Valentine's Day was started to honor a slain saint, but also to replace a pagan tradition celebrating the coming spring. In this episode of A Smarter U, host Hannah Belayachi talks with professors Stephen Dawson (religious studies) and Virginia Cylke (psychology) to delve into the history.

Who is rising in "The Rise of Skywalker"? Who is the most pivotal character in the Star Wars saga? Three Lynchburg Star Wars fans sat down with A Smarter U to talk about the new Star Wars movie, the expansion of the Star Wars universe with "The Mandalorian," and more.

Halina Peabody was a young girl when World War II and the German occupation of Poland turned her life upside down. Her father was imprisoned. She and her mother had to hide their Jewish identity and rely on inner strength, courage, and the compassion of others to survive. She joined host Hannah Belayachi and history professor Dr. Brian Crim to share the human side of what history students learn about the podcast.

A president stands accused of wrongdoing. A nation is divided on the president's policies and fitness for office. A polarized media environment plays to each end of the political spectrum with little agreement on reality. Sound familiar?

"Fake news" has been in the news and political rhetoric for a while, but it has been a major point of discussion in recent years. This episode of "A Smarter U" brings together a journalism professor, Dr. Ghislaine Lewis, and a philosophy professor, Dr. Devon Brickhouse-Bryson, to talk about the phenomenon and how news makers and news consumers can examine their beliefs and make sure they're getting an accurate picture of what's happening in the world.

Ever wonder what makes a supervillain? Criminology professor Dr. Ken Wagner and communication studies professor Dr. Mike Robinson join this episode of A Smarter U to talk about the mental workings of the Joker, the notorious "Clown Prince of Crime" who gets his own feature film coming on October 4. From his first appearance in the Batman comics to understanding the math to his madness, the professors unpack the Joker with help of Max Weber, Shakespeare, and the kind of pop culture expertise that can only come from decades of reading comics.

Francessca Vaszquez '00 leads an international team at Amazon Web Services to help companies use cloud computing technology to take their apps and businesses global. While she travels the world, she often refers back to lessons she learned while earning her computer science degree at Lynchburg — lessons from inside and outside the classroom that prepared her for leadership. She's our guest in this episode of A Smarter U.

Season two, episode one of "A Smarter U" features world-renowned women's running icon Kathrine Switzer, who got her start with competitive running at Lynchburg College (now University of Lynchburg) before she became the first woman to officially register for and run the Boston Marathon. Natalie Deacon, assistant women's soccer coach and a running icon at Lynchburg, joined her for the discussion with host Justin Cummings.

This episode was recorded in May 2018 when Switzer was on campus as the Commencement speaker.

Download the transcript here.

How does music get front-row tickets to the revolution?

From coded spiritual songs that guided slaves along the Underground Railroad to Ukrainian folk songs opposing Russian invasion, music has played a role in uniting people and inspiring protest. Dr. Lindsay Michie saw this firsthand when she was a photojournalist in South Africa during the fall of apartheid nearly 30 years ago. This helped inspire a class that she's offering to first-year University of Lynchburg students in Fall 2019.

Dr. Michie and Christine Moore, a student who has taken the music-and-revolution class before, sat down with Justin Cummings to talk about the power of music to inspire social change.

New this episode: You can now find A Smarter U on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play Music, TuneIn, and Spotify.

You also can listen to many of the songs referenced in this podcast in a Spotify playlist here.

 

 

Transcript, A Smarter U, Episode 2

Justin Cummings: Welcome to “A Smarter U,” a University of Lynchburg podcast. Today we're going to be taking a closer listen to music and asking how a song can start a revolution. I'm Justin Cummings, and today I'm joined by professor of history Dr. Lindsay Michie, and one of her students, Christine Moore.

So today we're going to be getting into, like I said, how music can start a revolution, but before we really dive into that, Dr. Michie, what kind of music do you listen to?

