Tuesday Humanities Coffee Hour series celebrates newly renovated Tolley Building

Tuesday Humanities Coffee Hour series celebrates newly renovated Tolley Building February 05, 2007Sara Millersemortim@syr.edu

Several faculty and staff members from Syracuse University, along with other guest presenters, will speak throughout the spring semester as part of the new Tuesday Humanities Coffee Hour series, which each week will focus on discussion and shared intellect, creativity and passion in an informal setting. The Tuesday Humanities Coffee Hour series is open to the public and offers a relaxed atmosphere with coffee, tea and other hot infusions. Parking for the general public is available in University pay lots.

On Tuesday, Feb. 6, Linda Martin Alcoff, professor of philosophy in The College of Arts and Sciences and director of the Women’s Studies Program, will speak on “Identity, Visibility and the Politics of It All,” focusing on identity politics in the academic community and in the public sphere, and drawing from her latest book, “Visible Identities” (Oxford University Press, 2006). The coffee hour will begin at 3:30 p.m. in the library on the third floor of the Tolley Building.

Other upcoming speakers include:

• Tazim Kassam, associate professor of religion, and Mehrzad Boroujerdi, professor of political science, leading a conversation about their project on media, religion and international relations on Feb. 13;
• Award-winning “Chicana” memoirist Norma Elia Cantu of the University of California, Santa Barbara, who will speak Feb. 20 about growing up in Laredo, Texas, in the 1940s through 1960s;
• Patricia Roylance, assistant professor of English, who on Feb. 27 will share her research about pro-slavery rhetoric in the United States prior to the Civil War;
• Chandra Talpade Mohanty, professor of women’s studies, who will speak about SU’s connection to a national project known as the Future of Minority Studies (date TBA); and
• Regina Jones, assistant director of multicultural affairs, who will speak about the Native American initiatives on campus (date TBA).

SU’s former Tolley Administration Building was recently renovated and re-dedicated as the site of the new Center for the Public and Collaborative Humanities, an academic area that will become host to humanities classes, seminars and organizations.

For more information on the Tuesday Humanities Coffee Hour series, contact Silvio Torres-Saillant, associate professor of English and director of the Latino-Latin American Studies Program, at saillant@syr.edu.