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Agency
Authenticity, power, action

DIFFICULT DIALOGUES SPRING 2012 SYMPOSIUM

In the broadest sense, agency means the capacity to act. Yet many people feel powerless in the face of contemporary political, economic and environmental conditions. Can we have agency amidst these daunting challenges? Can we avoid being paralyzed or overwhelmed, distracted, or in denial?

This semester, we will be asking these questions together in our dialogue symposium. First, what is agency? What types of agency are possible at the present moment, and how does that delimit our world? What access to agency do we have, individually and collectively, and how might we use it? Given the realities of our time, can we re-envision what is possible, with creativity and community, and act on it?

In the face of the worst aspects of human experience (genocide, racism, abject poverty, exploitation, environmental degradation), how do many of us continue to act with purpose? What are the limits of agency, and what are its pitfalls?

This spring, we turn to these questions with particular emphasis on the power of the arts — film, narrative, visual arts, place-making, design — to provoke, educate, enlighten, re-envision, inspire, heal, and transform. And we celebrate the flourishing of agency in the acts of members of our own community, here and around the world.

Symposium Events

What is Agency? community conversation, January 25

The Corporation film and conversation cafe, February 2

Occupy as an American Awakening conversation with Todd Gitlin, February 9

Black Is...Complicated conversation with Melissa Harris-Perry, February 13

Agency / Occupy Film Fest February 15 and 16

Voice to Vision conversation David Feinberg, February 23

The Occupy Movement community conversation, February 28

Agency, Clark-Style community conversation, March 21

Art and Agency conversation with Lily Yeh and Rob Shetterly, March 27

Engaging Haiti: Trauma, Narrative, Agency conversation with Elizabeth Maddock Dillon, April 3

Adding More Black Space: Agency and Representation in Design conversation with John Jennings, April 12

Keep on Pushing Black Agency in The Spook Who Sat by the Door conversation with Christine Acham, April 17

Community Conversation: What is Agency?

It’s both a hot topic and an abstract concept; what do we mean by the term agency? To launch our fall dialogue symposium, we’ll think together about what we understand agency to mean, and the forms and manifestations it can take. Please join us for this community conversation, with refreshments.

Wednesday January 25 @ 4pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

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The Corporation (2004)

Provoking, witty, stylish and sweepingly informative, Canadian documentary film The Corporation explores the nature and spectacular rise of the dominant institution of our time. Part film and part movement, The Corporation is transforming audiences and dazzling critics with its insightful and compelling analysis. Taking its status as a legal “person” to the logical conclusion, the film puts the corporation on the psychiatrist’s couch to ask “What kind of person is it?” The Corporation includes interviews with 40 corporate insiders and critics—including Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein, Milton Friedman, Howard Zinn, Vandana Shiva and Michael Moore—plus true confessions, case studies and strategies for change. Winner of 26 international awards, the film is based on the book The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power by Joel Bakan. (145 minutes)

Film screenings
Thursday February 2 @ noon, 3, 6, 9:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Conversation cafe
Thursday February 2 @ 8:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

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Occupy as an American Awakening / Todd Gitlin

The initiative of Occupy mushroomed not only because millions of people were, and are, aggrieved about the plutocratic rule and economic travail that has settled upon America, but because hundreds, then thousands, of people took it upon themselves to organize and create new facts. Tactically inventive, spunky, decentralized, humorous, wild and frequently incomprehensible, it represents not only a political revolt but the current incarnation of a tradition of Great Awakenings which punctuate American history and leave major cultural—if not political—changes in their wake. Professor Todd Gitlin will share his thoughts on how Occupy marks a turning point in American activism.

Thursday February 9 @ 4:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Co-sponsored by the Higgins School of Humanities, the Communication and Culture Program and the Sociology Department.

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Black Is...Complicated / Melissa Harris-Perry

Melissa Harris-Perry investigates the challenges facing contemporary black Americans. She works to understand the multiple creative ways that African Americans find agency in response to these challenges. Her latest book, Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America (Yale 2011), argues that persistent harmful stereotypes—invisible to many but painfully familiar to black women—profoundly shape black women’s politics, contribute to policies that treat them unfairly, and make it difficult for black women to assert their rights in the political arena.
As well as a contribution to the African American Intellectual Culture Series, Melissa Harris-Perry’s talk is a Clark Presidential Lecture and part of the universityâ€™s celebration of Black History Month. The theme for the month’s programs—“Black is”—is both a statement and a question. It is designed to explore the complexities, challenges and opportunities of African American identity today.
This event is part of the African American Intellectual Cultural Series.

