Events
Cosponsors
- Weatherhead East Asian Institute
- Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation
- Institute of Comparative Literature & Society
This forum brings together educators to rethink relationships between institutions of higher education, their local communities, and their global milieu. In response to current, hegemonic trends of globalizing higher education, we will explore alternative histories and theories of education, asking how local and global concerns in fact pertain to all educational institutions, and how educational inequalities pertaining to class, race, gender, and geography might be either exacerbated or redressed through new institutional, interdisciplinary, and pedagogic strategies. Rather than reject outright a concept of global education, this forum instead asks participants to consider what it would mean to truly make higher education globally accessible and what aims such an education would need to address. What hypothetical curricula, exchanges, funding structures, and institutional relations would respect societies’ and individuals’ rights to intellectual self-determination without, however, positing a priori assumptions of differing educational needs based on cultural or class distinctions?
Keeping in mind that free, compulsory, “universal” education (i.e., for children within a state’s boundaries) was inaugurated just over a century ago, we might take as a starting point the conundrum faced at the onset of universal primary education: How to impart both practical and theoretical knowledge? Or, put another way, how to establish fundaments of knowledge that somehow lend themselves to the pursuit of diverse vocations and professions, ranging from the agrarian to the academic, and can certain disciplines and forms of knowledge be justified as essential whether or not they prepare students for future occupations? Presentations will offer alternative visions of higher education, touching on issues of disciplinarity, class, geography, institutional structures, and new educational media.
Organized by Ginger Nolan, INTERACT post-doctoral fellow at the Institute of Comparative Literature and Society at Columbia University, and Jamyung Choi, INTERACT post-doctoral fellow at the Weatherhead Institute Columbia University. Co-sponsored by the Heyman Center for the Humanities, Institute of Comparative Literature & Society, Weatherhead East Asian Institute, and the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation.
Free and open to the public; no registration required.
Program
November 6, 2015 Friday
9:30am - 10:15am EDT
Coffee / Breakfast
10:15am - 10:30am EDT
Introductory Remarks
10:30am - 12:30pm EDT
Liberal Arts / Vocational Arts
Autonomy?
Mark Taylor
Professor
Columbia University
Assimilating Vocational Schools: Tokyo Imperial University and State-Led Merit Politics in Late Developer Japan
Jamyung Choi
Jamyung Choi
Visiting Assistant Professor, College of the Holy Cross
Critical Zones: Working Knowledge and the Duke Campus Farm
Saskia Cornes
Farm and Program Manager
Duke Campus Farm
Respondent
Mark Wigley
Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
GSAPP, Columbia Universty
12:30pm - 1:30pm EDT
Break
1:30pm - 3:30pm EDT
Cities (and Non-Cities)
The Ivory Tower is Dead! Rethinking Town and Gown in Today's Cities
Davarian Baldwin
Paul E. Raether Distinguished Professor of American Studies
Trinity College
The Politics of Race and University Service Learning Initiatives in the Second Gilded Age
Noliwe Rooks
Associate Professor in Africana Studies and Feminist, Gender, Sexuality Studies
Cornell University
On Giving Back: Knowledge Transfer through Spatial Practice
Stephen Zacks
Journalist
Respondent
Laura Kurgan
Associate Professor of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation
GSAPP, Columbia University
3:30pm - 3:45pm EDT
Break
3:45pm - 5:30am EDT
States (and Non-States)
Noëleen Murray
Director of the Wits City Institute and the A.W. Mellon Foundation Chair of Critical Architecture and Urbanism
University of the Witwatersrand
What Role for States in Higher Education of the Future?
Susan Gillespie
Vice President, Founding Director of Institute for International Liberal Education
Bard College
Respondent
Felicity Scott
Associate Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
Columbia University
November 7, 2015 Saturday
9:30am - 10:00am EDT
Coffee / Breakfast
10:00am - 12:00pm EDT
Epistemologies of the Global
Denise Ferreira Da Silva
Director of Centre for Ethics & Politics
School of Business and Management, Queen Mary, University of London
The Global Influence of China’s Universities: From Periphery to Centre or a Dialogue among Civilizations?
Ruth Hayhoe
Professor of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education
University of Toronto.
Exit Stage Left: the Social Arts College on the Global Horizon
Ajay Singh Chaudhary
Director
Brooklyn Institute for Social Research
Respondent
Lydia Liu
W.T. Tam Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Chinese and Comparative Literature
Columbia University
12:00pm - 1:00pm EDT
Break
1:00pm - 2:30pm EDT
The Fungibility of Knowledge
End of Translation
Jacques Lezra
Professor of Spanish and Portuguese, Comparative Literature
New York University
Interference: Some Historical Notes on Universities, Universals, and Hardware
Reinhold Martin
Associate Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
Columbia University
Respondent
Bruce Robbins
Old Dominion Foundation Professor in the Humanities
Columbia University
2:30pm - 2:45pm EDT
Break
2:45pm - 4:00pm EDT
Plenary Panel: Instruments of another Univers(al)ity
Hidetaka Hirota
Visiting Assistant Professor
The City College of New York
Dan-el Padilla Peralta
Assistant Professor in Classics
Princeton University
Grant Wythoff
Fellow
Society of Fellows in the Humanities
4:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
Concluding Remarks / Refreshments
Participants
- Mark Taylor Professor Columbia University
- Jamyung Choi Jamyung Choi Visiting Assistant Professor, College of the Holy Cross
- Saskia Cornes Farm and Program Manager Duke Campus Farm
- Mark Wigley Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation GSAPP, Columbia University
- Davarian Baldwin Paul E. Raether Distinguished Professor of American Studies Trinity College
- Noliwe Rooks Associate Professor in Africana Studies and Feminist, Gender, Sexuality Studies Cornell University
- Stephen Zacks Journalist
- Laura Kurgan Associate Professor of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation GSAPP, Columbia University
- Noëleen Murray Director of the Wits City Institute and the A.W. Mellon Foundation Chair of Critical Architecture and Urbanism University of the Witwatersrand
- Susan Gillespie Vice President, Founding Director of Institute for International Liberal Education Bard College
- Felicity Scott Associate Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation Columbia University
- Denise Ferreira Da Silva Director of Centre for Ethics & Politics School of Business and Management, Queen Mary, University of London
- Ruth Hayhoe Professor of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education University of Toronto
- Ajay Singh Chaudhary Director Brooklyn Institute for Social Research
- Lydia Liu W.T. Tam Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Chinese and Comparative Literature Columbia University
- Jacques Lezra Professor of Spanish and Portuguese, Comparative Literature New York University
- Reinhold Martin Associate Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation Columbia University
- Bruce Robbins Old Dominion Foundation Professor in the Humanities Columbia University
- Hidetaka Hirota Visiting Assistant Professor The City College of New York
- Dan-el Padilla Peralta Assistant Professor in Classics Princeton University
- Grant Wythoff Fellow Society of Fellows in the Humanities