Anat Shahar, staff scientist in the geophysical laboratory at the Carnegie Institution for Science, explores terrestrial planets and discusses what laboratory experiments can reveal about the conditions that formed them. This event is part of the Carnegie Astronomy Lecture Series
Amy Kind, professor of philosophy at Claremont McKenna College, and Shelley Streeby, professor of ethnic studies and literature at the University of California, San Diego, explore futuristic notions of family and reproduction in the work of science fiction author Octavia Butler.
Neal Nathanson M.D., discusses a 1955 incident in which Cutter Laboratories of Berkeley, Calif., inadvertently released batches of polio vaccine that contained the live virus. Nathanson also provides an update on efforts toward global eradication of poliomyelitis.
Suzanne Wright, associate professor of art history at the University of Tennessee, discusses the partnerships between Chinese painters and woodblock carvers who worked together to produce prints of exquisite beauty in the Ming and Qing dynasties.
Woody Holton, professor of American history at the University of South Carolina, offers a preview of research from his forthcoming book about the battlefields of the American Revolution.
Experts in the literature, history, geography, and archaeology of 16th- and 17th-century Britain examine four key geographic sites—body, house, neighborhood, and region—to illuminate the important spatial structures and concepts that define the early modern engagement with the world.
June Li, curator emerita of the Chinese Garden at The Huntington, will look at some of the functions of printed images in China from the late 16th through the 19th centuries, using examples from the exhibition "Gardens, Art, and Commerce in Chinese Woodblock Prints."
Steven Hahn, professor of history at New York University and the Rogers Distinguished Fellow at The Huntington, considers what the history of the United States would look like, especially for the 19th century, if we travel east and west from the middle of the country and north from Mexico and the Caribbean.
Novelist Edmund White (A Boy's Own Story) discusses the lasting impression that Christopher Isherwood's groundbreaking novel "A Single Man" had on him as a young author assembling his gay identity in the pre-Stonewall era.
Landscape architect Edmund Hollander, author of "The Good Garden," discusses how the design process for a residential landscape is informed by the interaction of natural site ecology, architectural ecology, and human ecology.