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Recent past events

Writing for The Conversation: Graduate Students
Thursday, March 6, 2025 12:00pm to 1:00pm
Join the Office of the Vice President for Research and the Graduate College for a virtual introduction to The Conversation US with Kristy Nabhan-Warren, Associate Vice President for Research.
The Conversation is an independent news organization dedicated to unlocking the knowledge of academic experts for the public good. With a monthly readership of 20 million, The Conversation expertly shares a scholar’s expertise far beyond the borders of our state. Articles are geared toward the general...

A Conversation with Scholars At Risk
Wednesday, March 5, 2025 4:00pm to 5:00pm
Join us for a public conversation for faculty, students and staff from across campus about the work of Scholars at Risk to protect and promote academic freedom worldwide. SAR staff representatives Clare Farne Robinson (Director of Advocacy Programs) and Adam Braver (Student Advocacy Seminar Coordinator and Author) will offer remarks on the current state of academic freedom globally, the evolving definition and implementation framework for academic freedom within international law and policy, and...

Radical Hope: Cultural Workers and Community Leaders in Conversation
Monday, March 3, 2025 6:25pm to 7:00pm
Join Dr. Leigh Patel, Ida Cordelia Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor, for a panel discussion and conversation with Iowa cultural workers and community leaders.
Dr. Patel is a Professor of Educational Foundation, Organizations and Policy at University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Patel's work focuses on the ways that formal education has consistently acted as one site of coloniality and oppression, and that education and studying is one of the strongest tools for liberation. Political education and...

Book Matters: Brady G’sell and Meena Khandelwal in conversation with Elana Buch
Tuesday, February 25, 2025 7:00pm to 8:30pm
Join us for a reading and discussion, co-sponsored by Prairie Lights, to celebrate recent works from Brady G’sell and Meena Khandelwal, faculty in the University of Iowa Department of Anthropology and the Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies Program. After the reading, Elana Buch, associate professor of anthropology, will join G’sell and Khandelwal for a conversation and Q&A with the audience. Light refreshments will follow.

Artist Talk with Jerron Herman
Thursday, February 20, 2025 5:00pm to 6:30pm
Join us for an inspiring conversation with acclaimed choreographer and disabled artist Jerron Herman, an artist compelled to create images of freedom.

Don't Panic! Rethinking How We Frame Difficult Content in the Classroom
Thursday, February 20, 2025 4:00pm
Join us for a conversation about trigger warnings, content alerts, and other approaches to teaching potentially upsetting topics — led by Newell Ann Van Auken, Associate Professor of Instruction, Division of World Languages, Literatures, & Cultures.
Co-hosted by the Center for Language and Culture Learning, the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies (CAPS), and the Chinese Humanities and Arts Workshop (CHAW), an Obermann Working Group.

Spring Application Deadline: Book Ends Book Completion Workshop
Wednesday, February 19, 2025 5:00pm
Co-sponsored by the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies and the Office of the Vice President for Research, Book Ends—Obermann/OVPR Book Completion Workshop supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist faculty members in turning promising manuscripts into important, field-changing, published books.

Application Deadline: Obermann International Fellowships (Fall 2025)
Saturday, February 15, 2025 11:59pm
The UI Obermann Center for Advanced studies is currently accepting applications for its new International Fellowships Program, which offers dedicated space, time, and funding for interdisciplinary scholars to collaborate on innovative research at the University of Iowa. Up to eight international fellowships will be granted every academic year. Applicants must be active researchers at an accredited institution of higher learning outside of the United States or independent researchers/artists with...

Jane and Her Music: A Musical Celebration of Jane Austen's 250th Birthday
Saturday, February 1, 2025 1:30pm to 9:00pm
A musical celebration of the 250th birthday of Jane Austen

Obermann Book Ends Information Session (virtual)
Wednesday, January 29, 2025 9:00am to 9:30am
Co-sponsored by the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies and the Office of the Vice President for Research and Economic Development, the Books Ends—Obermann/OVPR Book Completion Workshop—supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist faculty members turn promising manuscripts into published books.
At this brief Zoom session, attendees will learn about the program and the application...

Application Deadline: Spring 2025 Obermann Writing Collective
Friday, January 24, 2025 5:00pm
This program offers companionship and accountability to University of Iowa artists, scholars, and researchers working on any kind of academic writing project (ex. academic articles/essays, fellowship or grant applications, book projects, edited volumes, or nonfiction) who want dedicated time, a cozy space, and a community for the practice of writing.
In Spring 2025, three write-on-site groups will meet in our Writers' Attic at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies at 111 Church St. Each...