Monday February 13 @ 7pm
Atwood Hall

Co-sponsored by Higgins School of Humanities, the Office of the President, the Black Student Union, Dean of the College, the Office of Intercultural Affairs, and the Martin Luther King and Black History Month Program Committee.

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Agency / Occupy Film Fest

A selection of films and shorts related to agency and the Occupy movement will be screened for two days:

Stages (2009). A vérité exploration of the unexpected power of the simple act of storytelling. A group of older Puerto Rican women and innercity youth come together to create an original play out of the stories of their lives. Weaving together themes of immigration, identity, aging and coming of age, Stages offers an intimate portrait of an unlikely ensemble, transformed by the liberating power of their own stories.

The Maker Movement. Anil Dash shares his observations and insights into the development of the Maker movement with Dale Dougherty. He sees it as a kind of political movement that is apolitical in nature but also radical and inclusive. This conversation touches on the social context of making, and what it means for individuals, families and communities. How will a “long, slow make” transform our society?

Capitalism: A Love Story (2009). Written, directed and starred in by Michael Moore. The film centers on the late-2000s financial crisis and the recovery stimulus, while putting forward an indictment of the current economic order in the United States and capitalism in general. Topics include Wall Street’s “casino mentality”, for-profit prisons, the poverty-level wages, home foreclosures, and corporate-owned life insurance.

The Price of Civilization: Reawakening American Virtue and Prosperity. Jeffrey Sachs of The Earth Institute and Columbia University discusses how economic inequality in the United States has ballooned over the last 30 years in a presentation about his recent book and an October 2011 interview with Dan Rathers on Occupy Wall Street and the U.S. economy.

Naomi Klein interview at Occupy Wall Street. Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist, syndicated columnist and author of the international bestseller, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. She is a contributing editor for Harper’s and reporter for Rolling Stone, and a regular columnist for The Nation and The Guardian.

In Depth with Chris Hedges. Chris Hedges is an author and journalist, whose latest book is The World As It is. The Pulitzer Prize winning foreign correspondent speaks on politics, corporate power, terrorism and religion. Hedges has Masters degree in Divinity and is the author of nine books.

Wednesday and Thursday, February 15 and 16 @ noon to midnight
Dana Commons second floor lounge

A detailed listing with screening times is available here.

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Voice to Vision / David Feinberg

The Voice to Vision collaborative project captures the extraordinary experiences of genocide survivors from different parts of the world. The stories of the survivors are first shared through dialogue, and then transformed into works of visual art that display sculpture, painting, drawing, collage, and mixed media. Each art piece has been created through collaboration with a team of artists and genocide survivors. As the survivors share their experiences, members of the collaborative team exchange ideas and make creative decisions together to produce a work of art that reflects the convergence of each voice involved in the project. To share the dialogic process of moving from narrative voice to artistic vision, a series of documentary films have been produced that convey the scope of the work.

We will host an exhibition of the work from the project, a screening of a documentary about it, and a conversation with project director David Feinberg. This project has been developed through the collaboration of an inter-disciplinary visual research team that includes participants from University of Minnesota’s Department of Art and Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, as well as participants from surrounding Twin Cities communities.

The visit of the V2V project to Clark was initiated and organized by Assistant Professor Toby Sisson of the Studio Art Program in the Department of Visual and Performing Arts.

Exhibition opening and gallery talk with Holocaust survivor Fred Amram
February 16 @ 6:30-8:30pm
Schiltkamp Gallery, Traina Center for the Arts

Film screening and conversation with David Feinberg
Thursday February 23 @ 4:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Exhibition
February 16 to March 1 in Dana Commons, from February 16 to April 8 in the Traina Center and from February 16 to April 16 in the Strassler Center

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Community Conversation: The Occupy Movement

Occupy Clark and the Difficult Dialogues initiative collaborate to sponsor a community conversation on the Occupy movement.

Tuesday February 28 @ 7:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Co-sponsored with Occupy Clark

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Community Conversation: Agency, Clark-Style

A celebration of activities and projects in which members of the Clark community and others in the local Worcester community are taking agency—in the university, the community, the nation and the world. Please join us for short talks, a panel conversation and a gathering of representatives from current projects.

