Day

Michael Mehta will discuss how nanotechnology has made the leap from science ction to science reality and deal with the issue of the role of nanotechnology in assuring environmental and human health. With hundreds of nano-based products currently available, several questions arise about the adequacy of the regulatory system to protect the environment and human health.

Mehta is Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Winnipeg. He was founding Principal of Richardson College for the Environment, co-founder of the Environmental Studies Association of Canada, and has served on several international, national and provincial boards and expert committees. He has won numerous awards such as Chief Scientist Distinguished Lecturer for Outstanding Contributions in the Field of Science, Technology, and the Advancement of Science, Health Canada Award (2007).

The Energy and Environmental Systems Group and ISEEE is pleased to be presenting another exciting lineup of speakers for the Fall 2009 Seminar Series.

This information may be changed or updated throughout the semester. For the most up-to-date listing, please visit http://www.ucalgary.ca/EES/seminars.

Keynote Speaker:
Dr. Holger Herwig, Professor of History

Organized by the Department of Germanic, Slavic, and East Asian Studies. With support from the Faculties of Humanities and the Fine Arts, the Departments of His History and Political Science, The Association for German Education in Calgary, and the Vancouver Consulate of the Federal Republic of Germany. The exhibition is accompanied by a Film Series running Nov. 9-24 and by a display of items from MacKimmie Library located in the Library Link
(top of escalator to the right).

On November 9, 1989, the wall that divided Germany for nearly three decades began to crumble when East Germans were permitted to enter the West. This momentous event paved the way for the reunification of East- and West Germany and marked the beginning of a new era in history. It was the end of the cold war, the beginning of a more united Europe, and proof that peaceful change is possible. It was a night shown live on TV across the world, and the images have retained their astounding and moving power of hope and possibility.

In conjunction with the Vancouver Consulate of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Department of Germanic, Slavic, and East Asian Studies at the University of Calgary will be showing a photo exhibition to re-visit these events

The exhibition will be free and open to the public from 8:30 am - 4:30 pm until Dec. 8, 2009.

Join us to commemorate this event that changed the face of Germany and Europe!

Accompanying the exhibition are several other events on campus:

An exhibition of library materials is being shown in the MacKimmie Library,
Library Link at the top of the main escalator to the right.

German Film Series: “20 Years – The Fall of the Wall”

All films will be shown with an introduction by University of Calgary students.
Screenings take place in the Language Resource Center, Craigie Hall D 420, from 4:30-6:30 pm.

November 10: One, Two, Three (1961): Dir. Billy Wilder
November 17: Das Versprechen (The Promise, 1995). Dir. Margarethe von Trotta
November 19: Die Stille nach dem Schuß (The Legends of Rita, 2000). Dir. Volker Schlöndorff
November 20: Good Bye Lenin (2003): Wolfgang Becker
November 24: Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others, 2006), Dir. Florian Henckel von Donnersmark

Since Y2K, there hasn’t been much for apocalypse believers to focus on—until now.

The Nov. 12 release of a new Hollywood film entitled 2012 comes amidst a flurry of books, workshops and even vacation tours that attempt to legitimize the Maya prophecy. Supporters say this prophecy comes from an ancient carved monument recovered from the Maya region, which covers the Yucatan Peninsula, Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador and Ecuador, and has been home to the Maya, an indigenous people, since 900 BC.

The monument, called the Tortuguero Monument Six, does indeed refer to the date Dec. 21, 2012, but according to University of Calgary archeologist Kathryn Reese-Taylor, it is not an end-of-the-world prophecy. She says the translation of the text essentially says that something will occur on Dec. 21, 2012 and that it will be similar to something that occurred on another date in the past.

We don’t know, she explains, what that past occurrence was or what the future occurrence will be. At no point do any of the Maya texts actually prophesize the end of the world.

“It was originally thought by people who study Maya languages that the date refers to the time when a deity would descend upon the Earth,” says Reese-Taylor. “Re-examinations of the text now show that may not be the case.”

So how did this vague statement come to mean doomsday? Reese-Taylor says it never has meant the end of the world among the Maya people and it is North Americans who have created this interpretation.

“The idea of a Maya prophecy emerged in the 1970s when North American journalists and writers began to cherry pick ideas from the Maya, Aztec and Hopi cultures and created what they now call the Maya prophecy.”

At the time, North Americans started moving away from organized Western religions and towards exploring indigenous religions and beliefs. The notion of the Maya prophecy caught on and it has since sparked an industry of books, workshops and tours that Reese-Taylor says are no more than money-making schemes.

“What is important is that Maya texts still refer to dates beyond Dec. 21, 2012. How the Maya view time is much bigger than the current prophecy suggests.”  
 
Reese-Taylor will present a public lecture on debunking the Maya doomsday prophecy tonight at 7 p.m. in the Tom Oliver Lecture Theater (ES 162). The lecture is free and open to the public.