Princeton University

Nassau notes

Art Museum exhibition from Warhol collection

An exhibition titled “Andy Warhol: Electric Chair” will be on view from March 18 through June 25 at the University Art Museum.

The show features a portfolio of 10 prints from the museum’s permanent collection. The series, printed in 1971, is related to one of Warhol’s earlier “Death and Disaster” paintings, “Orange Disaster” (1963) by way of a source photograph, and demonstrates the artist’s sustained interest in mortality. This interest no doubt was renewed by his near-fatal shooting in 1968, noted Alex Kitnick, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Art and Archaeology, who organized the exhibition.

In the “Electric Chair” series, Warhol employed a screenprint process in which he pressed ink with a squeegee through a fabric screen partially blocked by a stencil, onto the paper to produce the image. Warhol also used this technique in his painting practice.

1,200 expected for comparative literature conference March 23-26

Some 1,200 scholars from across the nation and abroad will gather on campus Thursday through Sunday, March 23-26, for the annual meeting of the American Comparative Literature Association.

It is expected to be one of the largest such conferences ever held at Princeton, with sessions taking place in Chancellor Green, East Pyne, the Scheide Caldwell House, McCosh Hall and Alexander Hall. The event will be hosted by the Department of Comparative Literature, along with other departments and programs in the humanities and the creative arts. Sandra Bermann, chair of Princeton’s comparative literature department, is vice president of the national association.

Focusing on a central theme, “The Human and Its Others,” the interdisciplinary conference will integrate the work of leading scholars in the humanities with talks, readings, film screenings and performances by creative artists. Participants will discuss issues affecting the definition of the human and the humanities, addressing questions such as: How does literature, along with the other creative arts, help define the human? How has the human been shaped by religion, politics, philosophy, science, economics, medicine and technology? Against what images, ideas, dreams and nightmares has the human been defined and refined? And why does it seem to be a particularly pertinent, if not pressing, concern today?

One of the conference highlights will be a panel discussion on “Literature and Human Rights” by Simon Gikandi of Princeton, Joseph Slaughter and Gayatri Spivak of Columbia University and Domna Stanton of the City University of New York, who is past president of the Modern Language Association. Pauline Yu, head of the American Council of Learned Societies, also is expected to attend.

The conference will include sessions led by many of Princeton’s best-known artists: Toni Morrison will give the plenary address in dialogue with Valerie Smith; Joyce Carol Oates, C.K. Williams, Gabe Hudson and Susan Wheeler will read from their work; Paul Muldoon and Nigel Smith will present a concert with their rock band Rackett; and Su Friedrich, along with guest director Ruba Nadda, will lead film screenings.

Registration information and a schedule are available on the conference Web site at www.princeton.edu/~acla06. Members of the University community may register at no charge with a Princeton ID. Registration and book exhibits will be held in the Chancellor Green Rotunda.

Former French prime minister to speak

Alain Juppé, former prime minister of France, will speak on “The Future of Transatlantic Relations” at 3:30 p.m. Monday, March 13, in Dodds Auditorium, Robertson Hall.

Juppé served as prime minister from 1995 to 1997 early in the administration of Jacques Chirac. He previously was minister of state responsible for the budget from 1986 to 1988 and minister of foreign affairs from 1993 to 1995 under Francois Mitterrand.

His lecture is sponsored by the Program in Contemporary European Politics and Society, the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, the Program in the European Union and the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies.

Polish journalist discusses transitions

Polish journalist and activist Adam Michnik will deliver a lecture titled “A Dictatorship’s Past: The Cleansing of Collective Memory” at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 14, in 219 Burr Hall.

The lecture will focus on the difficulties of dealing with the past in societies with newly established democratic regimes. Michnik will examine transitions to pluralism and democracy in Germany after World War II, in various Latin American countries in the 1980s and 1990s, in post-apartheid South Africa and in post-communist East-Central Europe.

