speaker:

Vincent Courcelle-Labrousse, Defence Counsel at the ICTR and Special Tribunal for Lebanon

Why have we become obsessed with squeezing the most out of every minute? What’s wrong with wasting time?

Fr. Timothy Radcliffe OP, Dominican Friar and international writer and speaker, explores the delights and trials of sitting in silence, waiting for God to speak. Timothy Radcliffe was Master of the Order of Preachers from 1992-2001.

This talk forms part of the University Church’s Trinity term series for students and 20-somethings. Wine, cheese and juice will be in ample supply.

A short talk followed by questions and discussion. All welcome, whether you want to take part in the discussion or just listen.

As part of the Oxford University Shakespeare Festival, singers from across the university will present settings of Shakespeare texts for solo voice and choir.

Solo settings by Quilter, Gurney and Finzi will be followed by choral works including Vaughan Williams’ Three Shakespeare Songs – settings from The Tempest and A Midsummer Night’s Dream – and his stunning Serenade to Music which sets text from The Merchant of Venice; a piece which has been hailed as one of the most beautiful works ever written!

Tickets: £5 (including refreshments!)

Available here: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/276207

Speaker: Professor Richard Sennett
Professor of Sociology at the LSE & Professor of the Humanities at NYU. His work studies the social ties in cities and the effects of urban living on individuals, and entails ethnography, history and social theory.

Part of the Mansfield Lecture Series, convener Baroness Helena Kennedy QC.

experimentsandethics.wordpress.com

experimentsandethics.wordpress.com

The Psalms in England
With Prof M J Toswel, University of Western Ontario

Tuesday 10 June, 2-3pm, Headley Lecture Theatre

This lecture introduces the Anglo-Saxon psalter, and especially the interlinear vernacular versions in Latin psalters which were a unique feature in Europe at the time, and asks whether these provide evidence for greater engagement with the psalms in English than has generally been acknowledged.

Tickets £5/£4
http://www.ashmolean.org/events/Lectures/?id=132

Tour: Joseph Beuys & Jörg Immendorff
With Colin Harrison, Senior Curator of European Art

3–3.45pm on Wednesday 14 May and Wednesday 11 June

Tours are free, no booking is required. Please meet in Gallery 2.

http://www.ashmolean.org/exhibitions/details/?exh=92

This lecture is hosted by the Oxford Martin School and the International Migration Institute, an Oxford Martin School Institute

If Democrats and Republicans in the US Congress can agree that eleven million unauthorized immigrants are proof of a broken immigration system, why does Congress repeatedly fail to enact comprehensive immigration reform that might stand a chance of reducing illegal migration?

One reason offered by Rey Koslowski is that too many members of Congress are fixated on appropriating money for more Border Patrol Agents and fencing to stop people from crossing the US-Mexico border between ports of entry. Koslowski argues that each additional dollar spent at the border is a dollar that may have been spent elsewhere to a much greater effect in reducing illegal migration, for example, on worksite inspections to enforce employer sanctions against hiring unauthorized migrant workers. After President Obama was reelected with 72% of the Latino vote, Senate Republicans eagerly joined Democrats to forge a comprehensive immigration reform bill but it took throwing $44 billion at border fencing and more Border Patrol agents to secure enough Republican votes to pass the bill with a filibuster-proof majority.

Koslowski argues that this border security overkill is not only bad policy; it failed to attract majority support for comprehensive immigration reform among House Republicans as intended, leaving it unlikely that any immigration legislation will become law before the November 2014 elections.

This lecture will be followed by a drinks reception, all welcome

Joseph Reeves, a contributor to Humanitarian OpenStreetMap, will talk about the importance of crowd sourcing and open data in providing information during a humanitarian crisis.

Free, collaborative maps are uniquely valuable to humanitarian work, especially in places where base map data is often scarce, out of date, or rapidly changing. OpenStreetMap is a project to create a free and open map of the entire world, built entirely by volunteers surveying with GPS, digitizing aerial imagery, and collecting and liberating existing public sources of geographic data. The information in OpenStreetMap can fill in the gaps in base map data to assist in responses to disasters and crisis.

