Lecture | Global Questions Seminar
The Scandal of Cal: A Conversation about the Role of Academic Institutions in Historical Exploitation
- Date
- Tuesday 10 September 2024
- Time
- Serie
- Global Questions Seminar 2024-2025
- Address
-
P.J. Veth
Nonnensteeg 1-3
2311 VJ Leiden - Room
- 1.01
Global Questions Seminar & Futures of Native American Studies (JEDI)
Institute for History & Centre for the Arts in Society
Abstract
The University of California, Berkeley—widely known as “Cal”—is admired worldwide as a bastion of innovation and a hub for progressive thought. Far less known are the university’s roots in plunder, warfare, and the promotion of white supremacy. During this seminar leading US historian Tony Platt will introduce his work The Scandal of Cal (2023) on the history of his own university. This introduction will be followed by a conversation, moderated by Mike Schmidli and Sara Polak, about his research process and the relevance of this project for other academic institutions worldwide. Afterwards, we will continue the discussion over drinks.
About the speaker
Tony Platt is the author of thirteen books and 150 essays and articles on race, inequality, and social justice in American history, among them Beyond These Walls: Rethinking Crime and Punishment in the United States; Bloodlines: Recovering Hitler’s Nuremberg Laws, from Patton’s Trophy to Public Memorial; and The Child Savers: The Invention of Delinquency. His work has been translated into German, Spanish, Italian, and Japanese. In addition to scholarly books and publications, Platt has written for the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Truthdig, History News Network, Z Magazine, Nation, Salon, Monthly Review, and the Guardian, and his commentaries have aired on National Public Radio. Now a Distinguished Affiliated Scholar at Berkeley’s Center for the Study of Law and Society, Platt taught at the University of Chicago, the University of California, Berkeley, and California State University where he received awards for teaching and scholarship. He blogs on history and memory. He lives in Berkeley and Big Lagoon, California.
Global Questions Seminar
The motto of the Institute for History’s research programme is ‘Global Questions, Local Sources’. Across all areas and time periods, researchers of the Institute focus on important processes such as migration, colonialism, urbanization, and identity formation.
The ‘Global Questions Seminar’, for which we invite distinguished international colleagues to discuss the interplay between global and local issues from the past, brings all staff members of the Institute for History together.