March 28-29: NYU Medieval & Renaissance Center Conference

New York University's Medieval and Renaissance Center presents its spring conference: "Charisma." The conference aims to explore charisma as a force which charms, persuades, enchants and transforms, a force that may appear as a magical quality of human personalities, of works of art and architecture, of animals, and even of objects.

All events in the conference are free and open to the public. Visit the Medieval and Renaissance Center for details » 

March 28: Paul Muldoon Poetry Reading

Join New York University's Creative Writing Department as they host a poetry reading by Author Paul Muldoon. Muldoon is a Pulitzer Prize winner and New Yorker poetry editor and will be reading from his new book, The Word on the Street: Rock Lyrics, released in February by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. He will be introduced by Deborah Landau. This event is a part of the Creative Writing Department's Reading Series and is free and open to the public.

Thursday, March 28th, 7:00 p.m.

Lillian Vernon Creative Writers House

58 West 10th Street, between 5th and 6th Avenues

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March 28: Film Screening of Who Cares of Kelsey?

Join us for a special public screening of Who Cares About Kelsey?, a documentary exploring the journey of an emotionally-challenged high school student who is helped by a pioneering educational program. 

Thursday, March 28, 2013
6:30 - 8:30pm 

Tisch School of the Arts,
721 Broadway, Room 006

The screening will be followed by a discussion with Kelsey Carroll, Filmmaker Dan Habib (University of New Hampshire),  Kristi Koenig (Steinhardt) and Lynne McVeigh (Tisch). 

The event is free and open to the public, but seating is limited. Please RSVP by email. Sponsored by the New York University Council for the Study of Disability and the Center for Media, Culture and Communications.

March 28: “No Job For a Woman”: The Women Who Fought to Report WWII

Before World War II, war reporting was considered NO JOB FOR A WOMAN. But when American female reporters fought and won access to cover the war, there was another battle to fight: Women would be banned from the frontlines, prevented from covering Front Page stories, and assigned “woman’s angle” stories. Instead, they turned their second-class assignment into a new kind of war story: one that was more intimate yet more revealing.

Join this elite panel for a discussion on how women have made their way to the front lines, first as journalists covering conflict and now, as combatants participating in conflict zones across the globe. Special guests include Soledad O'Brien, Missy Ryan, Admiral Ann Rondeau, Kristen Rouse, Michele Midori Fillion, Leisa Meyerand, and Samantha Power.

The March 28th panel discussion is being hosted by NYU in Washington DC, but the event will be live-streamed beginning at 6:00 pm for those not in the DC area. Remote viewers will be able to watch the panel discussion and submit questions for the panelists in real time. Interested in hosting a viewing party? Contact Tom McIntyre at NYU Washington, DC for details on how to participate.

March 28: “Feeding our Kids, Feeding our Future” a Panel Discussion

New York University’s Fales Library, the home of one of the nation’s largest and prestigious collection in food studies, invited you to a panel discussion on March 28: “Feeding our Kids, Feeding our Future: What It Says about Us, Its Real Impact, and What We Have Done and Can Do about It.” The panel will address conversations about health, obesity, nutrition, foodways, and other related issues, and discuss the many efforts now being organized by individuals, institutions, and businesses to address modern thinking about our children’s health and how to feed it.

Thursday, March 28, 2013 | 4:00-6:00 pm Fales Library, third floor of the Bobst Library
70 Washington Square South

Panelists include Kate Adamick, co-founder, Cook for America; Cricket Azima, author and chef, The Creative Kitchen; Amy Bentley, author and associate professor, NYU Steinhardt; Jimmy Carbone, owner, Jimmy's No. 43, and host of Beer Sessions Radio on Heritage Radio Network; Victoria Stein Feltman, child nutritionist, Apple to Zucchini; and host Clark Wolf, food and restaurant consultant with more than thirty years of experience in the food industry, and founder and president of Clark Wolf Company.

This event is free and open to the public with a suggested donation of $10. RSVPs are required: email rsvp.bobst@nyu.edu with your name and the title/date of the event. For more information, call Elizabeth Wiest, 212-992-9744, or email liz.wiest@nyu.edu. 

Moderator Clark Wolf says, “it’s exciting to have a panel well peopled with graduates of the [NYU Steinhardt] department of Nutrition, Food Studies and Public Health, as well as a professor and a guest lecturer from the department. Steinhardt’s graduates are out there making a real difference.”

