Come curious. Leave inspired.

The UW offers an exciting lineup of in-person and online events. From thought-provoking art and music to conversations on culture, history, and science, the UW community invites you to explore, learn, and connect across disciplines throughout the University. And you don’t have to wait until November: Take a look at everything still happening in October.

Go directly to the week you’d like to view:

• Week 1: November 2 – 8
• Week 2: November 9 – 15
• Week 3: November 16 – 22
• Week 4: November 23 – 29
• Week 5: November 30 – December 6

to receive a monthly notice when the ArtSci Roundup has been published.

ArtSci On Your Own Time:

Closing November 7 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
The annual fall MFA show mediates on accumulation, the underground, labor & capacity, and the movement of systems and objects toward loss, disrepair, and failure. Spanning performance, installation, sound art, and found object sculpture, see the works of Jayden Dukes, Gaeun Kim, Cameron McGaff, and Skye Amber O’Brien. Free.

Opening November 7 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
This exhibition focuses on the biodiversity and global importance of Earth’s largest terrestrial ecosystem and the last intact forest on Earth. See, hear, and feel the forest through stunning photography, interactive displays, commissioned artworks, first-person stories, and Burke Museum collections. Learn about stories of resilience, strength, and hope in a changing world. Presented in English and Spanish, the exhibition gives voice to the boreal through the words of Indigenous community members, scientists, conservationists, artists, and writers. It shares how knowing nature can offer a vision for a sustainable future.

(Biology)
Wednesdays, noon to 4 pm / 2nd and 4th Saturdays, 10 am – 2 pm
For nearly 70 years, the Biology Greenhouse at the 黑料老司机 has played a vital role in research and teaching. Whether focusing on plant-pollinator interactions, paleoclimatology, or other biological questions, the teaching collection has enhanced and inspired UW biological research. Visit the 4 Collection rooms and browse through an amazing diversity of plant species from around the world. Free.

Book Club | A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende (UW Alumni Association)
Readers’ Choice! In the late 1930s, civil war grips Spain. Hundreds of thousands flee to France, including a wounded army doctor and his brother’s widow. The two team up to seek refuge in Chile as Europe erupts in war — but life in exile comes with its own dangerous challenges. UW Alumni Book Club invites all curious readers to dig into personal stories, timely topics, and transformative fiction.? Free.

Week 1: November 2 – 8

November 2 | (Chemistry)
Ram Seshadri is the Fred and Linda R. Wudl Professor of Materials Science and has served as the Director of the Materials Research Laboratory: A National Science Foundation Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (NSF-MRSEC) since 2015. He recently took on the additional role of associate dean for research in the College of Engineering. His research contributions are embodied in 450+ journal publications, and broadly address the topic of structure–composition–property relations in functional, crystalline inorganic, and hybrid materials. Ram is the editor of Annual Reviews of Materials Research and is a lead editor of Physical Review Materials. Free.

Virtual option – November 2 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
What do negotiations to end the war in Iran look like to those at the table? What role might the United Nations or Gulf States play in ending the violence in Gaza or Lebanon? Is there hope for diplomacy with Russia? Join us for a moderated conversation and Q&A with UW graduate and diplomat Dr. Mohamed Al-Hassan. With extensive experience navigating the US / Iran relationship; representing Oman at the United Nations and serving as the UN representative in Iraq; and leading Oman’s diplomatic mission to Russia, Dr. Al-Hassan brings an insider’s perspective on some of the most difficult diplomatic challenges of the day. Free.

Virtual – November 3 | ?(Jackson School of International Studies)
Helen Hardacre is Reischauer Institute Research Professor of Japanese Religions and Society, Harvard University. Her publications include The Religion of Japan’s Korean Minority (1984), Lay Buddhism in Contemporary Japan: Reiyukai Kyodan (1984), Kurozumikyo and the New Religions of Japan (1986), Shinto and the State, 1868-1988 (1989), Marketing the Menacing Fetus in Japan (1997), Religion and Society in Nineteenth-Century Japan (2002), Shinto, A History (2016), Constitutional Revision and Civic Activism in Japan (lead editor and contributor, 2021), and Shinto Shrines in Prewar and Wartime Japan (2025). Her current research concerns Shinto shrines in prewar and wartime Japan. She earned her Ph.D. from the Divinity School at the University of Chicago in History of Religions in 1980. Among her academic awards since 2000 are the following: John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellow (2003-04), Walter Channing Cabot Fellow (Harvard University, 2017), and Order of the Rising Sun (2018). Free.

