March

Lecture 1: Birds and Dinosaurs, the Origin of Flight Lecture 

Dr. Bruce E. Fleury is Professor of the Practice in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Tulane University. He earned a B.A. from the University of Rochester in Psychology and General Science, and an M.A. in Library, Media, and Information Studies from the University of South Florida. His career as a college reference librarian led him to Tulane University, where he became head of the university library's Science and Engineering Division. He went on to earn an M.S. and a Ph.D. in Biology, both from Tulane.

 Lecture 2: Birds and Boeings: the Magic of Flight

George has been an ICL member since January of 2005.

An award-winning scholar and professor examines commonly held myths and half-truths about American history and invites you to think about what really happened in the nation's past--as opposed to what many believe happened.

Dr. Mark Stoler, who holds a Ph.D. in History from the University of Wisconsin, is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Vermont. He is an expert in U.S. foreign relations and military history, as well as the origins of the cold war.

“In the Executioner’s Shadow” casts a penetrating look at the consequences of the death penalty through three powerful stories – the rare perspective of a former state executioner who comes within days of executing an innocent person; a Boston Marathon bombing victim who struggles to decide what justice really means; and the parents of a murder victim who choose to fight for the life of their daughter’s killer.

As the battle to overturn capital punishment comes to a head in the U.S., this provocative film challenges viewers to question their deepest beliefs about justice.

Ron Steiner is an OADP (Oregonians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty) board member and former Chair from May 2010 to January 2019. He was on the Steering Committee of the New Mexico Coalition to Repeal the Death Penalty from 2000 to 2009. And on the national board of directors of Murder Victim Families for Reconciliation for two 3-year terms. All of these positions have been volunteer positions. New Mexico repealed their death penalty on March 18, 2009.

Test your knowledge of the Death Penalty by taking this quiz.

Part 1: After reviewing how much sleep we need and the drivers of normal sleep, we will look at how sleep changes over the course of our lifespan. A brief look at sleep and mortality will then be followed by an overview of the six major categories of sleep disorders.

Part 2: A brief review of treatments, both pharmacological and non-pharmacological, for insomnia. The majority of this time will then be spent on obstructive sleep apnea syndrome - epidemiology, symptoms, diagnosis, and the increasing range of treatment options.

Dr. Bluhm was born in Medford, OR (native Oregonian), attended college at Pacific Lutheran University, attended medical school at University of Washington, completed internship and residency at University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver, Pulmonary and Critical Care fellowship at University of California, San Diego, joined Oregon Pulmonary Associates in Portland in 1998, which then merged with The Oregon Clinic in 2016. He is Medical Director of the Providence St. Vincent Medical Center Sleep Disorders Center, an 8 bed-sleep lab. He is board-certified in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine and a Diplomat of the American Board of Sleep Medicine.

The cultural gifts America has given the world are quite extraordinary, and nowhere is this truer than in the realm of music. A list of American-born musical genres would have to include spirituals, zydeco, bluegrass, and many more. What all these genres have in common and what makes them American is that they are syncretic: syntheses of diverse musical elements into wholes many times greater than their parts. Of greatest import to American music is the synthesis of West African and European musical traditions in North America, a synthesis that created a vast array of uniquely American genres, from gospel and soul, to ragtime and blues, to jazz and rock ‘n’ roll.

Robert M. Greenberg is an American composer, pianist, and musicologist who was born in Brooklyn, New York. He has composed more than 50 works for a variety of instruments and voices, and has recorded a number of lecture series on music history and music appreciation for The Great Courses.

William Billings, a friend of Paul Revere, composed Chester, which was enormously popular during the American Revolution. Largely self-taught, he earned his living as a tanner and hog reeve. Billings had an unusual appearance and strong addiction to snuff. His contemporary wrote that Billings ”was a singular man, of moderate size, short of one leg, with one eye, without an address & with an uncommon negligence of person.”

Stephen Foster, often called “the father of American music”, was a songwriter known primarily for his parlor and minstrel music. He has been identified as “the most famous songwriter of the nineteenth century” and may be the most recognizable American composer in other countries. His compositions are sometimes referred to as “childhood songs” because they have been included in the music curriculum of early education. I suspect that many ICL members would identify at least five of his more than 200 songs.

Dr. Holmquist majored in voice and organ at St. Olaf College in Minnesota, singing with the renowned St. Olaf Choir. She holds a Master’s degree in Music Education from Western Oregon University, and a DMA in Music Education and Choral Conducting from the University of Oregon. She is a distinguished member of the Institute for Continued Learning.

