How Star Trek Changed the World and Why it Still Matters
Tuesday, September 28
7 pm
Learn how Star Trek has remained relevant for more than 55 years. Amy H. Sturgis will discuss the ways Star Trek has changed science fiction and popular culture, and created global fan participation.
Sturgis earned her PhD. in intellectual history from Vanderbilt University and specializes in science fiction/fantasy/gothic and indigenous American studies. She serves as a contributing staff member for the Hugo Award-winning StarShipSofa podcast. Sturgis is the editor-in-chief of Hocus Pocus Comics. She is a faculty member at Lenoir-Rhyne University and Signum University, where she teaches undergraduate and graduate classes on Star Trek, Star Wars, and other historical and popular culture topics. Sturgis is also the author of four books and the editor of six others, and she has more than 60 published essays to her credit, including multiple works on Star Trek. She lives with her husband in the Appalachian Highlands of Virginia. Her official website is amyhsturgis.com.
You must register for this event to receive the link to the WebEx virtual lecture.
Ray Harryhausen: Myth in Motion
Tuesday, October 12
7 pm
Professor Dan Curley will discuss special effects master Ray Harryhausen, renowned for Dynamation, his brand of stop-motion animation, which he used to bring fantastic creatures to life.
Curley will highlight Harryhausen’s two films set in ancient Greece: Jason and the Argonauts (1963) and Clash of the Titans (1981). How does Harryhausen’s whimsical approach lend itself to making modern myth? And how are his techniques still applied on 21st-century screens?
Curley is associate professor of classics at Skidmore College (Saratoga Springs, NY). His teaching and research involve Greek and Roman poetry and the classical world in screen media. He is also the vice president of Antiquity in Media Studies (AIMS), a not-for-profit educational society focused on modern receptions of the ancient world.
You must register for this event to receive the link to the WebEx virtual lecture.