November 4 | (School of Music)
A free lunchtime performance featuring UW School of Music students in the North Allen Library lobby. Presented in partnership with UW Libraries. Free.

November 5 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Admission to the Burke Museum is FREE and the museum is open until 8 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month. Get closer to the daily work happening in the Burke Museum’s visible collections storage, labs and workrooms during Free First Thursday. Free.

November 5 – 7 | ?(Digital Arts & Experimental Media)
DXFEST, a three-day festival showcasing artworks and music by artists in the DXARTS program, opens at Gallery 4Culture with a lecture-performance by Afroditi Psarra as part of her exhibition Pythia Embodied. The festival moves to Meany Center for the Performing Arts, where there will be a digital art exhibition and electronic music performances. The music works will be presented using the DXARTS Ambisonics Audio System, a state-of-the-art multi-channel system designed to provide immersive spatial audio experiences. Artworks by DXARTS artists will be on display in the theater’s lobby prior to the concerts and during intermissions. Free.

November 5 – 15 | ?(School of Drama)
Phèdre is a queen and a mother who has been cursed by the Gods. She receives news that the king, Theseus, is dead. Encouraged by her lady-in-waiting, Oenone, and fueled by her own feelings Phèdre confesses to the King’s son and heir, Hippolytus that she is in love with him. Soon after, King Theseus returns, alive and well, setting off a series of unforeseen consequences.

November 6 | (Cinema & Media Studies)
Join the Henry Art Gallery for a special screening of short films made by students in the Department of Cinema & Media Studies. Spanning a wide range of genres, including documentaries, comedies, dramas, and music videos, get an exclusive glimpse into the work of this emerging cohort of filmmakers. After the screening, stick around to meet the filmmakers and faculty guiding Cinema & Media Studies students’ creative projects and research. Free.

November 6 | ?(Classics)
Presented by Verity Platt (Cornell). Free.

Opening November 7 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
This exhibition focuses on the biodiversity and global importance of Earth’s largest terrestrial ecosystem and the last intact forest on Earth. See, hear, and feel the forest through stunning photography, interactive displays, commissioned artworks, first-person stories, and Burke Museum collections. Learn about stories of resilience, strength, and hope in a changing world. Presented in English and Spanish, the exhibition gives voice to the boreal through the words of Indigenous community members, scientists, conservationists, artists, and writers. It shares how knowing nature can offer a vision for a sustainable future.

Week 2: November 9 – 15

November 9 | ?(School of Music)
Seattle Modern Orchestra’s (SMO’s) 黑料老司机 residency celebrates the legacies of longtime former School of Music professors and West Coast luminaries Stuart Dempster (b. 1936) and William O. Smith (1926-2020) with “90/100, Celebrating Stuart Dempster, William O. Smith, and West Coast Experimentalism.” Curated by longtime SMO clarinetist Rachel Yoder, the evening integrates elements of improvisation, deep listening, and playfully creative movement while rebooting elements of the composer/performer duo’s historic antics.

November 10 | (Clean Energy Institute)
A symposium on innovative technologies, strategies, and partnerships to accelerate a scalable and equitable clean energy future in Washington and beyond, featuring UW President Jones, former WA Gov. Jay Inslee, former U.S. Cabinet members Ernest Moniz and Sally Jewell, David Baker, and world-leading clean energy/materials researchers.

November 10 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
Indonesian pianist Janice Carissa, a Gilmore Young Artist and Salon de Virtuosi recipient, is celebrated for crafting vivid musical narratives that transcend mere virtuosity. Her program spans centuries and styles, opening with Bach’s elegant French Suite No. 5 in G Major, moving to Granados’ passionate Goyescas, “El Amor y la muerte,” and Ravel’s darkly glittering La valse. The evening also features works by Olivier Messiaen and Indonesian composer Eunike Tanzil, showcasing Carissa’s expressive nuance, lyrical sensitivity and command of both classical and contemporary repertoire.

Virtual – November 12 | ?(Simpson Center for the Humanities)
Safia Aidid is an interdisciplinary historian of modern Africa and Assistant Professor in the Department of History and the African Studies Centre at University of Toronto. She holds a PhD from Harvard University. Her research addresses anticolonial nationalism, territorial imaginations, borders, and state formation in the Horn of Africa, with a particular focus on modern Somalia and Ethiopia. She is currently working on a book manuscript entitled “Pan-Somali Dreams: Ethiopia, Greater Somalia, and the Somali Nationalist Imagination.” Free.