Learn more »

March 27: Queer Napoleon: from Napoleonic Friendship to Gays in the Military

Join Brian Martin at La Maison Francaise as he discusses his latest book, Napoleonic Friendship: Military Fraternity, Intimacy, and Sexuality in Nineteenth-Century France at new York University's La Maison Francaise. Based on extensive archival research in France, Napoleonic Friendship traces the development of affectionate friendships in the French Army from 1789 to 1916.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

6:30 pm - 8:00 pm

La Maison Française NYU

16 Washington Mews (at University Place)

This event is sponsored by Dean of the Humanities, Department of French, and Institute of French Studies and is free and open to the public.

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March 27: Round Table: Film, Magazines and Film Culture in Spain (1920s-1960s)

The King Juan Carlos I Center of Spain presents a round table on film magazines and film culture in Spain from the 1920s to 1960s, an event held in conjunction with the exhibit “Fotogramas and Film Culture in 1940s and 1950s Spain.” The roundtable will explore half a century's history of film magazines in Spain, focusing on their role in constructing the collective cultural imagination.

Toni Ulled Nadal, the current editor of Fotogramas, and grandson of the magazine’s founder, will be present, alongside speakers Eva Woods Peiró (Vassar College), author of "Rehearsing for Modernity: Consuming Stardom and Fashion in Spanish Film Magazines in the 1920s and 30s";

Jo Labanyi (NYU), author of "The Photographs in Fotogramas: The First Two Years (1946-1948)"; Kathleen M. Vernon (SUNY Stony Brook), author of “Media Divergence in a Modernizing Nation: Fotogramas in the 1950s and 1960s”; and moderator Isolina Ballesteros (Baruch College CUNY).

Wednesday, March 27, 2013 | 7:00 pm
King Juan Carlos I Center
53 Washington Square South, Suite 201 

This event is free and open to the public. A Reception will follow.

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March 26: Lecture on The Trojan War in Archaic Greek Art

The New York University Institute of Fine Arts presents The Trojan War in Archaic Greek Art: A Chapter on Greek Pessimism, a lecture by Tonio Holscher. Holscher is a professor of Classical Archaeology at the University of Heidelberg.

Tuesday, March 26th, 2013 | 6:00pm
NYU Institute of Fine Arts, Lecture Hall
1 East 78th Street

This lecture is free and open to the public. An RSVP is required.

March 26: Racialization, Citizenship, Empire: Unsettling U.S. Cold War Logic

The Asian/Pacific/American Studies Program presents "Racialization, Citizenship, Empire: Unsettling U.S. Cold War Logic," a conversation with Jodi Kim (Dept of Ethnic Studies, UC Riverside) and Joseph Keith (Dept of English, Binghamton University), moderated by Crystal Parikh (Dept of Social and Cultural Affairs, NYU).

March 26, 2013 | 6:30 - 8:00 PM
NYU Department of Social and Cultural Analysis
20 Cooper Square, 4th Floor
This event is free and open to the public.

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March 21-23: Vagueness in Law, Philosophical and Legal Approaches

Certainty is one of the fundamental pillars of the rule of law. It puts people in a position to use law as a guide by requiring judges to decide like cases alike. Vagueness, irrespective of its source, poses a threat to this ideal. Yet since ambiguous expressions are almost ubiquitous in our language, their use in legal texts is virtually inevitable. As a result, the problem of deciding whether a general law applies to a particular case often lacks a clear answer. On the one hand, this may give judges space for discretion, which they can use to pay respect to the peculiarities of the case; on the other hand, it seems to decrease the rule of law and to increase the rule of men. How much discretion is too much? What is the value of vagueness for law, and when does vagueness turn into a deficit?

Different philosophical and linguistic theories of vagueness may influence the ways we deal with cases involving vague expressions and problematic demarcations. As almost every socially relevant question of drawing a border eventually becomes the object of legal adjudication, it is of particular importance to discuss the practical implications of theories of vagueness for legal contexts and to develop and implement procedures of dealing reasonably with vague legal language. At the same time, and for the same reason, there is no better field to test the solutions and strategies those theories provide than the domain of law.

Thursday, March 21 - Saturday, March 23, 2013
New York University Philosophy Department
5 Washington Place, Room 202

This conference is free and open to the public with RSVP: contact Anupum Mehrotra at am3565@nyu.edu. 

March 21: Fashion and More in the Art of Italian Costume Design

The NYU Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimo invites you to a a conversation with Guido Torlonia, director of the upcoming documentary Handmade Cinema and the acclaimed plays "Caro Luchino" and "Caro Federico," Grazia d'Annunzio, U.S. special projects editor for Vogue Italia, and Stefano Albertini, director of the Casa Italiana and an expert on literature, cinema, and contemporary Italian history and politics. The event will include a screening of selections from the Torlonia's works.

