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Visiting Assistant Professor of English Emily Rohrbach presented a paper titled "Byron's Sense of History: The Objectionable Body of George IV" at the International Conference on Romanticism in Baltimore, Oct. 18-21. Her paper, part of a panel titled "Objections to Objects," explores Byron's representation of historical objects in his comic epic Don Juan.

Dean of Faculty and Professor of English Joseph Urgo published Violence, the Arts, and Willia Cather (Associated University Presses) in October. Co-edited with Merrill Skaggs of Drew University, the book gathers 23 critics to explore Cather's "cyclical encounters with death and disaster" and her commitment "to making art in the face of violence." In his introduction to the volume, "Existential Terror in Cather," Urgo examines the recurrence in Cather's fiction of "a sensibility reflective of living in a world that may be destroyed, or may destroy us, in a moment."

The weather was beautiful, the Red Sox were victorious, and the city of Boston welcomed the Hamilton College Alumni Association in fine fashion to the 43rd Head of the Charles Regatta October 20 and 21. Nearly 70 alumni, parents and friends gathered in the Reunion Village to cheer on the Hamilton College Crew Team as they competed in the Men's Four, Women's Four and Women's Eight Collegiate Races.   

David Corn, Washington editor for The Nation, a Fox News Channel contributor and best-selling author, will lecture on Monday, Oct. 22, at 7:30 p.m., in the Hamilton College Chapel. This event, hosted by the Hamilton College Democrats, is free and open to the public.

Ten members of Hamilton's class of 2008 were elected this month to the Epsilon chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation's oldest honor society. The students are Marco Alberto Allodi, Kristin Suzanne Alongi, Kate Elizabeth Berlent, Daniel Lawrence Campbell, Katharine Ruth Hottenstein, Jonathan David Millhauser, Thao Nguyen Thi Nguyen, Nathan Luc Vandergrift, Magdalena Maria Wierzbicka and Sarah Keller Wissel.

Robert Simon, the Marjorie and Robert W. McEwen Professor of Philosophy, has been named to the list of 100 Most Influential Sports Educators by the Institute for International Sport (IIS). Among other honorees are Andre Agassi, Tiger Woods, sportscaster Bob Costas and Duke University men's basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski.

Visiting Instructor of French John Lytle presented a paper at the 33rd annual 19th Century French Studies Colloquium, organized by the University of South Alabama in Mobile, which took place Oct. 18-20. His paper was titled "High and Low Approaches to History in Prosper Mérimée's 'La Vénus d'Ille.'"

Cheng Li, the William R. Kenan Professor of Government, was a guest in a discussion about China's leadership, foreign policy and U.S. -Chinese relations on The Charlie Rose Show on Oct. 18. Li was joined by Perry Link of Princeton University and Orville Schell, director of the Center on U.S.-China Relations at the Asia Society. The program is a talk show hosted by acclaimed interviewer and broadcast journalist Charlie Rose that engages America's newsmakers in all fields. It airs Monday through Friday on more than 200 PBS affiliates throughout the United States. 

A. Todd Franklin, associate professor of philosophy, presented a paper "The Dark Ghetto: Race, Subjectivity, and the Dialects of Dislocation" at a multidisciplinary symposium held October 12-13 at SUNY Binghamton. The paper focused on the tragic dimensions of ghetto life and the ways in which human subjectivity can positively transform it. In keeping with the symposium's theme: "Modernity and Locality: Discrete Spaces in Global Culture," Franklin's paper highlighted the ways in which American ghettos are hyper-segregated both spatially and socially.

Ann Bancroft, the internationally acclaimed polar explorer, spoke at Hamilton on Thursday, October 18, about experiences and triumphs during her career as a polar traveler. She first spoke at the College 11 years ago, shortly after her 1992-1993 expedition. Bancroft was the first woman to reach the Arctic Pole on ice, which she accomplished on May 4, 1986. On January 14, 1993 she and three other women became the first women to lead an all female expedition to the Antarctic Pole. They were also the first to reach the pole without any corporate sponsorship. Then in 2001 Bancroft and a fellow female explorer, Liv Arnesen, became the first women to cross the continent of Antarctica. Her lecture focused on the difficulties of entering the field and then developing a viable and meaningful career out of her lifelong passion.