November 13 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
Isata Kanneh-Mason joins artistic forces with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, celebrated for its trademark conductor-less precision and collective spirit. The award-winning pianist from the renowned Kanneh-Mason family and the Grammy Award-winning orchestra present a program of favorites by Mozart and Haydn with Suites No. 1 and No. 3 from Handel’s Water Music and a newly commissioned work by Katie Jenkins, performed with the mindset of a collaborative chamber ensemble.

November 14 | ?(Henry Art Gallery)
James Turrell’s Light Reign is glowing again—and you’re invited to celebrate! After an extensive restoration, the Henry’s beloved Skyspace has been transformed with a new lighting system that brings renewed brilliance to this extraordinary work by one of the world’s most celebrated artists. Watch as the Skyspace’s exterior comes alive with light at dusk, illuminating the Henry in a spectacular display. Then step inside to experience the atmospheric interior as light and color create an environment unlike any other.?Free.

November 15 | ?(Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Engage with professional archaeologists and researchers as they share their work. Learn about ancient technologies and local cultural heritage, try your hand at sorting artifacts, watch a flintknapping demonstration (that’s stone tool making!), and more.

Through November 15 | ?(School of Drama)
Phèdre is a queen and a mother who has been cursed by the Gods. She receives news that the king, Theseus, is dead. Encouraged by her lady-in-waiting, Oenone, and fueled by her own feelings Phèdre confesses to the King’s son and heir, Hippolytus that she is in love with him. Soon after, King Theseus returns, alive and well, setting off a series of unforeseen consequences.

Week 3: November 16 – 22

November 17 | ?(Honors)
Growing concerns about the health of America’s 250-year experiment in representative democracy should prompt us to think deeply about how civic belonging has been defined in U.S. society since the nation’s founding and what current efforts to restrict access and opportunities for civic participation mean for our collective futures. Civic Belonging in an Anti-Democratic Age brings together UW faculty whose teaching and research straddle law, politics, human rights, urban studies, and digital technologies for a lively interdisciplinary conversation about the stakes of belonging in U.S. society. Join us as we examine the current moment and ask how we can work towards a more inclusive democratic future. Free.

November 17 | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
We humanists are hoping for, and many of us are fighting for, a new day in the United States when the production and circulation of knowledge are understood as keystones of democracy and of human thriving – and thus as deserving of substantial public investment. Having worked so long in the spirit of doing a lot with a little, how do we envision the humanities in conditions of abundance? What shifts in traditional academic culture and policy will help us meet those conditions? In the spirit of Octavia Butler’s future-oriented thinking, this talk draws together many threads of contemporary thinking to sketch a future where American universities center the values and practices of liberal arts-grounded humanistic inquiry. Free.

November 17 | (History)
The Pre-Modern World History Lecture: Dr. Nore?a sketches the contours of the “new” global antiquity and argues that this rapidly emerging field can and should be fully global in its coverage and institutional organization. In this lecture, he explores how we might bring both Africa and the Americas into an agenda for a global antiquity that has been limited, for the most part, to Eurasia, and considers some of the main challenges for this field, both epistemological and practical. Free.

November 17 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
This year-long program series honors the gallery’s commitment to social justice and to gather the community to think about the work of liberation through shared texts, art, film, music, conversation, and workshops. Each month, the club will approach the topic of liberation from several perspectives. Unlike your traditional book club, all the reading and study happens together, and preparation is not required. Come ready to attend a workshop, engage with a piece of art, or chat over a shared meal. Free.

November 18 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Details coming. Free.

Virtual – November 18 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
In this presentation, Jennfier Angaiak Wood will discuss her Yup’ik ancestry, give an overview of Yup’ik artistic tradition, and share examples of how she incorporates historic design elements into her contemporary artworks. Free.

November 18 – 19 | Jazz Infusions – / ?(School of Music)
UW Jazz Studies students perform in small combos over two consecutive nights of original tunes, homage to the greats of jazz, and experiments in composing and arranging. Free.

Virtual option – November 18 |? ? (Jackson School of International Studies)
In this talk, Joanne Leow traces the process of writing and publishing her hybrid memoir Exhumations: In the Body of a Petrostate. By following the trajectory that her writing took from online writing to print journal to bound book, she considers what it means to publish work about Singapore while in the diaspora. Exhumations oscillates between socio-political and cultural analysis and a memoir of grief and illness. Seeing our porous bodies as part of a contaminated and compromised system based on extraction, violence, and political repression, her work asks what must be made visible in our current moment. In doing so, she draws from her time as a journalist for state media, her positionality as a “quitter,” and her current work as a scholar based in Canada. These intersecting experiences have allowed her to explore histories of activism, censorship, weapons manufacturing, terraforming, and petroleum refining in Singapore. Free.

