued to degrade the planet generation after generation. While Professor McClenachan is very focused on her research specifically concerning marine ecosystems and the changes that have been seen in these communities, she was able to take these ideas to a broader context for the purpose of the lecture, perpetuating the idea that a closer look at our past impact is crucial when addressing the present state of our global situation.

Early on in the lecture, she presented comparison photographs of different ecosystems (both marine and other) and asked the crowd to reflect on which ecosystem they thought was likely in more distress. In some situations, this question was quite straightforward, however in others it came with a bit more confusion. Underwater ecosystems were a place where this happened specifically often, due to their existence out of the scope of the public eye. While this was interesting to consider, it became much clearer when she introduced the idea of a shifting baseline system.

As Professor McClenachan explained, it is human nature to imagine that upon the first time viewing something, it is at that moment “natural” although it may very well not be even close to its original natural state. Interestingly, it seems we encounter this almost all the time, even with things in our lives that we are incredibly familiar with. While this is a nice idea to consider, and also must come as a reminder that nearly everything we come into contact with is “unnatural” simply due to the passing of time, I think it brings into question a bigger idea (which Professor McClenachan also surfaced) of how to create policies that encourage the preservice of naturalism to the best of our abilities. As she noted, things also naturally change over time too, that is in itself “natural”. However, the need for policy to encourage this true organic version of naturalism

As noted by Professor McClenachan, in the past 240 years alone, the world has seen a 52% loss in coral reefs. While this is extreme loss and one that must be worked to improve, she stated that this is only one a small sliver of the problems plaguing our planet as we know it. Should we continue to let issues such as this degradation of the reefs continue, the version of “natural” that are come to be known by upcoming generations will be so wildly different from what we see today that it will only perpetuate faster degradation due to the lack of understanding about what once existed. Proven by the research Professor McClenachan has been conducting surrounding fish size, etc. in Florida, we must come to understand that we need to constantly be in check with our perception surrounding the natural world as well as the harsh realities.

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An Undocumented Past

In this week’s lecture in the series Presence of the Past, we had the opportunity to hear from Heather Streets-Salter on “The Chill Before the Cold War: The Roots of Anti-communism in the Interwar Period”.  While much of the lecture was based around the specifics of the period of events and communism that were occurring in Shanghai in 1931, Salters also investigated the reasons for the lack of literature and understanding of these events that were taking place outside of mainland Europe, at a time when many of the relevant on-goings in the development of the Cold War were based in Europe and America. It was interesting to consider this bit of her investigation, as it is seemingly counterintuitive to study areas that are not at the center of events such as this. However, as we can see from the works of Salters, it is actually much more important than one would think to understand other global climates and events leading up to notable worldwide events.

More than a decade before the beginning of the Cold War, other students have been similarly aware of the ability for the events in Shanghai to feel disjointed from the Cold War itself, which would officially start between the US and Russia in 1945. Many students in the lecture, including students not a part of the series (rather attending for a different reason), noted that while this instance in Shanghai in 1931 is so specific, the way in which it is eventually related to the Cold War made this lecture applicable to almost any class in a multitude of disciplines.

Throughout this lecture, Salter educated the crowd about the existence of European communists who were living in Asia during the early 1930’s. Not only noting their arrests and investigations surrounding these arrests, she spoke on specific moments and findings that were “jackpots” in terms of providing evidence for the Noulens Affair investigation. Interestingly, as Salter pointed out, there is little literature surrounding this event specifically, even as more has come out surrounding the Noulens Affair and communism in Shanghai. While this might come as a surprise for some people, when thinking about this issue in the context of the lecture series, it seems fitting that there is a lack of acknowledgment for a past event that then only became recognized once the implications were unavoidable in the future.

