Berkeley Talks

In Berkeley Talks episode 141, a panel of scholars discuss the work of Roman Vishniac, a renowned Russian American photographer who took thousands of photos over seven decades and across three continents. Although Vishniac’s genres were diverse, he’s best known for images that he took of Jewish life in Central and Eastern Europe before the Holocaust.

“These photographs are distinguished by their epiphenomena, the life circumstances of their subjects and the narratives that have surrounded these images,” said Jeffrey Shandler, professor of Jewish studies at Rutgers University, at a two-day event in May presented by The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life in collaboration with Berkeley’s Center for Jewish Studies. “Shortly after these photographs were taken, most of the Jews they depict met a terrible fate during World War II. Those few who survived the Holocaust had to start their lives over in radically different circumstances."

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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Music by Blue Dot Sessions.

Photo of Rabbi Baruch Rabinowitz by Roman Vishniac, Mukacevo, ca. 1937-38.

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In episode 140 of Berkeley Talks, a panel of student loan experts discuss the Public Service Loan Forgiveness waiver, the recently extended COVID payment pause and student debt cancellation.

Panelists of this April 2022 talk included:

• Kat Welbeck, Student Borrower Protection Center
• Suzanne Martindale, California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation
• Kyra Taylor, National Consumer Law Center
• Moderated by Amanda Prasuhn, Berkeley Law Financial Aid Office

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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Music by Blue Dot Sessions.

Photo by Elena Zhukova.

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In episode 139 of Berkeley Talks, Damilola Ogunbiyi, CEO and Special Representative of the U.N. Secretary General for Sustainable Energy for All, gives the UC Berkeley Energy and Resources Group's 28th Annual Lecture on Energy and Environment. In the March 31, 2022 talk, Ogunbiyi discusses how to drive a just, inclusive and equitable transition to affordable and sustainable energy for all, and how the Russia-Ukraine war is affecting energy markets around the world.

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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(Photo by Bamas100 via Wikimedia Commons) 

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In Berkeley Talks episode 138, Harry Edwards, a renowned sports activist and UC Berkeley professor emeritus of sociology, discusses the intersections of race and sport, athletes' struggle for definitional authority and the power of sport to change society.

"You can change society by changing people's perceptions and understandings of the games they play," said Edwards in March at a campus event sponsored by the Institute for the Study of Societal Issues and Cal Athletics. "I'm saying whether it's race relations in America, whether it's relations between the United States and the Soviet Union and China, whether it's what's going on in South Africa with apartheid, you can leverage sport to change people's perceptions and understandings of those relationships. Change society by changing people's perceptions and understandings of the games they play."

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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(Photo courtesy of Harry Edwards)

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The Department of African American Studies at UC Berkeley’s 2021-22 Critical Conversations speaker series is a celebration of the life and legacy of June Jordan, an award-winning poet, activist and longtime professor in the department.

At Berkeley, Jordan founded the Poetry for the People program, where writers of all levels wrote and showcased their own poems, and taught poetry to other university students, high school students and community members.

In this episode of Berkeley Talks, two Berkeley alumni and former students of Poetry for the People — Samiya Bashir, an associate professor of creative writing at Reed College, and Solmaz Sharif, an assistant professor of English at Arizona State University — read their work, share some of their favorite poems by Jordan, and discuss the Poetry for the People program and the impact it continues to have on their lives.

The Feb. 28 conversation was moderated by Chiyuma Elliot, a poet and associate professor in the Department of African American Studies at Berkeley.

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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UC Berkeley psychology professor Jack Gallant discusses functional brain mapping for understanding health, aging and disease. The lecture, given on Jan. 20, was part of a series celebrating the 100th anniversary of Berkeley Psychology.

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(Image by Milad Fakurian via Unsplash)

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In episode 135 of Berkeley Talks, UC Berkeley political scientist George Breslauer and economics professor Yuriy Gorodnichenko discuss Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine — what his motivations are and how they compare to Hitler's and Stalin's, if the invasion was avoidable and what should be done about it. 

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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Black feminist artists and cultural workers communally explore the questions of how the forms and methods of opera, surrealism, free jazz, poetry and dance help us communicate the concerns of radical Black feminisms. This Feb. 11 conversation was organized by the Black Studies Collaboratory, a collaborative initiative to address racial inequality through bold and unique humanities-based research projects, in partnership with Cal Performances.

Listen to the episode and read a transcript on Berkeley News.

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Paulina Przystupa, a Ph.D. student at the University of New Mexico, discusses how archaeology inspires comic books and proposes ways archeologists can help build connections with the comic book community.

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The co-editors of The Palgrave Handbook of EU Crises discuss their research that explores the European Union's institutional and policy responses to crises across policy domains and institutions, including the Euro crisis, Brexit, the Ukraine crisis, the refugee crisis and the global health crisis caused by COVID-19.

"The EU has been surprisingly able to cope with crises of different kinds through adaptations, through reforms and through further integration," said Jarle Trondal, professor of public administration at the University of Agder in Norway, at the Jan. 13 event. "We argue that crises no longer pose existential threats to the EU as a political order."

Panelists include:

• Akasemi Newsome, associate director of UC Berkeley's Institute of European Studies and executive director of the Peder Sather Center for Advanced Study
• Marianne Riddervold, professor of political science at the Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences and senior fellow at UC Berkeley's Institute of European Studies 
• Jarle Trondal, professor of public administration at the University of Agder in Norway

Listen to the episode and read the transcript on Berkeley News.

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(Photo by Sara Kurfeß via Unsplash)

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