Thursday, March 21, 2013 @ 6:00 pm
Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimo
24 West 12th Street
Free and Public
Seating will take place on a first-come first-serve basis

Turning an actor into a character, sewing a precious dress or an antique pair of shoes as though creating a work of art, reconstructing a designer’s sketch into a beautiful set, all this is Handmade Cinema: a 50-minute long documentary made by journalist Laura Delli Colli and director Guido Torlonia, and produced for Enormous Films by Luchino Visconti di Modrone—a name which, for many, alone sums up a love for finely crafted cinema.

Handmade Cinema invites viewers into one of the great families of Italian cinema, whose artisanal heritage and secret skills are the envy of a world.

March 14: Cherif Keita's Documentary: A Rebel Missionary in South Africa

Join New York University's Wagner Student Student Alliance for Africa (WSAFA) as they host a viewing of Cherif Keita's documentary, A Rebel Missionary in South Africa.

The film tells the story of Dube, a then 16-year-old orphan who became an early pioneer in the decades-long struggle for South African freedom. Raised by missionaries who took responsibility for his education, training him as a printer and eventually sending him to Oberlin College in Ohio, Dube would use his education and training as a Congregationalist pastor to form South Africa’s first black-owned industrial school, to launch the first English-Zulu newspaper, and to help found the African National Congress. Today he has been honored for his work by Nelson Mandela and other leaders, and acknowledged as one of the forbears of modern South Africa.

March 14, 2013 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

NYU Africa House, 14 Washington Mews

This event is free and open to the public, but space is limited and an RSVP is required. Co-Sponsored by the Black Student Association (BSA), NYU Steinhardt's Higher and Postsecondary Education Program, Africa House, the Council of Young African Leaders, and the Institute for African American Affairs.

March 14: Current Trends in Medieval Art History

Join the Institute of Fine Arts for an ongoing exploration of current trends and new research in the field of western medieval art. Visiting lecturer Kirk Ambrose, associate professor and chair of the department of art and art history at the University of Colorado, Boulder, presents "An (Il)Legible Capital from Moutiers-Saint-Jean," an examination of how monsters present in the iconography at the monastery at Moutiers-Saint-Jean would have confused or interrupted the metaphoric experience of reading for many medieval viewers.

Thursday, March 14, 2013 @ 5:30 pm
The Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, 1 East 78th Street, in the Lecture Hall

Medieval lectures are free and open to the public, but an online RSVP is required. A reception will follow the talk. A full schedule of upcoming lectures can be found on the IFA website.

March 14: (In)Visible Warriors: Hijabi Monologues

Women's Herstory Month at New York University presents (In)Visible Warriors: Hijabi Monologues, a full-length performance of the renowned drama "The Hijabi Monologues" featuring international performers Kamilah Pickett, Rafiah Jones, and Heba Khalil. Founded in 2006, "Hijabi Monologues" creates a theater space for Muslim women’s stories; a space to breathe as they are; a space that does not claim to tell every story and speak for every voice. Through sharing stories, strangers touch and connect, are challenged, and are human. A post-performance discussion will follow with creative director Sahar Ullah.

Our stories. Our words.

March 14, 2013; doors @ 7:00 pm, show @ 7:30 pm
NYU Kimmel Center, Eisner & Lubin Auditorium, 4th Floor
60 Washington Square South

This event is free and open to the public with an online RSVP.

(In)Visible Monologues is co-sponsored by the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU, NYU Center for Spiritual Life, Islamic Center at NYU, NYU LGBTQ Student Center, Religious Studies Program, and Women of Excellence, Strength, & Tenacity. Learn more »

March 13: Chérif Keïta & Alhaji Papa Susso: Griots, Nobility, and the Transformation of Musical Culture in Contemporary West Africa

What happens when a nobleman picks up a guitar and sings praise? When a djéli or griot crosses an ocean, changing both his patronage network and the very stories that establish his legitimacy?

These are but a few of the questions that will be addressed in a dialogue between Chérif Keïta, a specialist of the Mande world, and Alhaji Papa Susso, a Senegambian kora player. "Griots, Nobility, and the Transformation of Musical Culture in Contemporary West Africa" is both a performance and lecture moderated by Ian Merkel. They will provide us a glimpse into the West African musical diaspora through both analysis and song, providing an evening of reflection, song, and certainly a bit of humor.

