International Festival of Arts & Ideas

Guided by the premise that dance is a barometer of society, Brenda Dixon Gottschild gauges the pulse of contemporary American performance: using dance as the focus and race as the parameter, she reveals Africanisms in modern and postmodern dance and in American ballet. As a dance writer and scholar, Gottschild draws from history, image and performance to examine the presence and impact of black dance in America.

Daphne Miller, MD is the author of The Jungle Effect, a unique travelogue of healthy eating. Her understanding of the interconnectedness of food, the environment and health reveal essential clues to our understanding of diet and lifestyle. Join her to discover food cultures from around the world that are still free of modern chronic diseases and to learn what they can teach us as we seek to develop our own healthy habits.

Ha Jin is the winner of the National Book Award for Waiting, and a celebrated author of short stories, poetry and fiction. David Henry Hwang is the Tony Award winning playwright of M. Butterfly, whose acclaimed new play Chinglish (2011) was the first Broadway play to be performed in both Mandarin and English. In this video from June 28, 2012, both authors read from their current work and talk about the intersection of contemporary writing and cultural perspectives on China. Moderated by Nancy Yao Maasbach, executive director of the Yale-China Association.

A major part of the cultural conversation today is about local culture in the global community: culture is part of the toolkit for global understanding, diplomacy, and more. Particularly in light of the London 2012 Olympics and its associated Cultural Olympiad, the world is more frequently than ever looking for opportunities to share art, ideas, cultures, and conversations. How do we seek to share our cultures, and how do we put our best feet forward? At Festival 2012, we invited Graham Sheffield CBE, Director of Arts for the British Council, to speak about arts and culture on the global scene. At the British Council, Sheffield has been heavily involved in the British government's efforts to share the country's cultural exports, and was also involved in the planning of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad. In this fascinating talk, Sheffield shares stories and insights about the power of art and culture to connect the local to the global, and vice versa. The discussion connects international perspectives to our national conversation about the value of cultural place-making.

Choreographer and conductor Mark Morris discusses his work with a special focus on his company's 20th anniversary performances of Dido and Aeneas. He is joined by Joan Acocella, dance writer for The New Yorker and the author of the 1993 biography Mark Morris.

Why do we like what we like? This wide-ranging and humorous discussion explores the idea that there are deep and surprising commonalities in the pleasures that we get from art, food, sex, stories, and consumer products. Paul Bloom is a Professor of Psychology at Yale University whose research explores how children and adults understand the physical and social world, with special focus on morality, religion, fiction, and art. He has won numerous awards for his research and teaching. He is past-president of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology, and co-editor of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, one of the major journals in the field. Dr. Bloom has written for scientific journals such as Nature and Science, and for popular outlets such as The New York Times, the Guardian, and the Atlantic. He is the author or editor of four books, including How Children Learn the Meanings of Words, and Descartes' Baby: How the Science of Child Development Explains What Makes Us Human. His newest book, How Pleasure Works, was published in June 2010.

Three generations of Irish writers share their stories and discuss writing for the 21st Century. Featuring Colm Toibin, an award-wining novelist, short-story writer and critic whose bittersweet novel Brooklyn (2009) was awarded the Costa Fiction Award, and Belinda McKeon, a Brooklyn transplant, journalist, playwright and writer. She has written for The Irish Times, The Paris Review, and her extraordinary debut novel Solace: A Novel was published in May 2011.

Last year's catastrophic earthquake was one of several humanitarian crises Haiti has faced in recent decades. Emeline Michel, a native Haitian singer and songwriter whose music draws from the island's history and traditions, Frank Bia, medical director of the humanitarian and disaster relief organization, AmeriCares, and former co-director of Yale's International Health Program, Marie Marthe Saint Cyr, Executive Director, Lambdi Fund of Haiti, share thoughts on how the nation can recover from disaster. Moderated by Dr. Gary Desir, professor of medicine at the Yale School of Medicine.

Fintan O Toole, Irelands foremost cultural commentator and assistant editor for The Irish Times, discusses the country's robust cultural landscape, which continues to flourish amidst tough economic times. Joined by Margaret Spillane, culture and politics writer for The Nation and other magazines, to discuss what the historic social and civic significance of the arts has been in Ireland? How have Irish cultural traditions evolved and what do cultural commentators think about the Irish state of mind?

The Visionary Leadership Award was created in honor of Jean M. Handley's leadership as a Founding Director of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas. The Award is presented annually to a visionary leader whose trailblazing work is impacting the world. The Festival's 2011 Visionary Leadership Award recipient Jill Abramson. Jill Abramson is executive editor of The New York Times since September 2011.