Although this may have been one of the first lectures not to hit on the topic of global warming and climate change, I couldn’t help but think about those issues while also thinking about the idea (and effect) that the lack of literature produces. The time period from the Noulens Affair in 1931, and then the actual start of the Cold War in 1945 is similar to the time span from when real acceptance of climate change entered the global sphere and today. Produced in 2006, An Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore was arguably one of the first public recognitions of global climate change, and just now (10+ years later) are we seeing real implications that are sparking more than a laid-back conversation, but a call for legitimate action. As other lectures in this series have done, this lecture (based in a field where I lack familiarity) was able to help me connect ideas from past lectures in order to create a better understanding of how to use the past to better (and hopefully not worsen) the present.

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Art Meets Anatomy

In this past week’s lecture by Dr. Carin Berkowitz, she spoke on two disciplines that commonly do not come into conversation with one and other: art and anatomy. While many might be familiar with some type of anatomical illustration at the very least, there often seems to be a disconnect when looking to understand the importance of the relationship for people on either side of the equation. Given the nature of this lecture series, I have been unfamiliar with many of the topics going into the lectures, however this one hit much closer to home. As an art history major, not only am I more familiar with the visual arts, but I have specific experience from being in a class called Medicine in Visual Culture, in which we studied in depth the works of Charles Bell (whom Berkowitz centralizes her lecture around).

The idea of the visual arts in conversation with medicine has been one that developed in anything but linear form. Once looked upon as disgusting, the beauty that artists such as Charles Bell brought to the table helped to legitimize this intertwining of art and medical culture. Despite the ability of Bell to make this connection stronger, Berkowitz noted that there is still a disconnect present when considering the meddling of these two fields. She argued that simplicity must be avoided in the representation of these forms, as this only serves as a barrier to true understanding of the body.

While we think about the works of Bell as fully representative of the intricacies of the human body, it is important to identify these barriers to realism that Berkowitz touched on and have also been identified by art historians. Due to the general lack of understanding surrounding the human body and its processes at the time of Bell’s works, they were mostly done in an exploratory fashion, focused on the interconnectedness of the body’s inner workings. This led to what some found to be grotesque images of the body, however it was an important step not only in understanding human anatomy but also in the medical field as a whole.

Although much of the lecture hit on elements of art historical anatomical drawings that I was familiar with due to my enrollment in Medicine in Visual Culture, I found it interesting to consider how the theme of the course fit into these works. Thinking specifically about the conversation about sourcing of bodies for these purposes (as has been mentioned by other students in the class), I found direct ties to some of the greater themes we have seen in this lecture series. While glorifying the affect these works had on the medical field, it is easy to forget that their arrival on the coroners table came often not by their own choice. This exploitation of the body continues to bring an ugly moral and ethical conversation into the picture when considering how these works should best be shown and viewed. This led to an interesting and thought-provoking end to the lecture, in which Berkowitz questioned how society should best deal with this issue of exploitation. While there is no easy answer, we can remain hopeful that there is a way in which these works can still be respected so long as there is greater consideration of the negative pretenses under which they were produced.

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Social Influence at the Micro Level

In last week’s lecture in the series: A Presence of the Past, Professor Suegene Noh gave a speech titled, “How Current Genomes are Shaped by Evolutionary Pasts”. A biology professor at Colby, Professor Suegene had a lecture much unlike many of the previous in the series. As other students have already noted concerning the methodology of the lecture, it was quite different from what we have seen already. Grounded in hard science and in a field that many in the lecture seem to have been well versed in (professors included), Professor Suegene still did a great job to ensure that those with less of a background in biology still had access to the material by means of thorough explanations when using technical jargon.

While I was unfamiliar with much of this topic prior to the lecture, and also would not consider myself proficient at all when it comes to the sciences, Professor Suegene brought up points about amoeba competition that connected more towards society than anything else even though the argument itself was based in hard science. It was interesting to consider that even at the smallest levels of life on this planet (ones at which the human eye cannot even see), there are some similar dynamics to the ones we see between individuals as well as communities in larger life forms.

Being in a field (art history) which focuses more on careful looking and research rather than experimentation, it was particularly interesting for me to learn a bit more about the research that Professor Suegene is conducting concerning dicty. It was incredible to learn about the adaptable nature of dicty, especially when considering the extent at which we have questioned humanities ability to adapt to other versions of change (both positive and negative) that we see in the current global scope.

