Astronomer Eric Jensen and microbiologist Amy Vollmer give an introduction to an interdisciplinary subject: astrobiology, the study of life beyond Earth. By trying to understand how Earth formed and evolved, and how microbial life forms have evolved and adapted to living in extreme environments on this planet, scientists are developing a better understanding of the possibilities for life elsewhere in the universe. Topics that Jensen and Vollmer explore include the early history of Earth, the formation of critical organic molecules, data from Mars, the likelihood of stars like our Sun and planets like Earth existing in the galaxy, and extreme environments on Earth that may give us clues about the limits of life elsewhere.

by Professor of Anthropology Farha Ghannam

What defines a "good death?" What happens when a young person dies suddenly? How do mothers, fathers, and siblings make sense of the unexpected passing away of a son or a brother? What discourses do people draw on to explain such a loss? Based on recent ethnographic research in a low-income neighborhood in Cairo, I examine the role of religion in offering people a set of ideas and discourses that they can actively utilize to understand and accept mortality in general and unexpected mortality in particular.

Unlike Western societies, where death is usually hidden and relegated to specific isolated spaces, death in Egypt is a public occurrence that mobilizes families, networks, and communities. Sharing in praying, carrying the coffin, participating in the burial, paying condolences, and respecting the memory of the dead and the feelings of his/her relatives are expected from neighbors, relatives, and friends. At the same time, death is widely discussed by men, women, and children and addressed by religious figures in the media and local mosques. In fact, death is the most commonly addressed topic by different sheikhs in weekly lessons in local mosques, TV religious programs, numerous audiotapes, and various books and booklets.

The death of young men in particular, which is usually sudden and tragic, is the focus of much attention. Religious figures often view the increasing number of such deaths a minor sign that the Day of Judgment is approaching. They repeatedly explain the notion of "good ending" (husn al-khatima), which all Muslims should to aspire to and work to secure. They also vividly describe the meaning of a "bad ending" (sua' al-Khatima), which should be avoided at all cost. On the other hand, we have family members, relatives, and friends, who link the timing and nature of death, the place of burial, and testimonies by others who attend the washing, praying, carrying, and burying in their attempts to present the passing of the loved one as a "good death." This lecture explores how these different actors selectively appropriate religiously and socially supported ideas, texts, and views in their attempts to attach positive meanings to the death of young men and present it within the highly cherished notion of "good ending."

This lecture asks us to question our normative view of the nation-state, and to imagine a world where ethnicity was neither a real nor an important form of community identity.

Pieter Judson '78 asks whether Austria-Hungary was truly an empire. He argues that how we answer this question shapes the way we view contemporary East-Central Europe. If, as most people do, we see the world through a nationalist lens, then we will categorize Austria-Hungary as a classic empire, one that ruled over several "captive nations." After the break up of Austria-Hungary in 1918, nationalist activists propagated just such a myth of Austria-Hungary as an imperial "prison of nations" in order to legitimize their new states of Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Yugoslavia. Twentieth-century social scientists too were invested in seeing Austria-Hungary as an imperial entity, one that had held together the complex ethnic mosaic they thought of as Eastern Europe. Finally, nostalgists pining for the lost world of fin-de-si???cle Budapest, Prague, or Vienna also promoted memories of Austro-Hungarian culture as particularly imperial in nature. All these views, Judson argues, are wrong-headed, originating in our need, like that of the nationalists, to see Eastern Europe in terms of well-defined nations and cultures. Austria was in fact a genuinely constitutional state with no ruling nation and no oppressed minority nations, but also one with no national identity.

Professor of History Marjorie Murphy discusses teacher unions, politics and how the differences between these two parties caused the Ocean Hill-Brownsville strike of 1968. Martin Luther King, McGeorge Bundy, Sunny Carson, and Dick Parrish are the key figures that this lecture seeks to bring to the forefront as characters whose actions aided in shaking up New York in the late 1960's. Their roles, influences, and actions are laid out in a clear and concise manner so as to highlight the specific route that their actions took.

