Bucket List represents the unbelievable intellectual privilege we enjoy as Columbia students. We do our very best to bring to your attention important guest lecturers and special events on campus. As always, feel free to mention any events we may have missed in the comments section (and/or mock our typos) and we’ll add them. Our recommendations for this week are below and the full list is after the jump.

Recommended

• “World Leader’s Forum: Laurent Lamothe, Prime Minister of the Republic of Haiti” Monday, 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm, Italian Academy, Laurent Lamothe
• “Kirill Medvedev: It’s No Good” Wednesday, 12:00 pm – 1:30 pm, 1219 IAB, Kirill Medvedev, Keith Gessen
  

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Bucket List represents the unbelievable intellectual privilege we enjoy as Columbia students. We do our very best to bring to your attention important guest lecturers and special events on campus. As always, feel free to mention any events we may have missed in the comments section (and/or mock our typos) and we’ll add them. Our recommendations for this week are below and the full list is after the jump.

Recommended

• “Women in Peace, Security, and Development: A Conversation with Inspiring Women Leaders at the UN” Wednesday, 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm, 1501 IAB, Judy Cheng-Hopkins, Lackshmi Puri, Leila Zerrougi, Zaina Bangurra
  
• “The Writing Lives Series: An Evening with Nick Hornby in Conversation with Saskia Hamilton” Wednesday, 6:15 pm – 8:15 pm, Rennert Auditorium, Kraft Center, Nick Hornby, Saskia Hamilton
• “Thinking Feminism at the Limits Keynote Address,” Thursday, 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm, Faculty House, Judith Butler
• “Addressing Public Health System Challenges in Haiti” Friday, 5:00 pm – 6:00 pm, 501 Schermerhorn, Jeffrey D. Sachs, Sonia Erlich Sachs, Tatiana Wah, Florence Guillaume

Full List

An anonymous tipster sent us such a goofy and curt chronicle of yesterday’s scheduled event, we thought it was too good not to share…

Man of mystery

President of Haiti Michel Martelly did not arrive to speak at his scheduled WLF event. Around 3 pm, half hour after event [was] scheduled to start, introductions and comments by Jeff Sachs and Earth Institute director for Haiti cut off by Bollinger saying President would not arrive, [and that] they had hoped foreign minister would arrive, but didn’t. Many people leave.

Jeff Sachs continues fielding questions about Haitian recovery and development.

Around fifteen minutes later, foreign minister arrives and gives speech while Jeff Sachs and ambassador to Haiti/Fugees member Wyclef Jean, stand behind him. Speech focuses on bringing investment to Haiti. Wyclef Jean then summarizes minister’s speech and talks about how he used to sneak into Columbia dorms as a teenager. Jean and Sachs hug awkwardly after Jean calls him ”the original rock star.” Foreign Minister then talks about the last time he was at Columbia, 1971, when he came down from Boston and partied.

Foreign minister then fields a few questions about Haitian agriculture and court system, as well as investigation of former president Duvalier before Sachs says that he needs to wrap up the event.

Haitian president via Wikimedia

Illustration by Eloise Owens

Edwidge Danticat was born in Haiti and graduated from Barnard in 1990. The success of her early semi-autobiographical novels and short stories has made her one of the most prominent writers to come out of Morningside Heights and an important figure in the Caribbean Diaspora. Although Danticat has been busy on tour for her new collection of essays, Create Dangerously: The Immigrant Artist at Work, she found a moment to speak with the Blue & White‘s Managing Editor Emerita Mariela Quintana about her work, her community, and her home.

FYI: Danticat will be speaking at the Brooklyn Public Library this Thursday night at 7pm! It’s free!

Blue & White: What is the art scene like in Haiti now? How has it changed since the January Earthquake?

Edwidge Danticat: After the earthquake there was a momentary pause because a lot people lost their family members and they had to worry about the business of survival. But soon some of the writers were blogging about the earthquake and about what happened to them. And immediately artists were writing and painting.

The week of the earthquake itself, on the cover of The New Yorker was a painting by Frantz Zephirin, a painter from Haiti. What he shared with other artists is that they all immediately started to use what they [could] to get out a broader sense of the catastrophe. For the writers, it was words. One of the things that was a lot more visible this time around was that the people who lived in Haiti were able to tell their stories to the rest of the world with the new social media, including the artists.

The people who have always written have continued writing, but many people who have never written before have started writing some for personal relief; some for their children, you know, as a response therapy. So, yes, art is alive and well in Haiti. (more…)

Last night curious students packed into Lerner Cinema to see Princeton professor and celebrity Cornel West talk on “how we can engage in activism that is characterized by faith, perseverance, courage and hope” in Haiti. Bwog’s Semi-Secretly Christian Organizations correspondent Derek Huang reports that students got more consideration of spirituality than of Port-au-Prince.

In a time when American mainstream media portrays human tragedy fleetingly, the Veritas Forum and Intervarsity Christian Fellowship invited Dr. Cornel West, professor of African American Studies and Religion at Princeton University, to discuss how to positively engage in humanitarian activism. Even though the lecture was originally titled “After the Headlines: Remaining Engaged in Haiti,” West primarily spoke about the reason for engaging in humanitarian aid and offered his thoughts from a Christian perspective. The program began with a presentation from Gabrielle Apollon (CC ’09, SIPA ’10). After showing the audience a video documenting her experiences in Haiti during the earthquake, Apollon introduced the issue of faith to the discussion, talked briefly about how she viewed her experience through the lens of Christianity, and invited West to the stage.

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Bwog’s Francophone Correspondent Jon Edelman reports from last night’s Read-In/Speak-Out on Haiti at the Maison Française:

As Associate Professor of French Madeleine Dobie stepped to the microphone to begin Friday evening’s “Read-In/Speak-Out on Haiti,” the room was primed for a selection of Haitian poetry or prose, or perhaps a discussion of Haitian history or culture. However, Dobie began with something a bit more familiar: The New York Times. Specifically, she discussed a January 14th op-ed piece by David Brooks in which the columnist indicted Haiti’s culture, among other factors, for the extent of the devastation. “We’re all supposed to politely respect each other’s cultures,” Brooks wrote. “But some cultures are more progress-resistant than others, and a horrible tragedy was just exacerbated by one of them.” In discussing her disappointment that Brooks had stood “in judgment, not solidarity” with Haiti, Dobie gave the readings that followed a sense of deeper importance: the recitations were refutations, for they evidenced of Haiti’s cultural richness and depth.

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This is not in EC, but don't you want to see what is?

There is a Residential Programs brunch happening now until 2pm with a lot of food and a suggested donation of $3 that will go to the Haiti Relief efforts on campus. Stop by EC now!

The CSA (Caribbean Students Association), HSA (Haitian Students Association) and various Student Councils have officially formed the There is Hope: Mission Haiti campaign in order to provide short-term and long-term help to the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. The new coalition will meet tonight at 8 in Earl Hall. Robert Taylor’s email detailing the initiative after the jump.

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