Campus film screening: Belarusian Waltz

Wisconsin Public Television, UW-Madison’s Center for Russia, East Europe and Central Asia (CREECA), and P.O.V. present a screening of the documentary film

Belarusian Waltz

by Andrzej Fidy

6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 5

4070 Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave.

UW-Madison professor Ted Gerber, director of CREECA will offer comments and lead a discussion following the film.

Belarus has been called “Europe’s last dictatorship.” Since 1994, Alexander Lukashenko has ruled the the ex-Soviet republic with a despotic hand jailing the opposition, shutting down the press and refusing to investigate the assassinations of dissidents. He has virtually silenced his critics - but not one lone performance artist who stages public stunts mocking the dictator’s pretensions. “Belarusian Waltz” is the story of Alexander Pushkin, whose audacious comical exploits find him facing the hostility of police and the consternation of his family. An offbeat tale of postmodern street theater meeting 1930s-style authoritarianism, the film offers a surprising window in the soul of the Belarusian people. This film is a co-production of ITVS International.

Click here for more information.

WISCTV to Air Series on UW-Alumn, Nazi Resister

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Masarah Van Eyck, Director of Communications, Division of International Studies, mvaneyck2@international.wisc.edu, 608-262-5590

Madison—Most people wouldn’t recognize her face or her name, but this Wisconsin woman’s story stretches far beyond our borders. In mid-November WISC-TV, News 3 will take an in depth look at Milwaukee native and University of Wisconsin–Madison alum, Mildred Fish Harnack and her amazing journey into Nazi Germany—a journey that started with a chance meeting on the UW–Madison campus.

After earning a BA and MA at UW–Madison, she met her husband, German-born Arvid Harnack, while lecturing in Bascom Hall. After moving to Germany, she became a pioneer in the study of American literature and eventually a major force in the underground resistance to the Nazis.

In the end, Fish-Harnack, was the only American woman executed on the direct orders of Adolph Hitler.

Mildred Fish Harnack: Back to Berlin will air each night at 10pm from November 13 -15 on News 3.

Film Series and Conference Explores Democracy in Germany and the US

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: NAME: Elizabeth Covington, Center for German and European Studies, eecovington@wisc.edu

Madison–What is democracy? How have both Germany and America, past and present, displayed democratic ideals and practices? What limitations have they revealed? And in today’s changing physical, social, and political worlds, how has democracy surfaced, or not, through each countries’ societies and cultures?

A free film series, “Selling Democracy—Films of the Marshall Plan, 1948–1953,” (October 13–17) will feature 25 short films made in Europe after the Second World War by the Marshall Plan’s Motion Picture Section and by the Documentary Film Unit of the US Office of Military Government. This landmark series was organized by Sandra Schulberg and curated with Ed Carter of the Academy Film Archive. Films include: “Out of the Ruins,” “Help is on the Way,” and “Strength for the Free World.”

The film series is hosted by a related conference, “Cultures of Democracy? Germany and the USA at Home and Abroad,” (October 19–20, 9am–4pm, Pyle Center, 702 Langdon St.) which will further explore the above questions about democracy.

Several Programs Partner with Wisconsin Film Festival

http://www.news.wisc.edu/13580.html

WISCAPE Series Examines Global University

“Re-imagining the University in the Global Era,” a conference in the “Ideas and Universities International Video Seminar Series, examines the assumptions underlying modern universities, the emergence of corporate universities, and the potential for internationalizing universities within the context of the knowledge economy. Sponsored by scholars at the University of Bristol (UK), the World Universities Network (WUN), the Division of International Studies, WISCAPE, the Department of Educational Policy Studies (EPS), linked by distance technology.

http://www.wiscape.wisc.edu/calendar/details.asp?id=481

Films, Speakers Examine War Reporting

Series, in conjunction with UW-Madison School of Journalism seminar, runs from February 1 through May. See Web for list and dates of speakers, films.

http://www.journalism.wisc.edu/latest/1_07Warstories.htm