Speaker: Susie Orbach
Psychotherapist, psychoanalyst, writer and social critic. Her books include Fat is a Feminist Issue and Bodies. A convenor of Anybody, an organisation that campaigns for body diversity. Co-founder of Antidote which works for the emotional literacy and Co-founder of Psychotherapist and Counsellors for Social Responsibility. Part of the Mansfield Lecture Series, convener Baroness Helena Kennedy QC

Al Jazeera host Mehdi Hasan will challenge Bernard Kouchner, co-founder of Medecins sans Frontieres and former French Foreign Minister, on France’s military interventionism. Are the country’s motives altruistic or do they respond to a neo-colonialist agenda? And is there a tipping point when intervening becomes essential? Syria, Mali, Libya, Kosovo and more.

This debate will be filmed and aired on Al Jazeera English at a later date. Audience members will be invited to participate in a Q&A section during the second half of the conversation.

Order free tickets here: http://bernardkouchner.eventbrite.co.uk

Dr Jonathan Jong, a researcher at the Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, explores how time is all “in the mind”. Philosophers disagree about the nature of time: does it really flow from the past to the future through the present? There is a good chance that it doesn’t, and that our perception of time is illusory. But why do we experience time as we do?

This talk is part of the University Church’s Trinity term discussion series for students and 20-somethings, ‘A Waste of Time’, critiquing our cultural fetishizing of efficiency. As well as a guest speaker, there will be Q&A and group discussion over wine and cheese.

This event is free and open to all in the students and 20-somethings bracket.

A short talk followed by questions and discussion.

“The Dalai Lama: a study in bourgeois rationality”

All welcome

A new report by the Humanitarian Innovation Project, Refugee Economies: Rethinking Popular Assumptions, will be launched to coincide with World Refugee Day, on Friday 20 June 2014. It is one of the very first studies on the economic life of refugees and fundamentally challenges existing models of refugee assistance.

The report is based on participatory, mixed methods research including about 1,600 surveys in Uganda, one of the few refugee-hosting countries in Africa that allows refugees the right to work and freedom of movement. However, it has wider implications for the emerging refugee crises around the world.

Far from being uniformly dependent, refugees are part of complex and vibrant economic systems. They are often entrepreneurial and, if given the opportunity, can help themselves and their communities, as well as contributing to the host economy. The data in the new report challenges five popular myths about refugees’ economic lives:

that refugees are economically isolated;
that they are a burden on host states;
that they are economically homogenous;
that they are technologically illiterate;
that they are dependent on humanitarian assistance.

Read more about the report: http://www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/refugeeeconomies

The Self-Portrait: a Cultural History
With James Hall, author

Saturday 21 June , 2-3pm, Headley Lecture Theatre

Recounting the history of the self-portrait, this lecture offers insights into artists’ psychological and creative worlds. James Hall talks about the medieval ‘mirror craze’, the confessional self-portraits of Titian and Michelangelo, and the multiple selves of contemporary artists such as Claude Cahun and Cindy Sherman.

Tickets £5/£4
http://www.ashmolean.org/events/Lectures/?id=132

Weekend of films screenings, talks and workshops about public health. Kicks off on Friday at 18.00 with a screening of Dallas Buyers Club at the Phoenix Picturehouse in Jericho. All welcome. Please visit our website for further details http://publichealthfilms.org/

Oxford Transitional Justice Research is pleased to invite you to its 2014 Summer Conference ‘Borders and Boundaries in Transitional Justice’.

This year’s conference, hosted with the support of the Planethood Foundation, Law Faculty, and the Centre for Criminology, will explore the issue of how borders and boundaries affect transitional justice processes across the world. The conference is organised around four panels:

The interplay between local, regional, and foreign transnational processes;
The role of diaspora and stateless communities in transitional justice;
The ways in which international law is dealing with cross-border transitional justice concerns; and
How local, national, and global approaches are affecting the theory and practice of transitional justice.

Registration is now open and we encourage all potential participants to register as soon as possible. Spaces are limited. We particularly welcome graduate students and early career researchers working on issues of transitional justice. A small registration fee includes tea and coffee and a light lunch.

In 2014 Barnett House is celebrating its centenary. The celebrations culminate with the Reunion Weekend on 12-13 July 2014.

This includes:
– Keynote talk from Magdalena Sepulveda, United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights.
– The 100th birthday tea party (the V-C Andrew Hamilton will cut the birthday cake!)
– A talk on the history of Barnett House and the launch of the book on the history.
– Open house at the department with displays of historic material and current research.
– Drinks and dinner with an after dinner talk from Prof Jonathan Bradshaw.
– Showing of the film Rich Man, Poor Man based on research carried out by Robert Walker and Elaine Chase with a discussion with the director of the film.