November 19 | (Henry Art Gallery)
Artist Trenton Doyle Hancock discusses his varied career and current projects. Inspired by the world-building of comics, Hancock’s work iterates over time through the investigation of character, story, and symbols. Co-presented with the UW School of Art + Art History + Design, Hancock will address his use of popular culture, narrative, and autobiography to subvert cultural tropes and national mythologies. A Q&A with the audience will follow the talk. Free.

November 19 | ?(Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Each month, hear from Burke staff about a book they recommend. Read the book ahead of time, or join to learn more about the selection. Free.

November 19 | ?(American Indian Studies)
Readings by Simon Ortiz and Sara Marie Ortiz, followed by audience Q&A. Storytelling offers a spiritual connection, a sharing of sacred breath. Literature, similarly, preserves human experience and ideals. Both forms are durable and transmit power that teaches us how to live. Both storytelling and reading aloud can impact audiences through the power of presence, allowing for the experience of the transfer of sacred breath as audiences are immersed in the experience of being inside stories and works of literature. Free.

November 19 | ?(Geography)
Alums share how their degrees in geography have shaped careers in climate risk, procurement, and user experience design. Featuring Derek Huling (Program Analyst, FEMA), Krystle Jumarawan (Geospatial Specialist II, Woven by Toyota), and Helen Elizabeth Olsen (Deputy Director, The Gates Foundation). Moderated by Professor Sarah Elwood. Free.

November 19 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
This talk examines the historical political divergence between China and Europe. While both regions experienced repeated shifts in territorial unification, political stability, and institutional development in earlier periods, from the medieval period onward, their trajectories increasingly diverged. Europe gradually evolved toward a polycentric political order, while China consolidated into a centralized and authoritarian state. This talk proposes the development of China’s imperial civil service examination system as a key driver of this divergence. Drawing on a synthesis of several recent works, it approaches the question from three complementary perspectives: macro-level patterns of political development, micro-level quantitative evidence on bureaucratic recruitment, and formal theories of political equilibrium and institutional change. Free.

November 19 | (School of Music)
Celebrated Russian pianist Mikhail Voskresensky leads a master class with UW piano students. Free.

November 20 | (Classics)
Eight years after demonstrators in Charlottesville, Virginia, chanted “Jews will not replace us!” at a rally whose promotional poster featured the acronym SPQR and where one group of activists carried shields emblazoned with images of the Roman fasces, most Classical scholars are aware that white nationalists and other hateful actors take inspiration from Greco-Roman antiquity. There is less consensus, however, about what this phenomenon means for those of us who research and teach about the ancient Greco-Roman world. In this lecture, Curtis Dozier, author of The White Pedestal: How White Nationalists Use Ancient Greece and Rome to Justify Hate (Yale University Press, 2026), draws on his ten years’ experience documenting appropriations of Greco-Roman antiquity by hate groups to bring into focus what white nationalist classicism reveals about the material we study, our discipline, our nation, and ourselves. Free.

November 19 – 21 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
Taiwan’s Hung Dance makes its Seattle debut with BIRDY, a powerful and poetic work choreographed by the company’s founder and artistic director Lai Hung-Chung. Performed by eight dancers, the piece blends contemporary dance with elements of Chinese opera, Tai Chi and myth. Using striking props like rattan poles and flowing pheasant feathers (Ling Zi), BIRDY explores the tension between freedom and constraint, personal feeling and social pressure. The movement is bold, fluid and deeply human. BIRDY invites audiences to reflect on the desire to break free, and the quiet strength it takes to keep moving within the world around us.

November 22 | (School of Music)
UW music students perform music from the Baroque era under the direction of Tekla Cunningham. Free.

Week 4: November 23 – 29

November 24 | (School of Music)
UW voice students of Thomas Harper and Carrie Shaw perform works from the vocal repertoire. Free.

Week 5: November 30 – December 6

December 1 | (School of Music)
The UW Percussion Ensemble (Bonnie Whiting, director) performs contemporary music arranged for percussion ensembles.

December 2 | ?(Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
Celebrate the season with the legendary Michael Feinstein in a festive evening of song and storytelling. A champion of the Great American Songbook, Feinstein brings signature warmth, wit and impeccable style to beloved holiday classics and timeless standards. Backed by lush arrangements, he delivers an elegant, nostalgic journey filled with heart and swing. This joyful concert promises an unforgettable night celebrating the magic, romance, and spirit of the holidays.