One element of the speech that I found particularly interesting was Professor Suegene’s notation of the idea of “strength in numbers”. Thinking about the positive element of this idea when considering the research being done by Professor Suegene, it is also interesting and important to think of the negative ways this idea has come up in some of the past lectures. Even lectures concerning climate change and the detrimental changes to our environment that have been seen over the past decade, we can acknowledge ways in which the presence (or lack thereof) of numbers has changed the eventual outcome that the past has had on the presence. Also, notable, was the idea that social pressures influence even the most basic forms of biological life. As touched upon by classmates, this brings upon the conversation regarding the ability of genes to undergo changes due to social pressures. While this idea is remarkable to think about, when reflected upon it really does make sense and Professor Seugene is correct in noting that it is often acts of social oppression that result in dominant changes to certain life forms genes. Overall, while much of the hard science made this lecture a bit more difficult to follow, the points regarding the biological processes of the past affecting the present rang true and stayed very in line with the topic of our lecture series.

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The Environment of Sexuality

Last week’s lecture by Professor Greta LaFleur touched upon the history of sexuality in relation to the environment. While seemingly a bit less related to the lecture series topic at the beginning, it became clear that the way in which we think about sexuality has undergone a distinct change given the evolution of our planet (even within a relatively short time period) and this did indeed tie well to the presence of the past. Without a doubt, one of the biggest crowd reactions during the lecture came from the introduction (or reintroduction to those who were already familiar with the idea) of the notion that intimate relationships and the search for a partner become more widespread during the colder months of the year. Spending time at Colby, and therefore in one of the colder climates in the country, this likely hit close to home for most students in the lecture yet hearing a bit more about the history of this notion was enlightening when looking to understand sexuality and the environment at a higher level.

As it has been stated already by other reflections on this lecture, it was quite interesting to hear from LaFleur about the effect that environment and geography have on the sexual decisions made by human beings. When she spoke about a locations ability to change the way people view sexuality (and she used Las Vegas as an example), I found myself contemplating the ways in which this has likely gone poorly (and in some places, well), in some specific locations. I would imagine that understanding this, and more so, understanding the ways in which these viewpoints are created, could be of value for places like colleges and universities as they are constantly working on creating positive environments of culture. If sexuality and more specifically behaviors surrounding sexuality change when an individual is in a certain location, I would imagine this process could be seen in other realms of life that can struggle to work well in isolated communities.

Thinking more generally about how this lecture fits into the series, the presence of the past, I found it interesting to consider the continual mention of the environment in the lectures we have had so far. While the topic of the environment (and its continual change due to human impact, global warming, etc.) is a hot topic for good reason, it has been surprising how many of our lecturers have based their explorations of cultural behavior in the environment, using this as a common thread to explain change between past and present. While some lecturers have used the environment to alleviate blame on humanity, LaFleur simply used the environment to process the ways in which humans behave sexually, while giving a short history of how this has likely changed during the time in which we have noticed relevant changes to the planet. This straightforward methodology was much appreciated, and I found it very relevant, as likely there were at least a few examples that everyone in the room could find themselves relating with at some level. As students have already mentioned many times in their responses, the reference to “cuffing season” got the crowds attention for a reason.

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Has the Past Ever Been Present?

This Monday, Professor Peterson (Associate Professor in the Colby College Department of Philosophy) gave an insightful lecture discussing the relationship between classical German philosophy and environmentalism. Specifically, he used the deliberations of Kant to critique some of the a priori that are inhibiting us from dealing with climate change and global warming. A priori, as Peterson defined, is an intuition held prior to an experience. These, he claims, are paramount to understanding why there has been a certain lack of progress in the forethought and action needed to confront climate change in an appropriate way.

Peterson set forward an interesting idea early in his talk, stating that “Our brains are simply not wired to deal with climate change,” and then questioning this statement by asking openly if humanity can really be held accountable for this inaction or not? While other lectures have been more visceral with their discussions about ways in which change could be brought about to reverse (or aid in the slowing of) climate change, Peterson was to the point.