Michnik was a leading figure in the struggle for freedom of speech and democratization in Eastern Europe in the 1960s and was imprisoned for six years in communist Poland. Since 1989, he has been editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza, which was the first free daily newspaper in post-communist East-Central Europe. Michnik was one of the founders of the Workers’ Defense Committee in Poland and a leading member of the Solidarity trade union movement.

The lecture is sponsored by the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies. It is designated as the 2005-06 Cyril Black Memorial Lecture and the annual PIIRS Distinguished Lecture.

‘Overnutrition crisis’ is topic

Diet in Decline: Can America’s Overnutrition Crisis be Reversed?” is the subject of a lecture scheduled for 4:30 p.m. Monday, March 13, in 16 Robertson Hall.

The lecture will be given by Kelly Brownell, chair of the Department of Psychology at Yale University, and Roger Platt, director of school health for New York City.

Brownell also serves as director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale and as a professor of epidemiology and public health. He is the co-author (with Katherine Battle Horgen) of “Food Fight: The Inside Story of the Food Industry, America’s Obesity Crisis and What We Can Do About It” and has written numerous books and articles on obesity and weight management.

Platt has been director of school health for New York City since 2003. He oversees all health services and health policy issues for the city’s public school system, which serves more than 1 million students. Previously, Platt held faculty and senior management positions at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Harvard Community Health Plan and Mount Sinai Medical Center.

The lecture is sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and the Center for Research on Child Well-Being as part of the “Researcher Meets Policy-Maker” lecture series.

George Shultz to lead conversation

Former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz will give a public lecture at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 15, in McCosh 50.

The lecture, titled “A Conversation With George Shultz,” is sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

Shultz was appointed as secretary of state by President Reagan in 1982 and served as the chief U.S. diplomat for seven years, playing a key role in implementing foreign policy that brought about the end of the Cold War and the development of strong relationships between the United States and countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

A member of Princeton’s class of 1942, Shultz has combined academics and government service in a long and distinguished career.

After earning his Ph.D. in industrial economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Shultz served as a member of President Eisenhower’s Council of Economic Advisers. He also was a faculty member and dean at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. Appointed U.S. secretary of labor in 1969, he went on to serve as director of the Office of Management and Budget and secretary of the treasury and to chair the Council of Economic Advisers under President Nixon.

In 1974, Shultz left government to become president and director of the Bechtel Group for eight years. He also taught at Stanford University before becoming secretary of state.

After leaving office in 1989, Shultz became director and senior counselor at Bechtel, professor of international economics at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business and a distinguished fellow at the Hoover Institution. In January 1989, he was awarded the Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor. In 1971, Princeton presented him with its Woodrow Wilson Award, given annually to an alumnus in recognition of distinguished achievement “in the nation’s service.’’

Shultz has written and co-written a number of publications, including his best-selling 1993 memoir “Turmoil and Triumph: My Years as Secretary of State.”

Senior thesis exhibition

“Dadona” is among the oil paintings by Hans Plukas on display March 14-17 as part of the exhibition for his senior thesis in visual arts. Hours for the show in the Lucas Gallery at 185 Nassau St. are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. An opening reception is planned for 6 to 8 p.m. Tuesday, March 14.

Paul Wellstone biographer here

Bill Lofy, a former aide to U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone, will discuss Wellstone’s life and legacy at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 14, in 16 Robertson Hall.

The lecture is titled “Paul Wellstone: The Life of a Passionate Progressive,” which also is the title of Lofy’s new biography of the late Minnesota senator.

Lofy is a senior trainer and writer for Wellstone Action, a national center for training and leadership development for the progressive movement. The center was founded in January 2003, three months after Wellstone died in a plane crash while campaigning for a third term in the Senate.

Lofy worked for Wellstone for six years as an organizer, communications specialist and travel aide. In 2001, after working briefly on Wellstone’s campaign, Lofy came to Princeton, where he earned an MPA degree from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in 2003.

The lecture is sponsored by the Wilson School.