Williams Thinking Explores Intellectual Life on Campus

Media contact: Noelle Lemoine, communications assistant; tele: (413) 597-4277; email: [email protected]
Note: Doors will open at 6:15 p.m. and the event starts promptly at 7 p.m. Please arrive early.
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass., Feb. 21, 2012—Williams announces an evening of intellectual discussion for the community with faculty members C. Ondine Chavoya, Justin Crowe, and Lee Park. Williams Thinking, an ongoing lecture series that shares with a broad community the ideas and research of the college’s outstanding faculty, will take place at 7 p.m. on Monday, March 12 in Paresky Auditorium. The event, hosted by Williams President Adam Falk, is free and open to the public. Reservations are not required. A reception with the speakers will follow the event.
Williams Thinking, which began in the summer of 2011, is a series of 20-minute talks aimed at ideas that matter in today’s world. The talks showcase faculty members in the humanities, social sciences, and science and mathematics in a way that is accessible and appealing to audience members of all ages and backgrounds.
“I’m pleased to be able to share with our local community the type of intellectual stimulation that’s available every day to our students,” says Falk. “And,” he adds, “I’m excited that the Williams Thinking webpage allows people outside of Williamstown, especially alumni and prospective students, to experience some of the remarkable teaching that takes place here.”
The talks are filmed before a live studio audience and then presented online at williams.edu/williamsthinking. Past talks have explored a range of topics, including storytelling, molecular fossils, sound perception, the Iranian revolution, the beauty of mathematics, and the origins of curiosity, among others.
C. Ondine Chavoya of the art department and Latina/o studies program will be presenting “Mobilizing the Mural.” Chavoya is a specialist in contemporary art and visual culture.  He is the author of numerous texts on Chicano avant-garde art, video, experimental cinema, and social space in southern California. He has long been interested in the ways artists represent, interpret, and intervene in the urban landscape. Chavoya is co-curator of the exhibition Asco: Elite of the Obscure, A Retrospective 1972-1987, the first museum retrospective to present the wide-ranging work of the Chicano performance and conceptual art group Asco that premiered at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in fall 2011 and is currently on view at the Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA). With curator Rita Gonzalez, he is also co-editor of the award-winning exhibition catalogue published by Hatje Cantz. He organized two previous exhibitions for WCMA: Pop Art from the Collection (2003) and the video retrospective Michel Auder: Chronicles and Other Scenes (2004). With Chon Noriega, Jennifer Gonzalez, and Tere Romo, Chavoya is co-editor of the forthcoming Chicano Art: A Critical Anthology (Duke University Press). He received his B.A. in art history and comparative literature from the University of California at Santa Cruz and his Ph.D. in visual and cultural studies from the University of Rochester.
Justin Crowe of the political science department will be presenting “In Search of the Center.” Crowe’s academic work focuses on the Supreme Court, constitutional law, and American political thought and culture. More specifically, he has written about the role of the Constitution and Supreme Court in the development of American politics. His forthcoming book, Building the Judiciary: Law, Courts, and the Politics of Institutional Development, will be published in less than two weeks. Crowe teaches a course on “Problems and Progress in American Democracy”—an experiential class that requires students to venture out into the community in order to uncover and reflect upon the lived experience of democracy in America—as well as a variety of other classes on democracy and the Constitution.  He holds a B.A. from Williams in political science and English and a Ph.D. in politics from Princeton University.
Lee Park of the chemistry department will be presenting “Designing Nanoarchitecture.” Park’s research is in inorganic and organic materials chemistry and nanotechnology, with a specific focus on self-assembling systems and device applications. Lately, Park has been looking into aspects of self-assembly that can be useful in the development of organic solar cells. She has trained over 75 students in her research lab at Williams over the years. She is a member of the Committee on Professional Training of the American Chemical Society, which oversees various aspects of the training and mentoring of chemists at the undergraduate and graduate levels nationwide. At Williams, Park teaches chemistry courses at all levels, including higher-level classes on inorganic and organometallic chemistry and the chemistry of materials (including a laboratory program in materials chemistry and nanoscale fabrication, one of the first of its kind at an undergraduate institution). She received her B.A. from Wellesley College in 1986, her Ph.D. from MIT in 1992, and spent her post-doctoral term at IBM’s TJ Watson Research Lab. She has been at Williams since 1993.
Williams Thinking is presented by the Office of Communications and the Office of Information Technology. Please note: these events will be recorded for distribution on the college’s website.
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