Christine Schoefer, a freelance journalist living in Berkeley, recounts her first-person memories of the historic fall of the Berlin Wall:
Twenty years ago I saw people dance on the Berlin Wall. I watched East Germans push westward through narrow border gates that had been forbidden to them for three decades. I witnessed strangers embrace each other like long lost best friends. I heard men sob in ecstatic happiness and witnessed a young woman kneel to kiss the cold asphalt of Niederkirchnerstrasse. I was there when the city transformed itself, overnight, from Cold War icon to global symbol of liberation. (continued . . . )
The above reminiscence is prented in conjuction with a free photography exhibit being held in Doe Library commemorating the fall of the Wall entitled Icons of a Border Installation. It is open Monday through Friday daily from 9-5 pm until December 18th, Room 190.
The Institute of European Studies was awarded a grant from the Social Sciences Research Council in 2008-09 to host a public outreach program focused on Gender, Islam and the West. This interdisciplinary program placed academics, public intellectuals, activists, artists, and writers in conversation with an informed public to explore the relationship between Islam and Western secularism, particularly as it manifests itself in the lives of women. Some of our talks, including those with public intellectual Ian Buruma and scholar Joan Wallach-Scott, are available in audio format (.mp3) on our SSRC page. Related videos, transcipts, and event summaries are also available.
Find out what IES has been up to! From outreach to California's high school students and teachers, to setting up a new EU Center of Excellence, IES's programs and events engage faculty, community members, grad & undergrad students, and diplomats in a rich, multilayered conversation about Europe's past and future. We support dialogue covering culture, politics, and economics, while providing a locus for European specialists and emerging experts to inform each other's thinking and research. Read more about our activities here with our latest editon of eNews.
