Events

The Dreyfus Affair transformed French society at the end of the nineteenth century. It also transformed the nature of Jewish identity, changing how Jews saw their place in the world and their relation to other Jews. This lecture, by the author of Alfred Dreyfus: The Man at the Center of the Affair (2024), explores Jewish reactions to the Affair in different national contexts, with particular attention paid to the effect of the Affair on various Jewish political ideologies. 

Maurice Samuels is the Betty Jane Anlyan Professor of French at Yale University, where he chairs the French Department and directs the Yale Program for the Study of Antisemitism. A recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship and the Cullman Center Fellowship at the New York Public Library, he is the author of five books, including most recently Alfred Dreyfus: The Man at the Center of the Affair, published by Yale University Press in 2024.   

Registration is required for guests outside of the Penn community and encouraged for all participants.

Sonia Gollance is a scholar of Yiddish Studies and German-Jewish literature whose work focuses on dance, theatre, and gender. Her first book, It Could Lead to Dancing: Mixed-Sex Dancing and Jewish Modernity, was published by Stanford University Press in May 2021. A National Jewish Book Awards finalist and winner of a Choice Award for Outstanding Academic Title, this book was released in paperback in October 2023.

A contemporary art exhibition that will open the two-day Transnational Feminist Networks Symposium from September 12-13, 2024, at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.

Join our community as we celebrate the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlawed racial discrimination in schools, jobs, and public facilities.  With the law’s 60th anniversary, the Office of Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Programs and the African American Resource Center, is offering a program to celebrate the passing of this historic act – the nation's benchmark civil rights legislation which continues to resonate in America. 

Our distinguished panel will speak to the legal, political, and advocacy aspects of the law.

Moderator: Dr. Marcia Chatelain – Presidential Compact Professor of Africana Studies
Panelist: Chad Lasiter – Executive Director, PA Human Relations Commission [MSW, Penn SP2]
Panelist: Benjamin Jealous – Professor of Practice, Carey Penn Law [Former National President and CEO of the NAACP]

Please click the link below to join the webinar:

https://upennmeeting-edu.zoom.us/j/91766948821?pwd=m8n1nDY6iLjIxPl5uKHONEKNP93l1z.1

Passcode: 704191 (not required)

Please join the 14th annual Veterans Day Flag Ceremony held on Monday, November 11 at 9:00 am at College Green on Locust Walk. 

Día de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, is a lively holiday blending of Indigenous Mexican beliefs and traditions with the Catholic celebrations of All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day. With roots in rituals dating back 3,000 years to pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, Día de los Muertos is observed across Latin America and in Latine communities worldwide.

Explore the unique history, traditions, and expressions of this celebration of life and death. Learn about the ofrendas (offerings) at the center of the festivities. These ornate and colorful altars honor the dead (and encourage them to join the party!) with bright yellow marigolds, food, drinks, and photos. Discover the origins of the iconic smiling calacas y calaveras (skeletons and skulls) that are seen on candy, masks, and dolls across parades, vigils, and gatherings.

Program supported by the Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

As a part of the Diversity Lecture Series at Penn, Jasmine E. Harris, Professor of Law will give a talk on The Intersection of Title IX and Disability.  Jasmine E. Harris is a law and inequality legal scholar with expertise in disability law, antidiscrimination law, and evidence.

Gain insight into Mexican religious folk practices through these selections from the Dr. William H. Helfand collection of ex-votos and devotional paintings on medical subjects. Ex-votos are votive paintings usually hung in churches and religious venues as a sign of gratitude for received blessings or healings. The collection includes ex-votos dated between 1868 and 2002 and are dedicated to Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, Saint Anthony of Padua, Saint Cosmas, and other Christian saints.   

The tradition of creating ex-votos in Mexico began in the 16th century. Once a practice of the wealthier class, the lower classes took on the tradition after Mexico gained independence from Spain in 1821. With this social shift came a corresponding change in the ex-votos themselves. In the 19th century, tin replaced the expensive canvas that had previously been used, and local, unschooled painters began to specialize in this kind of production, gradually developing personal styles.    

The miracle or the difficult situation in which the worshippers found themselves before the divine intervention occupies the central part of the ex-voto. Health-related miracles are among the most common found in Mexican ex-votos, together with miracles associated with surviving car accidents, earthquakes, animal attacks, and other violent events.   

This exhibit is curated by Manuel de la Cruz Gutierrez, Director for the Holman Biotech Commons, Elizabeth Blake, Eugene Garfield Resident in Science Librarianship, and Samantha Hill, Curator of Civic Engagement at the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts.   

The William H. Helfand collection is part of the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts.

Listen to the insight of the singular Prof. Mary Frances Berry in a new installment in the African-American branch of our Africana Lecture Series. On October 10, 2024, 4pm, historian and activist Prof. Mary Frances Berry will have a conversation on the work of civil rights in 1964. Register today for this event in the Agora Room of the Annenberg Public Policy Center on Penn’s campus!

REGISTER HERE

Alvin Khiêm Bùi (CUNY, Brooklyn), with commentary by Khoi Nguyen (Penn): This talk looks at how Vietnamese, Taiwanese and U.S. policies affected ethnic Chinese first in, and later, from southern Vietnam (“Hoa”) and Hoa reactions to these policies. I first look at the Republic of Vietnam’s “Vietnamization” policies (1955-1975) which attempted to “assimilate” (đồng-hóa/同化) the Hoa as fully-fledged Vietnamese nationals of a new postcolonial nation-state. I then reconstruct Taiwan’s role in the IndoChinese refugee crisis. As a non-UN member state by the peak of the crisis in the late 1970s, Taiwan’s contributions to the IndoChinese refugee crisis are not recorded in UNHCR statistics, which detail the global nature of resettlement (across the “Global North”). Many Hoa resettled in the United States, where their experiences in Vietnam were reconfigured in a new racial/ethnic landscape. By observing one ethnic community over half a century, my talk seeks to transpacificize across Critical Refugee, Southeast Asian, East Asian, Asian American/diasporic, and Cold War studies.