How do singers cast spells on listeners? And why does singing carrying such special powers to cause deliriums and entrancements, even beyond preaching, acting, or rallying the masses? This presentation looks at the circuitry that operates between singers-as-spell-casters and target-listeners.
While games are often associated with frivolous fun, game designers are increasingly exploring whether play can be a productive force to tackle our world’s problems. This presentation will discuss different ways that video games are being deployed to “serious” ends: educating players about tough social or scientific problems like climate change, inviting the public to volunteer to be a part of research projects, and helping people make necessary lifestyle changes.
Most of us seek to be reasonably good people leading reasonably good lives. There is a mountain of evidence suggesting that almost none of us live up to our own standards. This presentation will focus on the place of ongoing character development in helping us narrow the gap between the people we'd most like to be and the people we are, no matter what sort of vision we have of what it takes to live well.
Like many holidays, Halloween is often treated as empty fun; its content—which plainly concerns death and its place in life—is dismissed as irrelevant to the meaning of the holiday as it is now practiced although it is conceded that this macabre content may be part of the historical origins of Halloween. In this session, the presenter will argue that this "nothing to see here" attitude should be rejected, and that Halloween can give us the opportunity to think through the central question facing all of us: How should we live?
This presentation will examine the pivotal role of ancient pottery in archaeological research, focusing on the methodologies archaeologists use to analyze ceramic vessels and providing insights into the socio-cultural and economic aspects of past civilizations. By using actual pottery artifacts from the ISAC Museum's collection that offer tangible connection to historical contexts, attendees will gain an understanding of the analytical techniques used to study pottery, underscoring the importance of ceramics in reconstructing human history and cultural interactions.
In this presentation, artist Jason Salavon will explore his evolving art practice, which navigates the interplay between autonomous computational processes and traditional creative methods. He will present a range of projects, with a focus on his recent efforts to push AI models to create imagery "off-manifold," challenging the boundaries of generative AI. Salavon will also consider the broader impact of new technologies on visual culture, including the rapid rise of AI-driven digital art, and discuss how these innovations are reshaping the creative landscape.
Bob Dylan is best known for his songs in verse-refrain form. Think of the many tunes with long, florid verses that end with a refrain line, which often includes the song’s title. “Desolation Row” and “Tangled Up in Blue” are two famous examples. However, a significant number of his songs follow different formal outlines, among them 12-bar blues, verse-chorus, and 32-bar song form. In this presentation, the presenter is interested in exploring songs that include a bridge. What role do bridges play in Dylan’s songs? What does the presence or absence of a bridge say about the song's genre?
Kağan Arík’s research focuses on the historical development of the Turkish language and its various dialects. He is a member of the American Association of Teachers of Turkish and Turkic Languages. Arík also is an anthropologist (socio-cultural, linguistic, musical, medical) of Central Asia and has studied the region since 1987.
Srikanth “Chicu” Reddy is a poet, critic, and literary editor who studies poetry across a range of forms, historical periods, and regions.
Benjamin Callard’s research focuses on ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of the mind. This year, he is teaching courses in the philosophy of language, metaphysics and epistemology, ethics, and philosophy of logic; Callard has received several teaching awards from the University of Chicago. His most recent publication, "Comforting Counterfactuals," is forthcoming in Time, Meaning, and Value (Oxford University Press), a collection honoring the work of Samuel Scheffler, which explores how individuals should feel about what might have been.
