Summer-Fall 2001
CLA in Words and Images
Hún Qiáo confronts memories of World War II
Last May, an extraordinary concert took place at the Ordway Theater in St. Paul. Hún Qiáo: A Concert of Remembrance and Reconciliation featured world-renowned cellist Yo Yo Ma performing with the Chamber Music Society of Minnesota.
The musicians, including Korean-born violinist and professor of music Young-Nam Kim, played four newly commissioned works by composers from China, Japan, Korea, and the United States.
Hún Qiáo, Chinese for "Bridge of Souls," expressed the wish of the performers, composers, and concert organizers to heal the World War II-era wounds in Asia and beyond.
On October 19, the College of Liberal Arts and the Hún Qiáo Committee of The Chamber Music Society of Minnesota will sponsor a followup symposium. Hún Qiáo: Confronting the Memories of World War II--A Symposium on the Asian Tragedies in Wartime will feature prominent scholars and activists from the United States, China, and Japan. They will discuss the nature of World War II in Asia and the serious lingering issues of memory and restitution, including the Nanjing Massacre, enslavement of Chinese and Korean "comfort women," and treatment of the war in school textbooks.
The program is being coordinated by Eric Weitz, holder of the Arsham and Charlotte Ohanessian Chair in the College of Liberal Arts, and Stephen Feinstein, director of the College of Liberal Arts' (CLA) Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, along with Professor Yue-him Tam of Macalester College and the Hún Qiáo Committee of The Chamber Music Society.
For current informational links on Asian atrocities, see the Web site of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, www.chgs.umn.edu. For information on the symposium, contact Kathryn Walls Snyder, 612-624-0256.
Photo by Diana Watters
Fifth graders taste test the U
Fifty fifth-graders from Jordan Park School in Minneapolis experienced a day in the life of the University early this summer. They examined ancient artifacts in the archaeobiology lab with anthropologist Martha Tappen, composed poetry with English professor Maria Damon, questioned history professor Barbara Welke about the U.S. Constitution, and toured a digital media production studio in Rarig Center. They also visited a dorm room and the University rec center.
The pilot program that brought these elementary students into higher education grew out of a partnership between the University of Minnesota and the Minneapolis Public Schools. Its purpose is to engage young people in the excitement of learning and help them see how the basic skills they are now learning in school are connected to the skills they will need one day to pursue a college education. Over the long term, the goal is to help these students, many of whom would be first-generation college students, to see the University in their future.
Asked if he would like to attend the U one day, a student replied, "Yes, but it is a long way to each building!"
Baryshnikov to dance into CLA
Baryshnikov. Say the name and even non-dance enthusiasts will stop in their tracks and watch for an airborne body to inscribe a soaring, lofty arc across the sky.
In late September, this legendary dancer and choreographer will be toe-to-toe with CLA dance students. In a collaboration with the Walker Art Center, the Department of Theatre Arts and Dance will host a six-day residency with Mikhail Baryshnikov's White Oak Project dance troupe. Lectures, demonstrations, and master classes will culminate in a postmodern dance performance of "PAST Forward" on September 27-29 [2001] at the Ted Mann Theatre. Two of the expected six works in the performance will include dance students.
CLA tidbits
Language teachers from 27 states and 8 other nations traveled to the Twin Cities campus this summer for professional development and training at CARLA, the University's Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition.
FFI: http://www.carla.umn.edu/
The Minnesota Population Center was awarded a major grant from the National Institutes of Health to make U.S. census information since 1790 readily available to researchers and the public. This award follows another grant from the National Science Foundation. The center is one of twelve NIH-designated population research centers at leading institutions around the country.
Richard McCormick, Department of German, Dutch, and Scandinavian, is the new director of CLA honors. Rick replaces Gordon Hirsch, who is returning to research and teaching in the Department of English after 12 years of leadership that earned him the affection and esteem of students and staff and a Morse Alumni Award for Contributions to Undergraduate Education.
Photo Courtesy of University of Minnesota Archives
An accomplished scholar and teacher, McCormick has served the college with distinction in both undergraduate and graduate education. Dick Skaggs, associate dean for faculty and research, lauds McCormick's "experience, commitment to excellent undergraduate education, and zest for leading our Honors Division to even greater distinction."
CLA alum Dave Winfield, the first Gopher athlete to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame and the only athlete to be drafted in three different sports, received the U's Outstanding Achievement Award at a Minnesota Twins baseball game on June 9. University president Mark Yudof did the honors. Says Winfield, "Finishing college with four years' experience [in] a competitive academic environment... helped me grow as a person. It gave me a foundation for life. When I left the University, I think I was as prepared as any young man going into a professional environment."
Showboat: The river journey begins
Just 18 months after a fire destroyed the original showboat, the University's new Minnesota Centennial Showboat has been launched from its dry-dock in Greenville, Miss., in preparation for its voyage home to St. Paul, Minn. By late October 2001, the showboat will begin its 1,040-mile journey home to become the centerpiece of the $15 million dollar riverfront revival of St. Paul's Harriet Island Regional Park.
At a Grand Opening on July 4, 2002, a production of the melodrama "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" will launch the inaugural showboat season.