All News

Gregg Mitman, professor of science and technology studies at the University of Wisconsin, will speak on Breathing Space: An Ecological History of Allergy in America, on Monday, Feb. 20, at 4:10 p.m. in the Science Auditorium (G047). The topic is the subject of his latest book. This talk is supported by the Mary and Elihu Root Faculty Innovation Fund, F.I.L.M., the Dean of the College, and the Biology Department. Refreshments will be served. Also, on Sunday, Feb. 19, Professor Mitman will speak at 2 p.m. in the KJ Auditorium on Glamorous Species, which will be about the use and views of elephants and dolphins in science and film.

Alan Krueger, the Bendheim Professor of Economics and Public Affairs and director of the Industrial Relations Section at Princeton University, spoke to a crowded Chapel on Feb. 13 on the topic “The Economics of Terrorism.” Krueger spoke about research he’s been involved with that looks at the economic dimensions of terrorism participation, and said that the oft-cited link between poverty and terrorism does not hold up under empirical study.

Kamila Shamsie '94, a frequent visiting faculty member in Hamilton's English department, is the author of an op-ed in The New York Times (2/15/06) on the ongoing Danish cartoon controversy. Writing from her native Karachi, Pakistan, Shamsie says "There is nothing but condemnation here for European newspapers' publication of the cartoons... But there are two separate threads to this condemnation. The first relates to the extreme religious offense caused by the cartoons, which has prompted an increasing number of protests, with a worrying trend towards violence," Shamsie wrote. "The second thread to the condemnation concentrates not on the offense itself, but on the motive behind it. The idea that the cartoons were a deliberate provocation to get us to behave badly is being encouraged by officialdom: various political groups have condemned 'the planned conspiracy by the West to instigate the Muslims'; the Foreign Office has said the cartoons are part of 'sinister agendas...'" Shamsie is the author of the novel  Broken Verses.

Gita Rajan, the Jane Watson Irwin Visiting Associate Professor of Women's Studies, is co-editor of a new book, New Cosmopolitanisms: South Asians in the U.S. (Stanford University Press). The book, also co-edited by Shailja Sharma, associate professor of English at DePaul University, offers an in-depth look at the ways in which globalization, technology and travel have altered traditional patterns of immigration for South Asians who live and work in the United States and theorizes how their popular cultural practices and aesthetic desires are changing.

Bill Henderson '63 will be awarded the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award by the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) for the publishing year 2005 at the organization's 32nd annual awards ceremony in March. Henderson is founder of the Pushcart Press in Wainscot, N.Y., and editor of the annual Pushcart Prize anthology. Henderson is in good company, as previous Sandrof winners include Studs Terkel, Pauline Kael and Lawrence Ferlinghetti. NBCC is the country's leading organization of book critics and book review editors, with some 500 members.

In January the Hamilton Alumni Association gathered in 21 regions to celebrate the 249th birthday of Alexander Hamilton.  From 12 regional parties in 2004 and 10 in 2005, these celebrations have grown in scope, scale and content to the point where they can safely claim to be the College's "signature" Alumni Association social event.  Several components were added to the program mix in many cities this year, including showings of the video for Excelsior: The Campaign for Hamilton College, interaction with current students, Al Ham birthday cakes, trivia contests and prizes. 

University of Kansas Professor of Classics Stanley Lombardo will present a dramatic reading from Vergil's Aeneid on Wednesday, Feb. 15, at 4:10 p.m. in the Science Center auditorium (G027). He is one of today's preeminent translators of ancient literature. His translation of Homer's Iliad received the Byron Caldwell Book Award and was performed at Lincoln Center by the Aquila Theatre Company, and his version of the Odyssey was named a New York Times Book of the Year. Free and open to the public.

Hamilton's annual Volunteer Weekend will be held April 7 - 9. As is our tradition, y, engaged alumni and parent volunteers use this weekend to review current business, conduct new business, interact with students and attend a variety of events.  Two of the groups that meet in the spring are the Alumni Council of Hamilton’s Alumni Association and the Parents Advisory Council. The weekend is also an opportunity for friends of the College to return to the Hill to reconnect with one another, meet with students and enjoy the wide variety of events that are staged for this year’s attendees. Hamilton volunteers are critically important to advancing the work of the College. Each spring it is our honor to recognize these efforts. On Friday evening, the Alumni Council will present its Distinguished Service Award to retiring Professor of Anthropology Douglas A. Raybeck. In recent years, it has also been our custom to offer a comprehensive program during Volunteer Weekend highlighting a particular aspect of the College's curriculum.  This year, we will celebrate the visual, studio and performing arts, which are of course central to a liberal arts experience.  We are also in the early stages of planning for building new facilities for the arts to meet the needs of our students and faculty membersAs you will see on the schedules, features of the weekend include Council meetings complimented by theatre and dance workshops with accomplished alumni, faculty members and students and a symposium on political cartooning with prominent syndicated cartoonists. It is most helpful if attendees register for events. An "easy to use" alumni registration site is hyper-linked below. Please register if you plan to attend, and join us as we celebrate the efforts of Hamilton's alumni volunteers and discover the arts at Hamilton.

Associate Professor of Music Michael Woods performed his annual show to honor Black History Month on Wednesday, Feb. 15, at the Syracuse Suds Factory in Armory Square. Woods, jazz composer and bassist, was joined by Jeff Stockham on trumpet, Bob Cesari on sax, Joe Colombo on trombone, Tom Witowski on piano and Rick Compton on drums. The show featured original Woods songs "Steak Sauce" and "One Moment in Time," as well as his work based on traditional progressions. "I'm one of the very few African-Americans in this area who's writing original music," said Woods. "So to me, [the Black History Month show] is very important."

Barbara Gold was the invited keynote speaker at the 27th Australasian Classical Society meeting in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. She gave the evening keynote address, which was the Australian Humanities Academy Trendall Lecture for 2006, on "Inhuman She-Wolves and Unhelpful Mothers in Propertius' Elegies." She also gave another paper at a regular session of the conference on "Rhetoric and Auctoritas in Juvenal's Satires," and she presided over another session (at which Carl Rubino gave a paper on "Horace, Carmina 4.1: The Long Goodbye"). While there she also (as editor of a classical journal) attended a meeting of the classical journal editors from Australia and New Zealand.