Professor Murphy also discusses why public school education in many American cities, is for minority parents, an intellectual, social, and economic death sentence for their children, and why Dewey’s ideal of ideological ground fell to the neo-conservatives while the progressive shattered into fragments after the Ocean Hill-Brownsville Strike.

by Professor of Biology Amy Cheng Vollmer

"From the perspective of a typical bacterium or virus, the human body is a perfect incubator: constant temperature, filled with nutrients, bathed in moisture! So why are we still around? How do bacteria sense the presence of a host's immune response? How can both the bacterium and host survive? We'll consider these topics from a co-evolutionary and inter-dependent point of view," Vollmer says. "As well, we will explore the concept that there are many beneficial bacterial commensalisms, upon whom our lives depend. My talk will provide an overview to the intertwined worlds of humans and microbes. It will also include examples of how microbiology is an ideal vehicle for promoting science literacy throughout the Swarthmore curriculum."

by Assistant Professor of Philosophy Alan Baker

"Philosophers have traditionally classified mathematical knowledge as 'a priori' and scientific knowledge as 'a posteriori,'" Baler says. "In other words, mathematics can be done without leaving one's armchair, while physics cannot. In this lecture I challenge both sides of this traditional picture. On the one hand, are there such things as 'mathematical experiments' and what kind of role might they play in mathematics? On the other hand, can conclusions be justifiably reached about the nature of the physical world that do not depend on observation or experiment?"

The lecture is intended for a general audience and no specific mathematical or scientific background is presupposed.

by Assistant Professor of Japanese William Gardner

"In my lecture, I discuss the global context for the emergence of modernism in Japan in the 1920's and 1930's, as well as the ways in which Japanese modernist poetry deployed the distinctive qualities of the Japanese written language," Gardner says. "Although the prewar Japanese state could be characterized as both authoritarian and imperialist, the 1920's were a time of relative political liberalism and cosmopolitanism. This was also a period of rapid urban growth, as well as the rise of communications and transportation technologies such as radio, cinema, and aviation that seemed to shrink the size of the globe. Among the dizzying cultural developments of this period was the emergence of new types of literature in Japanese that we can identify as modernist and avant-garde, inspired in part by such European avant-garde movements as Futurism, Dadaism, and Surrealism. In my talk I will look at the work of four modernist poets, and show how each of them positions his work in terms of Japanese literary tradition, Western cultural hegemony, and Japan's expanding empire in East Asia."

by Associate Professor of Astronomy Eric Jensen

"Twelve years after the first discovery of planets outside our own solar system, we now know of more than 200 extrasolar planets," Jensen says. "This is enough to allow us to start to see emerging patterns that may yield clues to how Jupiter-like planets form, though current techniques are not yet able to detect Earth-like planets. I discuss what we have learned so far from our study of extrasolar planets, and the prospects for detecting Earth-like planets in the near future."

by Associate Professor of Classics and Philosophy Grace Ledbetter

"Why does Greek mythology figure centrally into some of the most pivotally modern works in the performing arts? If we have lost a romantic, sentimental attachment to ancient Greece as a cultural ideal, what significance can Greek myth have for us?" asks Ledbetter. "In this lecture I discuss Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos, Martha Graham's Night Journey, and Balanchine's Apollo and show that, in different ways, each of these works employs a kind of classicism that - somewhat paradoxically - evokes the ancient past specifically for purposes of modernizing its art form."

by Lang Visiting Professor of Issues for Social Change George Lakey

"We live in a breakthrough period for 'nonviolent struggle,' when pro-democracy movements are using it to overthrow dictators and human rights advocates are using it to save lives during civil unrest," Lakey says. "My question is: how can this social technology be made even more powerful for achieving justice, democracy and peace?

"I argue that it's time to view nonviolent action not just as an overall concept but to break it into three different applications, and I'll argue further that these applications are different from each other in important ways. By 'nonviolent struggle' I mean an approach to waging conflict in which the protagonist uses methods of protest, intervention and/or noncooperation without the use or threat of injurious force. It's often called 'people power.' Researchers are struggling to keep up with the increased use of people power around the world, the better to understand it."