Check back here for updates on the schedule and events.

Wednesday March 21 @ 4-7pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge
Panel conversation @ 5:30pm

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Art and Agency / Lily Yeh and Rob Shetterly

Through very different artistic practices, both Lily Yeh and Rob Shetterly inspire agency in the lives of those involved with their work. Lily works in collaborative processes to revitalize broken environments and communities through art-making. In striking portraits, Rob shares the lives and words of “Americans Who Tell the Truth”, to remind people of the dignity, courage and importance of some of America’s truth tellers, our own obligations as citizens, and that the struggle for equality and freedom is on-going. Lily and Rob met when Rob painted her portrait for his series. For this event, they will each share some of their work, and join us in a conversation about agency and art-making.

Before and after the conversation, we will be joined in performance by Mary Anne Driscoll, improvisational jazz pianist and vocalist, who is composing a song cycle based on quotes from Rob’s portraits.

Tuesday March 27 @ 7pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

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Engaging Haiti : Trauma, Narrative, Agency / Elizabeth Maddock Dillon

In the wake of earthquake of January 2010, the country of Haiti faced an unprecedented crisis as buildings, lives, and infrastructure were destroyed on a massive scale. However, the crisis in Haiti today has deep historical roots, stretching back to a history of colonialism, slavery, and revolution in the 17th and 18th centuries. Engaging Haiti today, from the position of a scholar or an activist in the U.S., requires attention to the complex nature of the trauma of the past and the trauma of the present. How does trauma destroy possibilities of narrating the past, present, and future? And how might new forms of narrative enable agency in the face of trauma? Elizabeth Maddock Dillon will share from her experiences working in Haiti, where she has recently taught seminars to teachers in Croix-des-Bouquets, and to students at Universite Caraibe in Port-au-Prince.

Tuesday April 3 @ 4:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Part of the Frontiers in the Humanities Series.

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Adding More Black Space: Agency and Representation in Design / John Jennings

It would be an ideal situation if there were only one totally inclusive documentation of the history of our society. However, there are many stories, histories and perspectives, some of which have traditionally been considered more valid than others; some of which have been aggressively enforced and propagated as absolute truth. How have designers participated in the shaping of these narratives? Where, perhaps, have they been apathetic? And where have they enacted their agency to actively re-shape the stories that define American culture?

James Baldwin argued that “Artists are here to disturb the peace”. Designer, graphic novelist and educator John Jennings aims to do just this in his work, and to bring that same sense of agency to his students. He will speak with us about his current projects—including his award winning graphic novel, The Hole, the influence of hip-hop methodology on his teaching—as well as share work from other artists and designers who are working to bring a greater understanding of African American cultural experiences and histories into the context of their practice.

Thursday April 12 @ 4:30pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Part of the African American Intellectual Culture Series. Co-sponsored with the Office of the Provost.

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Keep on Pushing: Black Agency in The Spook Who Sat by the Door / Christine Acham

Infiltrating Hollywood: The Rise and Fall of the Spook Who Sat by the Door is an independent documentary on the controversial and FBI-repressed 1973 black film The Spook Who Sat by the Door. Widely hailed as a cult classic, The Spook Who Sat by the Door is one of the most important underground black productions of the era.

Infiltrating Hollywood reclaims the lost history of the film and the people behind its powerful story, from its inception as a novel to its release and repression. It does so through archival footage, production documents, and interviews with author Sam Greenlee, Berlie Dixon, widow of director Ivan Dixon, Academy Award winning editor Michael Kahn, Melvin Van Peebles, several actors from the film, investors, academics, Todd Boyd, Ed Guerrero, and Eric Pierson. Infiltrating Hollywood was co-directed, edited and produced by Christine Acham and Clifford Ward. Christine Acham will join us to talk about the original film and her documentary, and the questions of agency in both.

Conversation with Christine Acham and screening of Infiltrating Hollywood
Tuesday April 17 @ 7pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Screening of Infiltrating Hollywood
Monday April 16 @ 9pm
Razzo Hall

Screenings of The Spook Who Sat by the Door
Monday April 16 @ 7pm
Razzo Hall

Tuesday April 17 @ 5pm
Dana Commons second floor lounge

Part of the African American Intellectual Culture Series. Co-sponsored with the Office of the Provost.

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