How do you find your own inner peace whilst living your own busy life?

How do you become the person who you truly are and honour your responsibilities?

How do you integrate and refine your soul’s purpose into your life?

An evening with Leon arts; Modern Day Alchemist, Dad, Visionary, Author, Social Innovator, Top Chef, Philanthopreneur, Traveller and Explorer of Consciousness.

To find the way to your own true self it helps to have a guide, it can be challenging to do it on your own. As the transformation of a cocoon into the butterfly is challenging and can feel like a struggle, it is easier in to do in the presence of another person with experience of the struggle.

When you change your inside world, the outside reality will follow suit: “As Within, So Without”.

Simon Singh will be discussing ‘Trick or Treatment? Alternative Medicine on Trial’.

The World Humanist Congress is taking place from Friday 8th August until Sunday 10th August in Oxford. Held every three years in different locations around the world, this years theme of the meeting is ‘Freedom of Thought and Expression’. We are pleased to announce during the conference period, 10 world-class speakers will be visiting the bookshop for a series of free 20 minute talks taking place in the Norrington Room. You do not need tickets to attend any of the talks but seating is limited, so please arrive early to get a ensure your place.

Kenan Malik will be discussing ‘What can the history of morality tell us about the nature of morality’.

The World Humanist Congress is taking place from Friday 8th August until Sunday 10th August in Oxford. Held every three years in different locations around the world, this years theme of the meeting is ‘Freedom of Thought and Expression’. We are pleased to announce during the conference period, 10 world-class speakers will be visiting the bookshop for a series of free 20 minute talks taking place in the Norrington Room. You do not need tickets to attend any of the talks but seating is limited, so please arrive early to get a ensure your place.

Sue Bolton and Fiona Ruck, smoking cessation specialists, look at the effects of passive smoking and their campaign for smoke-free homes and cars across Oxfordshire.

The talk will include myth-busting statistics and facts covering the effects of passive smoking on both adults and children, as well as a detailed look into what is in the cigarette smoke that is causing the adverse effects. Sue and Fiona will also look at local and national responses to this public health issue, including the Smoke Free Homes and Cars Pledge project.

Our speakers have worked as registered nurses and health visitors and worked for years in smoking cessation, including as a smoking and pregnancy specialist and as a smoking and young person’s specialist for Oxford Smoking Advice Service.

A public meeting with a short introductory talk followed by questions and discussion.

The anti-war movement
Thursday 21 August, 7:30pm to 9:00pm
Oxford Town Hall, St Aldates
All welcome

Organised by Oxford Communist Corresponding Society.
This is the second in a three-part series of public meetings on violence and war. The three meetings of the series are:

Thursday 17 July
The war to end all wars

Thursday 21 August
The anti-war movement

Thursday 25 September
The end of violence

All are from 7:30pm to 9:00pm in the Town Hall

Maybe an asteroid hit Earth. Perhaps a nuclear war reduced our cities to radioactive rubble. Or avian flu killed most of the population. Whatever the cause, the world as we know it has ended and now the survivors must start again. But how do we set about rebuilding our world from scratch?

Join Astrobiologist Lewis Dartnell in a lively and informative discussion about how we’ve become disconnected from the basic skills on which our lives and our world depend.

Lewis Dartnell will be at the Unicorn Theatre in Abindgon on Thursday 4 September talking about his new book The Knowledge, which explains everything you need to know to reboot our civilisation after a catastrophe.

Join us for an evening at Corpus Christi College with the composer Robert Saxton, as he discusses his lifetime achievements in music with his fellow composer Thomas Hyde.

Robert Saxton has worked with many experts in the field, composed for the BBC and London Symphony Orchestra, amongst other ventures.

A discussion on the need for more affordable homes in Oxford and what can be done to deliver them. Speakers Ed Turner ( Oxford City Council), Danny Dorling ( Oxford University), Bob Colenutt (Northampton University Charlie Fisher ( Community Land Trust)

A public meeting with a short introductory talk followed by questions and discussion.

The end of violence
Thursday 25 September, 7:30pm to 9:00pm
Oxford Town Hall, St Aldates
All welcome

Organised by Oxford Communist Corresponding Society.
This is the last in a three-part series of public meetings on violence and war. The three meetings of the series are:

Thursday 17 July
The war to end all wars

Thursday 21 August
The anti-war movement

Thursday 25 September
The end of violence

All are from 7:30pm to 9:00pm in the Town Hall