NEA Big Read | Free Book Pick Up
Monday, January 20, 9:00am to Wednesday, February 12, 2025 5:00pm
The Stanley Museum of Art will launch its National Endowment for the Arts Big Read program on Jan. 20, 2025, Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
This event features a community wide reading of the novel Beloved by Toni Morrison. Pick up a free copy of Beloved at 12 pickup locations across Iowa City between Jan. 20 and Feb. 12, 2025.
Register here to pickup a free copy: https://uiowa.doubleknot.com/event/nea-big-reads-beloved-by-toni-morriso...
An email confirmation must be presented to claim a book...

2025 Winter Institute for Teaching with Writing
Wednesday, January 8, 2025 10:00am to 12:00pm
This is a series of two workshops, on Jan. 6 and 8, focused on teaching with writing and designed for faculty and TAs interested in using writing to promote student learning. Participants can sign up for one or both days.

2025 Winter Institute for Teaching with Writing
Monday, January 6, 2025 10:00am to 12:00pm
This is a series of two workshops, on Jan. 6 and 8, focused on teaching with writing and designed for faculty and TAs interested in using writing to promote student learning. Participants can sign up for one or both days.
Lecture: Met Opera Tosca in Historical Perspective
Friday, November 15, 2024 5:00pm
Professor Anna Barker will introduce the opera Tosca and provide a historical perspective. Streaming from the MET Opera will be in Marcus Theater Sycamore on Saturday, Nov. 23 at noon.
Learn in a fun way about one of the most-often performed operas. Free and open to all.
Hosted by the Opera Studies Obermann Working Group

Pecha Kucha "Engage the Innovators"
Thursday, November 7, 2024 10:00am to 4:00pm
Join us for the University of Iowa’s very first Mental Health and Well-Being Pecha Kucha.
Pecha Kucha, Japanese for chit-chat, is a fast paced, imagery-focused workshop that elevates the voices of our campus “mental health and well-being innovators.”
Attend these workshops to:
• Discover new ways of thinking about work from a mental health & well-being lens
• Get tangible takeaways about innovative mental health and well-being practices occurring on campus
• Create connections to...

Application Deadline: Obermann Symposium Director (2025–26)
Wednesday, October 30, 2024 5:00pm
Is there a burning topic in your discipline or a topic that cuts across disciplines that we should bring to campus? Is there a format for the conversation that can energize an intellectual community around that topic? That might be the perfect topic for an Obermann Symposium!
These imaginative half- and whole-day symposia connect the arts and humanities with design, politics, health sciences, environmental studies, technology, and other disciplines via a compelling topic. Symposia should...

Counterpoint: The Politics of (International) Writing
Monday, October 14, 2024 7:30pm
How do politics affect what poets or novelists write, and even how they write it? How does literature inform political discourse? What is cultural diplomacy, why is it so important, and what is the UI’s role in promoting it?
For this inaugural event in the Obermann Center’s new Counterpoint public conversation series, Christopher Merrill — poet, nonfiction writer, translator, editor, and director of the UI’s renowned International Writing Program — and Loren Glass, a historian of creative...

Application Deadline: Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (Summer 2025)
Wednesday, October 9, 2024 5:00pm
The Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (IDRG) foster collaborative scholarship and creative work by offering recipients time and space to exchange new ideas leading to invention, creation, and publication. IDRG groups work at the Obermann Center for two or four weeks, usually in July and/or August. Applicants propose work on a project with colleagues from across the University, across disciplines within their own department, or with colleagues from other parts of the country or the world...

Keith Haring, Censorship, and the Power of Art | Panel Discussion
Thursday, September 26, 2024 6:00pm to 7:30pm
Join us for a panel discussion exploring the power of art and information in the face of censorship. This collaborative event by the Stanley Museum of Art, the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, and the Iowa City Public Library will explore the enduring impact of Keith Haring's work in the fight against HIV/AIDS. We'll discuss the historical and contemporary implications of banned books on sexual health and the importance of unrestricted access to information.
Panel members:
• Saba Vlach...

Cultivating Success: International Scholarship and Creative Work
Thursday, September 26, 2024 1:30pm to 3:00pm
Scholarly and creative research activity is a linchpin of faculty life at the University of Iowa. International collaboration has been demonstrated to boost the visibility and impact of research. This webinar will focus on the challenges and rewards of international scholarship, including cross-national research collaborations, grant proposals, ways to promote research to domestic and international audiences, the opportunities and potential pitfalls of publishing in non-US journals, and tactics...

Fall Application Deadline: Book Ends Book Completion Workshop
Thursday, September 19, 2024 5:00pm
Co-sponsored by the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies and the Office of the Vice President for Research, Books Ends—Obermann/OVPR Book Completion Workshop supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist faculty members in turning promising manuscripts into important, field-changing, published books.
Applications for upcoming Book Ends workshops are due Sept. 19, 2024 (5 p.m.).