Oregon enjoys an exceptional place in Bridge Architecture thanks in large part to the efforts of former State Bridge Engineer Conde B. McCullough. McCullough is that happy convergence of a visionary meets funding, his time as State Bridge Engineer coincided with New Deal funding with the mandate to employ Americans. This combination resulted in the ability to both produce a tremendous amount of structures work, but he also interpreted this mandate to provide work that visually enhances the built environment. Since McCullough’s tenure the development and production of aesthetically pleasing results in this practice have become decidedly more haphazard. “What happened” and “where are we going” in this aspect of the built environment?

A lifelong resident of Salem and a graduate of Oregon State University, Scott began his practice with the Department of Transportation where his own appreciation of the McCullough era bridges first prompted him to examine the visual aspects of bridges. He first applied concepts of visual study at the North Santiam River (Gates) Bridge completed in 1994. He continued his practice with application of these concepts to the Sisters Loop Ramp Bridge in Bend, the Rogue River (Depot Street) bridge in Rogue River, rehabilitation of the Monroe Street Bridge in Spokane, the Burnside Bridge in Portland, and several McCullough era bridges, culminating most recently in his participation on the Sellwood Bridge replacement for Multnomah County. Through these projects Scott has collaborated with numerous architects and bridge engineers who specialize in bridge aesthetics and has developed a knowledge base of approach to structures design that is rooted in classic architectural practices, as originated by the Roman master builder, Vitruvius, and developed over the ensuing centuries. The topic will explore generally accepted excellent examples of bridge architectural design and contrast and compare those to examples that are considered less successful. This exploration supports an examination of the art of bridge design, the split in practice of architecture and engineering that coincided with the 19th century industrial revolution, and the on-going work to re-unite these practices to achieve greater reliability of visual results. Currently Scott is the Bridge Practice Manager for Otak Inc. in their Vancouver and Portland offices.

I went to prison because I wanted to teach a class on the causes and consequences of mass incarceration, and I thought I should at least see what I was planning to talk about. What I found there was both deeply surprising and inspiring. I work with men at the Oregon State Penitentiary, trying to enact and adapt the principles of Restorative Justice for the conditions of prison. This work has led me to teach a class with half Willamette students and half prisoners, become a community activist and fundraiser for a Japanese-style Healing Garden with OSP’s Asian-Pacific Family Club, and partner with OSP’s Uhuru Sasa club to provide programming for at-risk youth. In this session, we will explore the problems with the current criminal justice system, offer some thoughts about how Restorative Justice can bring about transformation, and discuss what are the appropriate goals of incarceration. I will be joined in the second half by two Willamette students: Paige Spradlin and Leah Olson who will talk about their experiences working with prisoners and launching WU’s own Restorative Justice Coalition.

Melissa Buis Michaux is Professor of Politics, Policy, Law, and Ethics and a contributor to the Women’s and Gender Studies program. She earned her B.A. from Boston College and Ph.D. from Brandeis University. Since coming to Willamette in the fall of 2000, her research and teaching have spanned a variety of topics: welfare policy; social capital; the politics of motherhood; health care policy; and now criminal justice. She and her husband have three kids and a hobby farm with cows, sheep, chickens and bees.

Mass migration, and the problems associated with it, have directly abetted the rise of populist parties in Europe. Opposition to immigration was the prime driver of support for Brexit; it brought a far-right party to the German Bundestag for the first time since the 1950s, and propelled Marine Le Pen to win a third of the vote in the French presidential election. In addition to calling for stronger borders, these parties are invariably illiberal, anti-American, anti-NATO and pro-Kremlin, making their rise a matter of serious concern for the national security interests of the U.S.

William T. Smaldone is the E. J. Whipple Professor of History.
Bill Smaldone came to Willamette's History Department in 1991. In addition to general surveys in modern European history, he offers courses on German and Russian history, Latin American history, urban history, the Holocaust, European socialism, and capitalism.
Education:
B.S. State University of New York College at Brockport
M.A. State University of New York College at Brockport
Ph.D. State University of New York at Binghamton

The disproportionate Jewish role in the American Civil Rights Movement is well documented. Jews were prominent among the founders of the NAACP, the Urban League and other African American civil rights organizations. It is estimated that about 50 percent of the white student volunteers during Freedom Summer were Jews. National Jewish organizations like the Anti-Defamation League and local Community Relations Committees were prominent in 20th (and early 21st) century civil rights coalitions. Today, surveys demonstrate far stronger support for minority rights and progressive policies among American Jews than among other white Americans.

