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November 30, 2023

California Magazine
Normal (Asian) Lives: Adrian Tomine’s graphic novel Shortcomings gets the movie treatment

Adrian Tomine earned a B.A. in English in 1996.

KQED Forum
KQED Forum: Why Cults Fascinate Us With Poulomi Saha

Listen to this episode of Forum 

November 27, 2023

Research Q&A: Andrew Jones, East Asian Languages and Cultures

Andrew F. Jones, Louis B. Agassiz Professor in Chinese, teaches modern Chinese literature and media culture.

November 20, 2023

“Why are we so obsessed with cults?” Professor Poulomi Saha’s Homecoming lecture explores a pop culture phenomenon

Dozens of documentaries about cults are currently available on Netflix, Hulu, and Max, along with countless podcasts on Spotify, Apple, and other platforms. What's driving this trend? What's behind our collective fascination with communities and spiritualities that offer total belonging and total enthrallment?

November 15, 2023

Collaborative Initiative Brings Psychedelics Research to the Humanities at Berkeley

Berkeley, CA -- On November 15, the University of California, Berkeley and Harvard University announced a new, collaborative initiative that will expand psychedelic research across the arts, humanities and social sciences.

Los Angeles Times
Latina judge, daughter of Mexican farmworkers, elevated to largest appellate court

Ana de Alba holds multiple degrees from UC Berkeley. She graduated in 2002 with a dual major in Spanish & Portuguese and Political Economy of Industrial Societies and earned her J.D. at Berkeley Law in 2007.

A first-generation Mexican American who worked in the fields with her farmworker parents has been elevated to the largest federal appeals court.

November 13, 2023

The Daily Cal
Dominique Fawn Hill (TDPS) talks path to costume design, creative approach to ‘Wintertime’

A criminal justice major at UC San Diego, Dominique Fawn Hill was just like many students at UC Berkeley, wondering if her studies were something she truly enjoyed, or just something that paid the bills. She decided to take a costume practice class for fun and, realizing that this could be both a profession and a passion, has pursued costume design ever since.

November 9, 2023

PhD Student Noor Asif: "public-facing writing is important because it democratizes literature and the study of literature"

Our next interview will be with a PhD student in the English Department: Noor Asif. I first met Noor because she was my GSI for English 45C, which was one of the first English classes I took at Berkeley, and which covers literature from the mid-19th through the mid-20th century. The class taught me so much about the ways to go about studying, and writing about, literature. Noor also is an editor for a magazine called Parapraxis, which focuses on psychoanalysis, and she previously studied art history.

November 6, 2023

Damon Young: "The self is everywhere, but also threatened with obsolescence by the rise of AI"

Damon Young is Associate Professor in French and Film and Media Studies. Young specializes in Critical theory, Digital media, Film theory, Gender and sexuality studies, Global art cinema (with a focus on French and francophone). Below is an interview with Young conducted by Lucille Lorenz for her weekly column "What is Humanities Research?" 

October 31, 2023

Professor Andrew F. Jones: "If you take literature seriously enough, you will find that it's a material force that changes the world"

This is an interview with Andrew F. Jones, Professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, who also holds the Louis B. Agassiz Chair in Chinese, he is also the Head Graduate Advisor. Bold questions posed by Ann Chen. 

October 27, 2023

Interview: Mario Telò on bringing “antiquity” into steady dialogue with the "now"

Mario Telò is a Professor of Rhetoric, Ancient Greek & Roman Studies, and Comparative Literature; participating member in the Critical Theory DE.

To start us out, how did you first come to study classics and comp lit? And are there any interests you enjoy outside of academia that you see informing your studies? 

October 24, 2023

Berkeley News
Berkeley News: New banners celebrate 150+ years of Berkeley's prominence in teaching world languages

At least 60 languages — from Mongolian and Old Norse to Polish, Catalan, Ancient Egyptian, Arabic and Biblical Hebrew — are taught at UC Berkeley, one of the nation’s top institutions for the breadth and depth of its world languages program. A growing emphasis also is being placed at Berkeley on revitalizing and preserving endangered languages, most of them spoken by Indigenous peoples.

California Magazine
California Magazine: Mona Simpson's Literary Commitment

Mona Simpson made her mark on the literary world with her very first major work, the critically praised novel Anywhere But Here (1986), which was later adapted into the 1999 film by the same name starring Susan Sarandon and Natalie Portman. Since then, the Berkeley alum ('79) has added five more books to her name and garnered high-profile awards including a Whiting Prize, a Guggenheim, and a Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

October 23, 2023

Three Arts & Humanities faculty members selected as 2023 Hellman Fellows

Congratulations to assistant professors Lilla Balint (German), Fumi Okiji (Rhetoric), and Nathaniel Wolfson (Spanish and Portuguese) on being named 2023 Hellman Fellows!

Dana BaniHammad: "Whenever I can, I like to speak Arabic with others"

Tell me about yourself and what languages you speak.
I am a double major in Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures and Political Science and I speak Arabic, English and a little bit of Turkish. I took Turkish at Berkeley.

October 20, 2023

Berkeley News
Largest recent hire of faculty in the arts brings 10 gifted scholars to Berkeley

The recent hire of 10 faculty members in UC Berkeley’s Division of Arts and Humanities is "the largest arts hire in recent years, and it shines a light on the important role that artists play at a public research university," said Sara Guyer, dean of the division.

Berkeley Language Center receives grant to support critical uses of A.I. in language instruction

The Berkeley Language Center (BLC) announced that it received a $150,000 grant from the Department of Education’s International Research and Studies Program to develop instructional materials on critically utilizing machine translation technology in language acquisition.

October 19, 2023

Art Daily
Art Daily: Hilary Harkness's first exhibition with P·P·O·W is now open

Hilary Harkness graduated in 1993 with a B.A. in Art Practice.

October 18, 2023

Department of English
Cathy Park Hong on Poetry, A.I. and an Intellectual Homecoming

This semester we were pleased to welcome Cathy Park Hong to the UC Berkeley Department of English as Professor and Class of 1936 First Chair in the College of Letters and Science. We spoke to her about poetry, AI and UC Berkeley as an intellectual homecoming. 

Wilson Wang: Learning my Best Friend's Language

Tell me about yourself and what languages you speak. 
I’m a senior with a double major in Film and Media Studies and Philosophy and I’m a native speaker of Mandarin Chinese. I also speak English and Cantonese Chinese, the latter of which I’ve been taking over the years here at Berkeley. I’m also on the Division of Arts & Humanities Dean's Leadership Team.