Four years ago, thirteen faculty members decided to hold a Colloquium, supported by Liberal Arts and CTLE, to address the iconic Parthenon from a variety of perspectives. The program would follow the Summer Olympics in Athens, and the start of USI’s new International Studies major. Carter Hall was the only venue open for that day, though we didn’t expect more than a few faculty and students to attend. To our great surprise, Carter Hall filled all day, with a total attendance of about 2,500 students. The next year the Ram in the Thicket also drew a large crowd, then the Day of the Dead and The Gothic Imagination, which coincided with the opening of the Labyrinth on the Quad. 

When we planned the Great Wall Colloquium, which will be held on September 26, I had no idea that it would coincide with the Olympics in China. This summer David Glassman, Xinran Hu, Katie Waters, Matthew Graham and Joan Kempf de Jong went to the Great Wall in China. You will see spectacular photos by Xinran, Katie and Joan, and hear poems by Matthew about the Wall at the Colloquium. 

Following a conference at the University of Leeds, I went to Hadrian’s Wall. I had planned to walk the length of it, gathering information about Roman and British religion. Eighty miles isn’t that long, I thought. A native of Los Angeles, where a commute of that distance is not unheard of, I imagined an eighty mile long sidewalk with convenient detours into museums and cafes, and that six days would more than suffice. 

First of all, I didn’t have the right stuff. Apparently jeans and Pumas just get soggier when you’re stumbling on the steep, slippery slopes of the Whin Sill in constant rain and wind, or crouching under the ruined Wall. I needed different clothes, hiking boots, walking sticks, a compass and proper maps and the brains to use them. So instead I took the local bus, the 122, named for the year Hadrian started building the Wall, and got dropped off here and there. I was wet, but the changing light on the landscape was stunningly beautiful. At dawn one morning I found the unmarked spring of the British goddess Coventina, whose Roman votive gifts included 16,000 coins, 30 altars, rings, a bronze Scottish terrier and human skulls. Facing north, beyond the Wall, into the bleak blue Scottish lowlands, and the advancing mist, I watched a farmer and his dog round up a flock of sheep. Katie and Matthew sent me to a haunted inn on the Wall, where I met John Gibson and Leslie Roberts, who had come up from their cottage in Suffolk. We didn’t see any ghosts, if such a thing can be seen, but the place felt haunted by Roman soldiers, and by the Brigantes whose families were divided by the Wall. 

Wandering along the Wall I didn’t meet a single person with an umbrella, but I met people from all over the world who were spending a week away from their normal lives to be transported there and back again, with greater understanding of people so remote, and so like us, who were also far from home. Next week your colleagues will transport you to Great Walls and Other Barriers – China, Britain, Mexico, Berlin, and the Iron Curtain. I hope that you will join us then. And to be sure, four years from now, when the Olympics open in London, we will take you there.

POST CONTRIBUTED BY: PATRICIA AAKHUS, director of International Studies.

The 2000 presidential election occurred during my first semester at USI. I can remember trying to encourage students to vote, only to be told that their vote didn’t make a difference. I responded by giving numerous examples of how one vote mattered:

• In 1645 one vote gave Oliver Cromwell control of England
• In 1776 one vote gave America the English language instead of German
• In 1845 one vote brought Texas into the Union
• In 1876 an Indiana congressman (who had been elected by a one-vote margin) cast the winning vote for Rutherford B. Hayes when that year’s Presidential election was thrown into the House
• In 1923 Adolf Hitler became leader of the Nazi Party by one vote
• In 1960 John F. Kennedy’s margin of victory over Richard Nixon was less than one vote per precinct

Still, I generated little student interest as most in my classes said they probably wouldn’t show up at the polls. The next day, though, I had one of those almost perfect learning moments when students came back to class with questions and comments and proof that votes do matter. The 2000 election still sparks conversation and debate with references to hanging chads and recount battles.

In 2004, people seemed more interested in the election, perhaps if only to see if new procedures would prevent a repeat of 2000. USI became more aware of the need to encourage students to become citizens active in public life, so the University initiated a voter registration drive. A joint effort by students, faculty, administrators, and staff succeeded by registering nearly 1,000 voters and caused voter registration to be incorporated in to new student orientation.

For the 2008 election, the University is going a step farther. Recognizing that democracy works not just by voting, the University is providing an additional way for people to get involved in the political process. In an era of a widening partisan divide and public disenchantment with politics and political leaders, we have created an opportunity to come together and learn how the political system works and what our candidates represent. Debate-A-Palooza is a nonpartisan voter education program that brings citizens together to watch a televised debate and talk about what they learned. As part of a national DebateWatch program sponsored by the Commission for Presidential Debates and the National Communication Association, Debate-A-Palooza taps into the University’s mission to create better-informed citizens who live wisely and are responsive to community needs. Debate-A-Palooza serves to assemble people for public conversation, and help us think of ourselves as united in voice rather than alienated and disenchanted.

Debate-A-Palooza will be held on Friday, September 26, on the USI Quad (the Health Professions Center if rains). The event begins at 6 p.m. with music by Deaf Megan.  From 6-7.30 p.m. students in the Communication Club and Communication Studies Program will register people for the event and distribute food tickets. Although the event is free and open to the public, registration is necessary to create the small discussion groups for the post-debate activity. The televised debate will be shown on super-sized screens from 8 to 9.30 p.m. After the debate, student facilitators will lead a short discussion about the debate and the event. The event is sponsored by the Communication Club and APB with support from Academic Affairs, the RISC Grant Program, University Core Curriculum, and the USI Bookstore.

POST CONTRIBUTED BY: LEIGH ANNE HOWARD, associate professor and coordinator of Communication Studies