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 @ 6:30 pm
La Maison Francaise
16 Washington Mews at University Place

This event is co-sponsored with the Institute of French Studies at New York University and is free and open to the public. Learn more »

March 13: Suki John Author Reading

The NYU Bookstore presents a reading with writer and choreographer Suki John, a graduate of the NYU Gallatin School and an assistant professor at the School for Classical Contemporary Dance in Fort Worth, Texas. John will be reading from her recently published book Contemporary Dance in Cuba: técnica cubana as Revolutionary Movement.

Wednesday, March 13, 2013
6:00 pm - 7:30 pm
NYU Bookstore
726 Broadway

This event is free and open to the public. Seating is limited but no reservations are required.

Ongoing through March 25: Open Tryouts for the Poe Room Event

The NYU Office of Government & Community Affairs and Lois Rakoff, Community Director of the Poe Room, announce Open call tryouts for the Spring Poe Room Event!

The Poe Room Event is seeking creative submissions to showcase the life and work of Edgar Allan Poe. Community members are encouraged to audition for the chance to illuminate Poe’s life through media such as dance, drama, music, painting, sculpture, magic, readings, performance art, and other forms of expression. All ages are welcome to submit work on a rolling basis until Monday, March 25. Contact Arlene Peralta at 212.998.2401 or arlene.peralta@nyu.edu.

And save the date for the Poe Room event: Friday, April 19, 2013 at 6:00 pm at the NYU School of Law, 245 Sullivan Street.

March 12: A Conversation with Ruth Ozeki, Author of "A Tale for the Time of Being"

The NYU Bookstore invites you to a unique discussion with novelist, filmmaker, and Zen Buddhist priest Ruth Ozeki, the award-winning author of My Year of Meats, All Over Creation, and the newly published A Tale for the Time Being. Ozeki will be in conversation with Robert Oxnam, a China scholar and former president of the Asia Society.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013
6:00 pm - 7:30 pm
NYU Bookstore
726 Broadway

This free and public event is co-sponsored by NYU's Asian Pacific American Institute and the Asia Society.

March 12: "Tracing Our Roots" Eteri Andjaparidze in Concert

Join renowned Georgian/American pianist and pedagogue Eteri Andjaparidze, performing alongside her students and special guest Elena Sorokina at "Tracing Our Roots," a public program in piano performance presented by the NYU Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013 7:00 pm - 10:00 pm 

Frederick Loewe Theatre
35 West 4th Street

March 12: "Weeping Like a Beaten Child: Figurative Language in Chaucer and Mallory"

University of Melbourne professor Stephanie Trigg explores the way in which one curious metaphor connects the works of two of early English literature's most central works, inquiring into the relationship between figurative language, gesture, and the representation of emotion: "Weeping Like a Beaten Child: Figurative Language in Chaucer and Malory."

Tuesday, March 12, 2013 | 6:00 - 8:00 pm
New York University Medieval & Rennaisance Center
19 Univeristy Place, Room 222

In two dramatically different emotional contexts, Chaucer and Malory describe grown men (Absalom and Lancelot) as weeping like children who has been beaten. Both examples draw on what seems to be a kind of proverbial simile, though the two narrative and generic contexts produce very different effects on the reader: cosmic laughter in "The Miller's Tale;" tragic pity in Le Morte d'Arthur. Trigg's talk will focus on this proverbial or 'conventional' simile, asking how, in medieval literature, do literary figures like similes shape the expression of emotion?

This event is free and open to the public. For more information, call 212-998-8698 or email mar.center@nyu.edu. Learn more at MARC online »

March 11: French Literature in the Making: Yasmina Reza in conversation with Olivier Barrot

Join New York University's La Maison Francaise for a conversation between writer, journalist and television producer Olivier Barrot and Yasmina Reza, author of the Tony Award-winning plays “Art; Trois Versions de la vie" and "God of Carnage" as a part of the French Literature in the Making Series.

March 11, 2013 7:30pm
La Maison Française
16 Washington Mews at University Place


One of the most prominent playwrights of her generation, Yasmina Reza has been translated into some thirty-five languages and performed all over the world. She is the first non English-speaking recipient of two Tony awards, and has also received numerous Olivier Awards, Molières Awards, and a César. Also a director and actress, Reza is the author of seven works of fiction. Her latest book, Heureux les heureux, consists of twenty monologues involving recurring characters. Pessimistic, ironic and humorous, her works depict, with sharp sarcasm, the ridicule and childishness of adults living in a materialistic world.