In this moment of hyper-politicized border and migration issues, questions of representation are crucial. This roundtable of scholars, journalists, and practitioners will address the needs and challenges of producing stories about complex border issues along with the potential for different stories to effect real change. Our panelists are actively documenting, producing, circulating, and reflecting on migration stories through a range of media and will share from their own work, focusing especially on the contentious borderspaces of the southern U.S. and southern Europe. This discussion is organized by the Migrations initiative and co-sponsored by the East Asia Program, the Institute for European Studies, the Department of Sociology, Latin American and Caribbean Studies, and the School of Public Policy.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

Key questions that journalists, academics, and practitioners consider in producing and responding to stories and coverage of migration issuesHow different media shape what stories get told and who they reachHow the politicization of migration affects what stories do and do not get toldThe possibilities that different media and storytelling practices offer for challenging dominant narratives or providing more complex accountsThe role that images play in communicating migration and border issues to the public

The Institute for African Development (IAD) Summer Africa Internship program provides sophomores, juniors and rising senior undergraduate students with challenging practical fieldwork in Africa. Application deadline is February 28th. Internships are available in Ghana and Zambia. Those interested in applying must attend two seminars in the IAD Special Topic Seminar Series (CRP 4770) and a pre-departure meeting.

Contact: iad@cornell.edu

The Fulbright U.S. Student Program supports college graduates conducting research or teaching English in more than 150 countries. Applications are due in the fall; students who wish to begin the program immediately after graduation are encouraged to start the process in their junior year.

Contact: fulbright@einaudi.cornell.edu

Learn about the Laidlaw Undergraduate Research and Leadership Program. Open to first- and second-year students, this 2-year program provides generous support to carry out internationally-focused research, develop leadership skills, engage with community projects overseas, and join a global network of like-minded scholars from more than a dozen universities. Join us to learn more about the program, its benefits, and the application process, as well as tips for approaching potential faculty research mentors and writing a successful application

Digital book talk/discussion with Sonia Gollance about her new book “It Could Lead to Dancing: Mixed-Sex Dancing and Jewish Modernity.” Juan Manuel Muñoz (PMA) and Jonathan Boyarin (Anthro/NES) will be serving as interlocutors.

Book Description: Dances and balls appear throughout world literature as venues for young people to meet, flirt, and form relationships, as any reader of Pride and Prejudice, War and Peace, or Romeo and Juliet can attest. The popularity of social dance transcends class, gender, ethnic, and national boundaries. In the context of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Jewish culture, dance offers crucial insights into debates about emancipation and acculturation. While traditional Jewish law prohibits men and women from dancing together, Jewish mixed-sex dancing was understood as the very sign of modernity––and the ultimate boundary transgression.

Writers of modern Jewish literature deployed dance scenes as a charged and complex arena for understanding the limits of acculturation, the dangers of ethnic mixing, and the implications of shifting gender norms and marriage patterns, while simultaneously entertaining their readers. In this pioneering study, Sonia Gollance examines the specific literary qualities of dance scenes, while also paying close attention to the broader social implications of Jewish engagement with dance. Combining cultural history with literary analysis and drawing connections to contemporary representations of Jewish social dance, Gollance illustrates how mixed-sex dancing functions as a flexible metaphor for the concerns of Jewish communities in the face of cultural transitions.

About the author: Sonia Gollance is Lecturer in Yiddish at University College London. She is a scholar of Yiddish Studies and German-Jewish Literature whose work focuses on dance, theatre, and gender. She received her Ph.D. in Germanic Languages and Literatures from the University of Pennsylvania and has taught previously at the University of Vienna, The Ohio State University, and the University of Göttingen. Her first book, It Could Lead to Dancing: Mixed-Sex Dancing and Jewish Modernity, was published by Stanford University Press in May 2021.

Sponsored by Jewish Studies Program with co-sponsors Institute for German Cultural Studies, Department of Performing and Media Arts, and Institute for European Studies

This session will provide PhD students with information on the Einaudi Dissertation Proposal Development Program. The program offers seminars, workshops, and faculty mentoring to PhD students in the social sciences and humanities who are developing research projects abroad or domestic research projects on topics that connect to global issues. Students receive up to $5,000 for summer research. Workshop and seminar costs are also covered.

Contact: programming@einaudi.cornell.edu