Application Deadline: Mellon Sawyer Seminar
Monday, September 16, 2024 5:00pm
The Mellon Foundation’s Sawyer Seminars program was established in 1994 to provide support for comparative research on historical and contemporary topics of scholarly significance. The seminars, named in honor of the Foundation’s long-serving third president, John E. Sawyer, bring together faculty, foreign visitors, postdoctoral fellows, and graduate students from a variety of fields — mainly, but not exclusively, in the arts, humanities, and interpretive social sciences — for intensive study of...

Book Ends Information Session (virtual)
Wednesday, August 28, 2024 8:30am to 9:00am
Co-sponsored by the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies and the Office of the Vice President for Research, Book Ends — an Obermann/OVPR Book Completion Workshop — supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist faculty members in turning promising manuscripts into important, field-changing, published books. Read more about the program.
Interested applicants are invited to learn more about...

Ten Years Too Long: Making the Flint Water Crisis Public Archive
Wednesday, July 10, 2024 12:00pm to 1:00pm
The Flint Water Crisis Public Archive aims to aid community leaders, researchers, and the general public in better understanding what happened during the Flint Water Crisis. Without our intervention, we risk losing access to documents released regarding the crisis, stripping us of the opportunity to learn about these important events and their ongoing implications for communities in Michigan and beyond. Panelists will include the project's founder, who will discuss the upcoming launch of the...

Dissertation Camp
Friday, June 7, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Thursday, June 6, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Wednesday, June 5, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Tuesday, June 4, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Monday, June 3, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Friday, May 31, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Thursday, May 30, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Wednesday, May 29, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students

Dissertation Camp
Tuesday, May 28, 2024 9:00am to 1:00pm
The 2024 dissertation writing camp for graduate students
Lecture: "John Luther Long, David Belasco, Giacomo Puccini, and Butterfly’s Journey to La Scala and the Met."
Wednesday, May 8, 2024 5:30pm to 6:30pm
Lecture by Professor Anna Barker

Application Deadline: Obermann Faculty Fellows (Fall 2024)
Tuesday, May 7, 2024 5:00pm
Obermann Center Faculty Fellows (formerly Fellows-in-Residence) fully devote themselves to projects within an interdisciplinary community. The program supports artists, researchers, and scholars during periods when focus and feedback are crucial. The program is rooted in our mission: to support the work of individual scholars, while also providing Fellows with the opportunity to enrich an individual, discipline-specific project through interdisciplinary exchanges with a lively intellectual...

Obermann Center 45th Anniversary Celebration, Featuring Keynotes by Joy Connolly & Antoinette Burton
Monday, May 6, 2024 5:00pm
Please join the Vice President for Research at the Hancher Auditorium's Stanley Café at 5 p.m. on Monday, May 6 to celebrate the 45th anniversary of the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies. The event will feature guests Joy Connolly and Antoinette Burton, prestigious national leaders in the humanities and social sciences. All are invited to the reception afterward to celebrate this important anniversary and the Center’s outgoing director, Professor Teresa Mangum.
Please RSVP to let us know...

Application Deadline: Obermann Working Groups (2024–25)
Wednesday, May 1, 2024 5:00pm
Obermann Center Working Groups provide space, structure, and discretionary funding for groups led by faculty that may include advanced graduate students, staff members, and community members with a shared intellectual interest. Groups have used this opportunity to explore new work and to share their own research, to organize a symposium, and to develop grant proposals.
This program allows participants from across the campus and beyond to explore complex issues at a moment when cross...
Film History Now: A Conversation with Pardis Dabashi and Allyson Nadia Field
Tuesday, April 30, 2024 12:30pm to 2:00pm
What does the practice of film history look like today? What different methods—from interdisciplinary inquiry to speculative historiography and public humanities projects—are scholars using to tell new stories about film culture? Please join us to discuss these and other questions with two highly accomplished scholars: Pardis Dabashi (Bryn Mawr College) and Allyson Nadia Field (University of Chicago). Dr. Dabashi will discuss her recently published monograph Losing the Plot: Form and Feeling in...

CLIMATE through a Wide Lens
Thursday, April 25, 2024 4:00pm to 5:30pm
Rising seas, toxic rivers, deforestation, smoke-filled air—headlines remind us daily of the local, national, and international impacts of climate change. Join us for a wild pecha kucha ride through the effects of climate change with researchers who also tirelessly seek solutions. World-renowned climate scientist, Jerald Schnoor will open with big picture issues. That will set the stage for artist Isabel Barbuzza’s work on South American lithium salt mines, environmental literary scholar Eric...

Journal Publishing Now: A Conversation with Jennifer Bean, Lauren Cramer, and Patricia White
Tuesday, April 23, 2024 12:30pm to 2:00pm
Please join us for a panel conversation about academic publishing with three esteemed editors of interdisciplinary journals: Jennifer Bean (University of Washington; Feminist Media Histories), Lauren Cramer (University of Toronto; liquid blackness), and Patricia White (Swarthmore College; Camera Obscura). The panelists will discuss the nuts-and-bolts of journal publishing (for would-be contributors as well as would-be editors), and they will also each reflect on key directions in the fields of...