He noted that “Knowledge of risk is rarely sufficient to induce behavioral change in our societal transformation,” going on to explain that the reason behind this is likely due to human natures tendency to use supplies until they run out (as we have seen for thousands of years of world history). This was all in support of his notion that we must acknowledge the lack of desire for change and also accept that we are hard-wired against change in order to move forward and create distinct change. Personally, I found this one of the best messages we have received in this lecture series so far.

While there were limited suggestions on actual (hard science) ways to reverse the effects of climate change, this itself was seemingly not Peterson’s point and there seemed to be considerable respect for this being the case. I left the lecture in a positive light, feeling that while I did not know where I could add to the discussion on changing our approaches to climate change, there was certainly a way to enter this conversation if one leaves behind some of their “a priori”.

To conclude the discussion of this lecture, I think it is important to address the importance of philosophy in our modern day lives. This semester I have had the opportunity to take my first class in the philosophy department (unfortunately not with Professor Peterson), and I have to say that it has been incredibly fulfilling. In our fast-paced lives, we rarely step back to process our thoughts, let alone how we go about forming them. This process of reflection and deep thinking on the workings of life has certainly been transformative for many academics and the like before us, and I seem to think we might distance ourselves from it a bit too much in this modern age. Professor Peterson served as a great reminder to the audience that while philosophy may not seem the most applicable when talking about the hard sciences, it is important to take into consideration when thinking about how to build  a more responsible humanity.

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Bridging the Emotional Disconnect

This week’s lecture by Dr. Wai Chee Dimok seemed to be an incredibly appropriate continuation of the subject matter in this lecture series. As noted by others, it felt very in line with many of the ideas brought to us by Dr. Hensley in a prior lecture. While Dr. Hensley sited The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland in his lecture on the transitionary period that we are facing in regard to climate change, Dr. Wai Chee Dimok used William Blake and Elizabeth Bishop to iterate a similar point. In many ways however, I found Dr. Dimok’s argument to be slightly more pointed and concrete (regardless of my slight disagreement with its potential success and necessity in the modern world).

Dr. Dimok had a very commendable conclusion of her talk, in which she made her point simply while prompted by questions: Sciences should be more in conversation with arts and humanities. Many others in the series responses have has some issue with this idea, and to this I find myself agreeing. At a meta level, there is clearly need for the sciences to come into closer contact with the humanities, however I do not believe that this is the fix for the crisis that is noted not only by our speakers, but raw science itself. Dimok cited the overall complexity in the realm of sciences taking away from one’s ability to understand (and therefore aid) our current situation yet did not offer solution besides the inclusion of an emotional component of the sciences.

This push for an emotional connection, while interesting and likely grounded in a true realization that less people interact with science daily than we should hope, seemed lofty to me. Even discounting these ideas, herself during the question section of the lecture, Dimok admitted to rarely remembering anything she reads in her daily routine of reading Scientific American. I find it hard to believe that this should be the first consideration when thinking about ways to confront our climate crisis due to these reasons exactly. While emotional connection to the content is clearly important to grab the attention of a wider audience that can inevitably make a difference, this connection I would imagine will likely need to be grounded in the sciences and not the humanities.

Additionally, I found her information regarding the worldwide meat and animal product industry shocking when thinking about our world in a climate change crisis. This industry, while we all know is not necessarily clean and clear of evils, certainly did not sit high in my pre-conceived intuition of industries that had the most detrimental impact on our planet. Learning this was interesting, yet also a bit disheartening considering the nature of the industry and the likelihood that much can be done in the short term to change some of these overarching issues that surround it. While this is a place where her push for an emotional connection could be useful, differentiating between an emotional connection and a call for concrete action seemed absent in the discussion. It is this disconnect that I think we have seen consistently through this series, and one that all presenters so far have tried to address in their discourses.

