2021–22 Imagining Futures
The Oregon Humanities Center (OHC) presents its 2021-22 endowed lectureship series centered on the theme Imagining Futures.
The Imagining Futures lecture series seeks to reframe some of today’s pivotal social issues in order to conceptualize a more just and sustainable future for all. The topics covered throughout the lecture series will be interdisciplinary and will address issues that impact all of us. Our speakers will help us to reimagine our futures around climate change, housing, immigration, indigenous sovereignty, and racial justice.
The world we now inhabit will not be the world that later generations encounter. The COVID pandemic has exposed and deepened societal challenges and inequities that demand urgent attention and sustained action. Prior to the pandemic, many were already living with the realities of systemic injustice and climate destruction. At this crucial turning point in human history, we now must ask: What does a better future look like, and for whom? Who will—and should—have the power to define the future? How do we move forward together? This lecture series will summon us to imagine answers to these and other related questions.
Christina Rosan, Geography and Urban Studies, Temple University. “Reimagining Cities to be Sustainable, Healthy, Green, and Equitable.”
Daniel Martinez HoSang, Ethnicity, Race, and Migration and American Studies, Yale University. “A Wider Type of Freedom: How Struggles for Racial Justice Liberate Everyone.”
Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg scholar, writer, and musician. “Rehearsals for Living: My First Letter.”
Kimberly Nicholas, Sustainability Science, Lund University, Sweden. “Facing Climate Change with Facts, Feelings, and Action.”
Charles Chavis, Jr. founding Director of the John Mitchell, Jr. Program for History, Justice, and Race at George Mason University’s Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution, where he is also an Assistant Professor of Conflict Analysis and Resolution and History. “Hidden in Full View: A Story of Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation.”