Public Lecture: “Made to be Seen: Kongo Graphic Writing as a Basis for Rethinking the Transmission of Knowledge” - Bárbaro Martínez-Ruiz, Visiting Scholar, School of Art and Art History
Wednesday, April 17, 2024 5:30pm
Visiting Scholar Professor Bárbaro Martínez-Ruiz will be giving a public lecture titled “Made to be Seen: Kongo Graphic Writing as a Basis for Rethinking the Transmission of Knowledge.”
Professor Martínez-Ruiz is the Tanner-Opperman Chair of African Art History in Honor of Roy Sieber at the Department of Art History at Indiana University. He is also Senior Research Associate in African Art and Its Diaspora at the University of Oxford and Honorary Professor at the University of Cape Town...

Joseph Graves. A Voice in the Wilderness: A Pioneering Biologist Discusses How Evolution Can Help Us Solve Some of Our Biggest Problems
Saturday, April 13, 2024 10:45am to 11:30am
A Voice in the Wilderness: A Pioneering Biologist Discusses How Evolution Can Help Us Solve Some of Our Biggest Problems. A public talk by Joseph Graves

2024 Iowa City Darwin Day
Saturday, April 13, 2024 10:00am to 12:30pm
Every year to mark Charles Darwin’s birthday, Iowa City Darwin Day organizes a two-day celebration of science designed to promote scientific literacy and increase public awareness of the contributions of science to society. The featured speakers for the 2024 events on April 12 and 13 are Joseph Graves Jr., Harmit Malik and Heather Sander. All talks are free and open to all.

Harmit Malik: Rules of Engagement: Molecular Arms Races Between Primate and Viral Genomes
Friday, April 12, 2024 4:30pm to 5:30pm
Rules of Engagement: Molecular Arms Races Between Primate and Viral Genomes. A seminar talk by Harmit Malik.

Joseph Graves: Race, Health, and the Built Microbiome
Friday, April 12, 2024 3:30pm to 4:30pm
Race, Health and the Built Biodome: Seminar presentation by Joseph Graves Jr., Professor of Biological Science at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University.

2024 Iowa City Darwin Day
Friday, April 12, 2024 2:30pm to 5:30pm
Every year to mark Charles Darwin’s birthday, Iowa City Darwin Day organizes a two-day celebration of science designed to promote scientific literacy and increase public awareness of the contributions of science to society. The featured speakers for the 2024 events on April 12 and 13 are Joseph Graves Jr., Harmit Malik and Heather Sander. All talks are free and open to all.

Prairie Lights Reading with Visiting Scholar Lesley-Ann Noel
Thursday, April 11, 2024 7:00pm
Free copy of Design Social Change: Take Action, Work Toward Equity, and Challenge the Status Quo for the first 30 attendees!
What motivates you as a changemaker? What forces are preventing you (and others) from thriving? These questions are essential to the work of creating social change, and they are exactly what Lesley-Ann Noel asks you to explore in her new book, Design Social Change: Take Action, Work Toward Equity, and Challenge the Status Quo (Ten Speed Press, 2023). In the book and at...

Jewish Stories of Identity and Belonging: In the Shadow of the Inquisition, the US Constitutional Right to Liberty of Conscience
Wednesday, April 10, 2024 12:00pm to 1:00pm
Part of the series: Jewish Stories of Identity and Belonging: Spain, Portugal, and the Americas
"In the Shadow of the Inquisition: The US Constitutional Right to Liberty of Conscience"
Dr. Isaac Amon
Director of Academic Research, Jewish Heritage Alliance
Adjunct Professor, Washington university School of Law, St. Louis, Missouri
Sponsors of the series: The Jewish Studies Working Group; The Anne Frank Initiative; International Programs; Obermann Center for Advanced Studies; Center for...

Jewish Stories of Identity and Belonging: Spain, Portugal, and the Americas
Tuesday, April 9, 2024 3:30pm to 5:00pm
Join us for a Public Talk:
"The Legacy of Sefarad: (Crypto) Jewish Experiences in Spain and Portugal,” Dr. Isaac Amon, Director of Academic Research, Jewish Heritage Alliance and Adjunct Professor, Washington University School of Law, St. Louis, Missouri
"Zamora Sefardí: Jewish Legacy in Zamora, Spain,” Dr. Jeśus Jambrina, Professor of Spanish, Viterbo University, LaCrosse, Wisconsin
This is part of the series: "Jewish Stories of Identity and Belonging: Spain, Portugal, and the...
To view additional past events, please search the UI Events Calendar.