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A Consideration of The Fictional Nature

While it is important to recognize to recognize the impact that humanity has on the environment and the natural world, it is an entirely different level of commitment to draw those realizations to ones own discipline (regardless of how simple or complex doing so may be). I found it interesting how a professor focused in literature and specifically the English department was able to address some of these issues of climate change and the current detriment that humanity is having on the natural world. Striking moreover, was Dr. Helnsley’s use of such an iconic text when considering the state of our planet. Leaving the talk, I found myself considering the power of this in the relation to our topic: the presence of the past. 

While Helnsley spoke about the ever changing nature of our planet, he seemed to dwell on the issue that we lack the language to explain exactly what state of nature we are in right now. This is an interesting paradigm, and I see ways in which he is spot on and arguably slightly off course in his discourse. While he uses Alice in Wonderland to contextualize another place where lack of proper language existed, I do believe this example also struggles because of the fictional narrative it brings forth. While there is of course a need to analyze and respect fictional works in the lineage of contemporary English literature, placing them into the context of such a real issue like climate change brings upon slight issue in my mind. 

I felt as if the legitimacy of our climate problems and the way we talk about them was potentially not as strong as it could have been given the textual reference. I would imagine my point could be easily countered, and one could argue that then we should also discount the work of George Orwell in his book, 1984. However, I found it notable that this left me feeling slightly off put. 

Thinking about climate change more broadly, I think it is great and important to see multiple disciplines tackling the issue. While an English department may not commonly confront works on climate change, that is not to say they should not. I think to my own major, of Art History, and consider the ways in which we should be better about breaching the topic within our discourse on the history of art. While some artists bring upon the issue in very apparent and well respected manners, as a historical discipline we struggle to use these works for further analysis because their meaning is often quite straightforward and requires a minimal amount of unpacking. Artists such as Maya Lin create works (one of which is in the Colby College Museum of Art titles, Pin River) that represent the deterioration of our natural world, yet historians fail to put these issues into context of what has come before us in terms of other periods of hardship and struggle.  

While this lecture was not immortal at fulfilling and I found myself leaving with a bit of uncertainty surrounding the strength of Dr. Helnsley’s arguments, after a bit of reflection I think he is headed in a direction that is not only positive for departments of English, but academia as a whole. 

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Questioning the Auto Ethnographical Approach

While there were many aspects to Professor Thomas’s lecture that were out of my realm of familiarity, the approach to her research was also done in a way I had not encountered before. The auto ethnographical approach that Professor Thomas brought towards her research not only helped contextualize the happenings in her home state of Montana and her Indian heritage, but this approach also helped to bring greater general understanding to a subject that many in the room were likely unfamiliar with. While the research that Professor Thomas is conducting is relatively specific (and a bit out of the realm of what most on this campus are familiar with), I found her personal approach to be incredibly useful in bringing light on the Indian presence within native American populations in the American west.

Although the interviews she has conducted with not only priests, but those in the community and native populations, I continue to wonder the accuracy of these interactions given her close relationship to the topic and the subject matter. While I would imagine that she gain obtain answers with an extreme amount of honesty, I found myself questioning the use of an auto ethnographical approach in a situation such as this. I am sure however, that this will lead to an incredibly interesting piece of literature once these interviews are bolstered with more historical context and an ongoing narrative of the events in eastern Montana.

I am incredibly interested to see what further research and information Professor Thomas will look to acquire when preparing to link the chapters of her book that she laid out for us in the presentation. While it was quite easy to understand the ongoing cultural issues and challenges of priests coming to the united states, it was still a bit confusing to understand the backstory of their departure from India. I am interested to see how the strengthening of this linkage will inevitably establish a more concrete and linear relationship between the reason the priests are leaving their homeland, and then the struggles they encounter once they reach the American west.

After attending this lecture, it really made me consider the lack of knowledge we have as Americans about some of the communities and people that inhabit our towns and cities. While this rural, eastern Montana town is far off the beaten path for most, it begs me to question how many more of these circumstances exist that we have no knowledge of. Being at a place such as Colby, we learn to broaden our cultural horizons and consider more issues and communities than before, yet this served as a reminder that there are always people and communities that need attention and to be more highlighted in the national and international sphere.