Lindsay Michie: Well, I grew up listening to all kinds of different music. I really liked listening to a R&B and soul and rock and pop, but also jazz and classical. But in the last 10 or 15 years, I've been listening a lot to hip hop and rap music. Mostly the woke, though, not the trap.

Justin Cummings: What made you decide to start doing research? Not just listening to him enjoying music, but actually doing some research on it and then teaching about it?

Lindsay Michie: I lived in South Africa for a while, and when I was teaching over there, I was also working as a photojournalist. I was covering a lot of events and demonstrations during a time that apartheid was ending. So there was a lot of revolution in the air and I noticed that music kind of punctuated every single event that happened. And it sort of got into my head how important music is as an element in any kind of resistance movement.

Justin Cummings: So you're teaching a class this upcoming fall about this specifically for first year students. Why do you think this is a good class for first year students?

Lindsay Michie: Well this class is part of the new Dell program, the general education program that we're starting this year. And it's part of something called the integrative seminar series. These are seminars that introduce the topic that's not necessarily wedded to one discipline like history or English, but gets students thinking about a topic on a different level. So the topic of mine is, “Can music start a revolution?” It takes into consideration music and lyrics and history and politics and social movements, and so it's a way to sort of listen to music in a different way.

Justin Cummings: You already taught a very similar class as an upper level class?

Lindsay Michie : Yes.

Justin Cummings: And Christine, you took that class, correct?

As the New England Patriots and the Los Angeles Rams head to the Super Bowl, a physicist and an athletic trainer sat down to talk about the physics of the game and the science of concussions.

This is the first episode of A Smarter U, a University of Lynchburg podcast featuring University of Lynchburg professors talking about current events and other items of interest.

Episode 1 features Dr. John Eric Goff, a well known sports physicist who has provided commentary in podcasts, articles, and TV appearances around the world, and Dr. Tom Bowman, an athletic training professor who is working on a National Football League-funded study on concussion treatment. Justin Cummings ’19, a communication studies major working for University Communications and Marketing, hosted and produced the episode.

Subscribe to A Smarter U on Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, Google Play Music, or Apple Podcasts.

Transcript: A Smarter U, Episode 1

Transcript prepared by Annabelle Nagy ’22

Justin Cummings - Welcome to a smarter you, a University of Lynchburg podcast! With the Super Bowl right around the corner, today we will be discussing football from a different point of view. I’m Justin Cummings and today I am joined by professor of physics, Eric Goff.

Eric Goff - Hey Justin. How are you?

Justin - And professor of athletic training, Dr. Tom Bowman.

Tom Bowman - Hey Justin. Thanks for having me.

Justin - Thank you guys for being here today. So, the Super Bowl has officially been set with the Rams and the Patriots. So, before we get into that, before we get into the Super Bowl itself, how has your research crossed paths with football and what led you to look at that specifically?

Eric - So, this is Eric here, and I have done a lot of research with soccer balls, which the rest of the world calls football. And I have always examined the World Cup footballs for the last dozen or so years and the interest with football came about two and a half years ago when StarTalk launched “Playing with Science” and I’ve been on that show ever since the very beginning and we’ve done all kinds of different sports from skating to baseball to Tour de France, soccer, and we’ve even done golf and football. And then two years ago partnering with “Playing with Science,” “Tune In” and the NFL had me start appearing regularly on Sundays to do play analysis. So, for the past two seasons I’ve been analyzing a play from the NFL, pulling out the physics and doing some calculations. Trying to elucidate what’s going on in the field in some of the more fascinating plays from the NFL in the past two seasons.

Justin - Awesome. Tom, what about you?

Tom - So, the majority of my work is focused on the sport of men’s lacrosse because we don’t sponsor football here at the University. When we do work in lacrosse, we always find ourselves comparing to football because, although lacrosse is the fastest growing sport in the world, football is king in America and that is probably the most popular sport. So, I’ve done some work on how to impact biomechanics with looking at what do head impacts look and feel like when our lacrosse and soccer players are on the field and we’ve compared those to some of the findings in football. And, I’ve also looked at protective equipment,