Past Events

The rise of China as a modern superpower has prompted a variety of questions in the U.S. and around the world. From the height of the Qing empire to the present day, how has China approached the world? What is Beijing’s geopolitical “grand strategy,” and how might the U.S. respond as China seeks to shape its future in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond? Dan Blumenthal, Director of Asian Studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), discusses these and related questions. **Photo:**_National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Ambassador to China Terry Branstad, State Councilor Yang Jiechi, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, White House Senior Aide Jared Kushner, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, Director of Social Media and Assistant to the President Dan Scavino Jr., Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. Cui Tiankai, and Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Zheng Zeguang during President Trump and the First Lady’s tour of the Forbidden City, Beijing, China on November 8, 2017. [State Department photo/Public Domain]

Professor Toomey explains why time travel is so alluring, not just for science fiction, and he’ll tell us about the major contributions to the development of the idea. He also discusses the significance of science fiction in the evolution of time travel.

Young adult author Molly Booth talks about her novel, _Nothing Happened_, with author Katie Bayerl. Booth's novel is a modern-day retelling of Shakespeare’s _Much Ado About Nothing_ in which sisters Bee and Hana juggle their camp counselor responsibilities with simmering drama at the idyllic Camp Dogberry. Image: Book Cover

Hanna Holborn Gray, the first woman president of a major American University, discusses her debut memoir, _An Academic Life_ with historian, author, and Harvard professor Jane Kamensky. _An Academic Life_ is a candid self-portrait by one of academia's most respected trailblazers. Gray describes what it was like to grow up as a child of refugee parents, and reflects on the changing status of women in the academic world. She discusses the migration of intellectuals from Nazi-held Europe and the transformative role these exiles played in American higher education—and how the émigré experience in America transformed their own lives and work. She sheds light on the character of university communities, how they are structured and administered, and the balance they seek between tradition and innovation, teaching and research, and undergraduate and professional learning. An Academic Life speaks to the fundamental issues of purpose, academic freedom, and governance that arise time and again in higher education, and that pose sharp challenges to the independence and scholarly integrity of each new generation.

Economist and fierce EU critic Yanis Varoufakis considers the need for a radically new way of thinking about the economy, finance and capitalism. (Photo: Marclozanobosch/Flickr)

This is the fifth and final presentation in our Science Literacy series at MIT. Dr. Sonkusale describes the advantages of nano-scale science and the remarkable nano-innovations in sensory devices for environment and medicine that his lab has produced. He also discusses how the Tufts Nano Lab creates devices that can be used around the world –a democratizing of nanotechnology.

“Language arrived fragmentary / split in syllables / spasmodic / like code in times of war,” writes Luljeta Lleshanaku in the title poem to her powerful new collection Negative Space. In these lines, personal biography disperses into the history of an entire generation that grew up under the oppressive dictatorship of the poet’s native Albania. Lleshanaku instills ordinary objects and places—gloves, used books, acupuncture needles, small-town train stations—with subtle humor and profound insight, much as a child might discover a world in a grain of sand. Part of the [Transnational Literature Series](https://www.brooklinebooksmith.com/programs/transnational-literature-series/ "") at the Brookline Booksmith.

Acclaimed Chicano poet, novelist, children’s book author, and journalist Luis J. Rodriguez tells the story of his childhood as a gang member in the national bestseller _Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A._ This vivid memoir explores gang life and cautions against the death and destruction that haunts its participants. A _New York Times_ Notable Book, _Always Running_ was named one of the nation’s one hundred most-censored titles by the American Library Association due to its frank depictions of gang life. Photo: By Javier Ramirez [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons

The one-pathogen-one-disease paradigm – the focus of infectious disease research for more than a century – has been complicated by the discovery of the human microbiome (i.e. the bacterial communities that reside in and on our bodies). The gut microbiome is intimately tied to the development of our immune system, our physiology, and even our psychology. A breakdown in the ecological structure of our gut has been associated with inflammatory disorders, metabolic syndromes, and cancer. In this talk, Dr. Gibbons will discuss how disturbances of the gut ecosystem can make us sick and how restoration of the microbiome back to a healthy state can potentially alleviate many complex diseases.

Iranian novelist Shahriar Mandanipour discusses his magisterial novel of love and war, Moon Brow, with his intrepid translator Sara Khalili and Restless Books publisher Ilan Stavans as part of Brookline Booksmith's Transnational Literature Series, which focuses on books concerning migration, exile and displacement. Part of the [Transnational Literature Series](https://www.brooklinebooksmith.com/programs/transnational-literature-series/ "Transnational Literature Series") at the Brookline Booksmith.