How do women choose to speak or not speak about personal experiences of sexual violence?

Rape culture silences victims of sexual violence, and while social movements such as #Beenrapedneverreported (2014) and #Metoo (2018) have worked to undo this silencing, they have succeeded by both facilitating collective speech and acknowledging women’s right to keep secrets. If doubt is a common response to speaking out, then for women, speaking cannot be presented as the only solution. Acknowledging that speaking does not necessarily cure, Martine Delvaux explores how women navigate secrecy, in order to think about secrets as a radical feminist tool.

Sponsored by Martha Durkin and YWCA Southern Arizona

The push for independence in African nations was ultimately an incomplete process, with the people often left to wrestle with a partial, imperfect legacy. The various transitions to independence from Ghana to South Africa produced uneven results that do not fit neatly into narratives of “failure” or “success.” Decolonization in Africa unfolded as a tug of war between the leaders of protest movements and the defenders of European colonial rule, with violent repression defining the landscape and leaders often murdered or jailed. Living with tremendous loss, survivors forged on in continued hope, while custodians of imperial domination pushed back. Rather than liberation in name alone, the ongoing struggle has been one for meaningful freedom.

Scholars have called The Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) a “fratricidal war in Europe’s backwater.” The conflict became much more, galvanizing adversaries on the left and the right and serving as a prelude to the Second World War. More than 60 years later, that “war in Europe’s backwater” and its consequences still loom large in Spain and beyond. Because of its profound political, social and artistic influence, the war and the lessons learned from it still have much to teach us about how societies confront the crises that increasingly threaten civil society.

In the 21st century, space exploration transcends national boundaries and has the potential to bring humanity together. Scientific collaboration has transformed the rivalries of the Cold War era into a shared search for knowledge. Dante Lauretta, principal investigator for the OSIRIS-REx mission, will discuss how a degree in Japanese in addition to theoretical math and physics has given him a career advantage. Since the Japanese Space Agency is heavily involved in asteroid exploration, Lauretta has applied his humanities degree to establish a cross-cultural exchange program and effectively engage his Japanese colleagues. Space exploration is an activity for all humanity and forms a natural vehicle to foster international collaboration and understanding.