Historians generally root these patterns to a strong “minority consciousness” among American Jews, arguing that, even as Jews became fully accepted and successful in the United States, they retained a strong collective memory of both recent and historic anti-Semitism that fostered identification with other, less privileged, minority groups. Yet finer grained analysis suggests ups and downs in these relationships, linked to Jews’ sense of belonging/insecurity in particular places and times. In addition, while feelings of vulnerability could fuel minority consciousness, they could also inhibit public engagement. My research looks at how moments of Jewish security and insecurity, belonging and otherness, shaped their responses to challenges facing other minority groups. Using several examples from Oregon Jewish history, I will explore variations in the community’s engagement with other groups and how these reflect shifts in Jewish Oregonians’ sense of belonging over time. Examination of these patterns can be helpful in understanding how the current resurgence in anti-Semitism may impact Jewish engagement.

Ellen Eisenberg has been a member of Willamette’s History Department since 1990, and was appointed Dwight and Margaret Lear Professor of American History in 2003. She teaches a variety of courses on American history since Reconstruction and coordinates the College Colloquium program.
Her scholarship focuses on American Jewish history and, particularly, Jews in the American West. She has published five books, including The First to Cry Down Injustice? Western Jews and Japanese Removal during WWII, which was a 2008 National Jewish Book Award finalist. Her two volume history of Jews in Oregon, titled Embracing a Western Identity: Jewish Oregonians, 1849-1950 and The Jewish Oregon Story, 1950-2015, was published in 2015 and 2016.

Dayna came to art 15 years ago as a result of introspection through The Artist's Way, a book on creative recovery by Julia Cameron. Trained as an historian and counselor, Dayna dove into art by taking class after class, working in various mediums, challenging herself to find artistic expressions that reflected her eclectic approach to art and life. Dayna will share how her recovery and lots of synchronicity opened doors to her evolving work as an artist.

Dayna works and shows her art in the Pacific Northwest. She is a gallery artist at Guardino Gallery in Portland and RiverSea Gallery in Astoria. Her work can be seen in several published books: Art for Everyone, a Chemeketa Community College textbook, Oil and Cold Wax by Serena Barton, Art Abandonment by Michael and Andrea deMeng, The Mixed-Media Artist by Seth Apter, and in Rebecca Crowell and Jerry McLaughlin's Cold Wax Medium.

In addition to painting, Dayna is an avid collector/junker, energized by hunting for materials to use in her found object assemblage art or in her Salvage Collages. She hyperventilates when she discovers a rusty piece of metal or a tattered, disintegrating book. Dayna uses these tired, worn out objects to create vignettes that tell a new story.

In addition to the DownBeat awards, the Willamette Singers have received many honors during the 35 years Wallace Long has directed the group. Recognition has come in the form of honorific performances at regional and national conventions of the Oregon Music Educators Association, Music Educators National Conference, the American Choral Directors Association and the International Association of Jazz Educators.

The Willamette Singers is a 17-member vocal jazz ensemble and instrumental combo. The Singers' most recent CD, "1st Train Home", was released in September 2017. Three previous CDs, "Green Garden", "Love, My Old Friend", and "I'll Sing For You" earned the Singers the DownBeat Magazine title of Best Large Undergraduate Collegiate Vocal Jazz Ensemble in the nation in 2013, 2014 and 2017. The Willamette Singers performed at the National Convention of the ACDA in Dallas, Texas in March of 2013 and at the Northwest Regional Convention of ACDA in Seattle in March, 2014.

Discussion of topics in music.

Professor Wallace Long Jr., Director of Choral Activities; B.M., M.M., A. Mus. D., University of Arizona; taught choral music in Tucson, Arizona, before coming to Willamette; performed professionally with the Robert Shaw Festival Singers in France and Carnegie Hall and performs with Male Ensemble Northwest including compact disc recordings and an honorific performance at the American Choral Directors Association's National Conferences in Washington, D.C. and San Antonio, Texas.

We will watch a Nova DVD about fractals and the Bill will show how art and fractals intersect. An activity will be included, so bring your colored pencils or felt pens for additional participation!

Bill Blitz joined ICL in September of 2016.

ICL member Don Gallagher will coordinate the session, modeled after the music and art potpourri sessions. Member presenters each give us a short science lesson of their choice. Today we hear from the following:

Janet Budke: “A Taste of Coca Cola”

Ken Ash: “The Mystery of the Monarch: The Almost Unbelievable Life Story of a Butterfly”

Irene Konopasek: “Earth’s Magnetic Field; Why Is It Moving?”

David Engen: "A Lesson in Celestial Navigation"

GwenEllyn Anderson: “The Science of Memory”

Wayne Wallace: "Gynandromorphs and Single Individual Color Morphs: examples and possible causes"