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U.S and E.U Trade Relations: the French Example

 

Eric Beaty – Economic and Commercial Attaché
United States Consulate for Western France

 
Born in Sapulpa, Oklahoma on October 21, 1958, Eric Beaty grew up in Nacogdoches, Texas.  He graduated from Nacogdoches High School in 1976 and did his undergraduate studies at Stephen F. Austin University in Nacogdoches, earning a B.A. (Cum Laude - 1979) with a double major in French and German and a minor in history.  He went on to earn an M.A. in French literature at Rice University in Houston, Texas (1982).  Later, Beaty received an Msc. in Linguistics from Aston University in Birmingham, U.K. (1996).

Beaty began his career at the University of Rennes 2, France in 1981 as a lecturer in American studies.  He then worked as the assistant director of courses at two Chambers of Commerce in France.  In 1986, Beaty became the executive director of a bi-national center known as the Franco-American Institute, an organization created by Rennes City Hall, the U.S. Embassy in Paris and Rochester, N.Y. City Hall in 1961. 

In 1999, Beaty was instrumental in setting up the United States Consulate for Western France. He was hired in 2000 by the U.S. State Department that same year as the Economic and Commercial Attaché. 

Beaty has participated in the organization of 14 White House visits and 36 congressional delegation visits.  He has chaired the Rennes-Rochester, N.Y. sister-city relationship since 1986.   He is on the board of the University of Rennes 2.  Beaty has received 18 meritorious and superior service awards from the White House, the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Department of Commerce.  Beaty received a National Export Initiative award for his export success stories in 2011.   

Date:
Location:
Multipurpose Room (B-108C) at the WT Young Library
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Bale Boone Symposium: Europe Today and the Memory of Violence

Symposium: Europe Today and the Memory of Violence

All sessions at W. T. Young Auditorium, University of Kentucky

Schedule

W. T. Young Library Auditorium

9:00

 

Introductory remarks 

9:15

The French Revolution and the European Memory of Violence

Jeremy D. Popkin, University of Kentucky

10:00

Law, Morality, and Violence in Nazi Germany

Herlinde Pauer-Studer, University of Vienna

11:15

“Inadmissible” but Secondary: Algerians, the Parisian Police and the Afterlives of State Terror

Lia Brozgal, UCLA

1:30

Weapons of Mass Instruction: Historical Narratives as a Destructive and Reconstructive Force in Former Yugoslavia

Charles Ingrao, Purdue University

2:30

Narcissistic Group Dynamics and the Threat of Violence within Liberal Democracy

Stefan Bird-Pollan, University of Kentucky

3:45

Aftermath of Violence: Reconceptualizations of Trauma

Sara Beardsworth, University of Illinois-Carbondale

4:45

 

Concluding round table

 

 

Date:
-
Location:
W. T. Young Auditorium
Event Series:

Bale Boone Symposium: Normalizing the Nation: Commemorating the State in Berlin and Dublin, 2013-2016

Karen E. Till is Senior Lecturer of Cultural Geography at Maynooth University and Director of the Space&Place Research Collaborative. Till’s geo-ethnographic research examines the significance of place in personal and social memory, and the ongoing legacies of state-perpetrated violence. In addition to numerous articles and chapters, her publications include The New Berlin: Place, Politics, Memory(2005), Mapping Spectral Traces (2010), and the co-edited volumesTextures of Place (2001) and Walls, Borders and Boundaries (2012). Till’s book in progress, Wounded Cities, highlights the significance of place-based memory-work and ethical forms of care at multiple scales that may contribute to creating more socially just futures.

Throughout Europe, a wave of anniversary commemorations remembering events such as war and division has been celebrated over the past five years. Using examples from the ‘Super-Gedenkjahr’ in Berlin (2014) and the ‘Decade of the Centenaries’ in Dublin, I examine how recalling difficult pasts may extend conservative agendas of ‘normalising’ the nation, but may also work to recall the foundations of the democratic state as a means of challenging forms of current-day social violence in a neoliberal and transnational Europe. 

For more information visit: http://www.uky.edu/academy/2016BBS.

Date:
Location:
W. T. Young Auditorium

Religion, Identity and Competing Visions of Islam in Post-Soviet Central Asia

For several decades, studying Islam in Central Asia meant beginning with questions, analytical categories, and conceptual frameworks rooted in Soviet and Russian studies; this approach, combined with a lack of basic understanding of the historical experience of Central Asian Muslims prior to the Soviet era, led to host of misconceptions surrounding the character of Muslim religious life in the Soviet era, the impact of Soviet policies and realities, and trends in the renegotiation of religious identities in the post-Soviet age.  Recent years have brought, in some circles, growing awareness of the need for approaches drawn from Islamic studies and from a  historically-grounded understanding of the history of Muslim religiosity in Central Asia.  This lecture will discuss some of the misconceptions rooted in the ‘Sovietological’ approach to Islam in the region, and the lessons to be drawn from viewing the region through the lens of Islamic studies, with a particular focus on the ways in which religiosity was manifested in Soviet times, and on the ways in which religiosity shaped or interacted with notions of ‘national’ identity.

Date:
Location:
Room 249 of the Student Center

"Sleepless Nights/Wasted Time: Seeking Islam in Egypt's Hollywood"

Professor Joel Gordon will explore the depiction of ‘normative’ religious practices and personal expressions of religious identity in recent Egyptian movies with a particular focus is on Egyptian youth.  Whereas in the past signs of piety had been restricted to either ‘traditional’ Egyptians – often in comic fashion – or political extremists, a few recent films have dared to depict ‘normal’ veiled women and bearded men and even a social environment in which questions of piety, morality and proper behavior dominate the discussions, concerns and conflicts between young Egyptians.  These films may point to a growing willingness by film artists to honestly explore social trends that have been taboo, especially as Egypt enters a new political era.

Prof. Joel Gordon: Professor of History and Director of Middle East Studies, University of Arkansas; Specialist in modern Egyptian history and Arab popular culture; Author of Nasser' Blessed Movement, Revolutionary Melodrama, and Nasser: Hero of the Arab Nation

 
Date:
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Location:
UKAA Auditorium @ WT Young Library

“The Arab World and American Democracy”

“Specters of War” examines the influence of post-9/11 American military interventions in the Middle East on the production of both American and Arab literature. Focusing on images of ghosts, spectral illusions, the undead and the undying, the talk attempts to locate zones of inter-textual contact where contemporary American and Arab literary voices move past mutual redactions and engage one another’s respective cultural realities. The goal is to both introduce Arab literary voices into the conversation about America’s presence in the Middle East and to interrogate the haunting presence of the Middle East in contemporary American literature.  Works discussed will include Ali Bader’s The Tobacco Keeper, Hassan Blasim’s The Corpse Experiment and Other Stories of Iraq, Mohamedou Ould Slahi’s Guantanamo Diary, Theo Padnos’s “My Captivity,” Phil Klay’s Redployment, and Ross Ritchell’s The Knife.

Date:
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Location:
The Niles Gallery

“The Arab Spring: The Youth Revolts of the Arab World Aren't Over

The youth revolts of 2011 and after in the Arab world have permanently changed the face of the region.  While most observers have mainly interpreted them through the lens of high politics, this talk argues that the big story here is the rise of a new generation of young Arabs, the Millennials, who have innovated in grassroots organization (including, but not limited to new ways of using social media for politics).  It is too soon to know thow he political struggles that they initiated will end.  But it is certain that a new generation, with distinctive values and aspirations, has announced its arrival on the scene.
 

Date:
Location:
UKAA Auditorium @ W.T. Young Library
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