Understanding catastrophic occurrences is topic of Feb. 19 talk

Thursday, February 7, 2008, By News Staff

Understanding catastrophic occurrences is topic of Feb. 19 talkFebruary 07, 2008Erica Blustesblust@syr.edu

The Department of Communication and Rhetorical Studies (CRS) in Syracuse University’s College of Visual and Performing Arts will present the talk “Catastrophe/Afterlife: Constituting Life at the Threshold” with Yasmeen Arif of the University of Minnesota on Tuesday, Feb. 19, at 4 p.m. in Room 500 of the Hall of Languages.

Arif is the Sawyer Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Minnesota. Her approach to understanding catastrophes is based on a reframing of the event in a way that privileges the analytic rather than the diagnostic or definitive. Using such events as Hurricane Katrina and the 1984 Sikh carnage in India in her discussions, she poses the central question: How is life constituted at the threshold of damage and recovery?

CRS is presenting the talk under the auspices of the Public Memory Project, with additional support from the Department of Geography and the South Asia Center in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. For more information, contact CRS at (315) 443-2308.