December 2 | ?(School of Music)
The Studio Jazz Ensemble (Jacob Zimmerman, director) performs big band arrangements and repertory selections. The Modern Band (Cuong Vu, director) performs innovative arrangements of jazz standards, selections from the outer limits of the genre, and new original compositions.

December 2 | (School of Music)
A free lunchtime performance featuring UW School of Music students in the North Allen Library lobby. Presented in partnership with UW Libraries. Free.

December 3 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Admission to the Burke Museum is FREE and the museum is open until 8 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month. Get closer to the daily work happening in the Burke Museum’s visible collections storage, labs and workrooms during Free First Thursday. Free.

December 3 | (School of Music)
The Campus Band (Joshua Michael Smith, conductor) and Concert Band (Yuman Wu, conductor) present “Song and Dance,” performing music by Leonard Bernstein, James Barnes, Frank Ticheli and others.

December 3 | (School of Music)
UW keyboard students perform from the piano repertoire in the quarterly Brechemin Piano Series concerts. Free.

December 4 | (School of Music)
The UW’s top auditioned choirs present modern vocal works, music from around the globe, and great works from the sacred repertoire in shared quarterly concerts showcasing each group’s most recent work.

December 5 | (School of Music)
The Modern Music Ensemble (Cristina Valdés, director) presents works of our time in several concerts each year. Including repertoire from the early to mid-20th century and beyond, the group focuses on small ensemble and chamber orchestra works, performed by both undergraduate and graduate students. Free.

The ArtSci Roundup

The ArtSci Roundup is your guide to connecting with the UW—whether in person, on campus, or on your couch.

Those who receive monthly emails, with timely updates and engaging content wherever you are. Check the roundup regularly, as events are added throughout the month. Check out the ArtSci On Your Own Time section for everything from podcasts to videos to exhibitions that can be enjoyed when it works for you!

Do you have an event that you would like to see featured in the ArtSci Roundup? Connect with Lauren Zondag (zondagld@uw.edu).

Source

The 黑料老司机 today broke ground on a $231.1-million Chemical Sciences Building. Once completed, the state-of-the-art facility will be a nexus for collaborative research and teaching that will help the UW define the next 100 years of science education and breakthroughs.

Recognized worldwide, the UW’s Department of Chemistry is one of the largest in the country, and faculty are leaders in the field. The new Chemical Science Building will provide research synergies and dynamic, active learning spaces.

“The Chemical Sciences Building will be more than a new facility. It is an investment in the students, faculty and researchers whose curiosity and collaboration drive discovery. We are deeply grateful to the donors, state leaders and supporters who are making this investment possible,” said UW President Robert J. Jones. “The work that happens here will help advance science, strengthen our state and improve lives for generations to come.”

The Chemical Sciences Building opens additional pathways for workforce development, industry collaboration and academic excellence in Washington. Updating facilities also helps the UW attract and retain top-notch students and scientists, further fueling the state’s economy and renown.

“Washington’s economy is built on innovation,” Gov. Bob Ferguson said. “Maintaining our leadership requires a reliable pipeline of skilled, highly educated workers. We’re proud to be an investor in this state-of-the-art new building. It’s an investment in our students, and Washington’s economic vitality.”

Funding for the project is led by the State of Washington, the College of Arts & Sciences and private support. The 104,500-square foot, five-story building will be constructed on the former site of the Chemistry Library Building behind the Molecular Engineering and Nanoengineering buildings on West Stevens Way NE. New classrooms and laboratories in the Chemistry Sciences Building will allow the UW to complete a renovation and update of Bagley Hall, the 1937 structure that’s long housed the Department of Chemistry.

“This new building will be a catalyst for both the Department of Chemistry’s and the College’s collaborative work that addresses some of the most pressing and complex challenges of our time,” said Daryl Maeda, the Katherine and John Simpson Endowed Dean of the College of Arts & Sciences. “Researchers will push the boundaries of chemistry further than ever before, partnering with students in spaces designed for creativity and connection. Our students will benefit from a world-class education and research opportunities that set them up for success and impact after graduation.”

The Chemical Sciences Building will:

• Expand student opportunity by providing hands-on research labs and connecting classroom learning with scientific discovery. Students will work alongside faculty, gain experience with modern tools and prepare for high-demand careers across Washington and beyond.
• Enhance collaboration by bringing research groups together and giving them the newest and best tools to do their jobs, spark new ideas and accelerate solutions.
• Create paths to discovery. Flexible, state-of-the-art laboratories will remove barriers posed by aging facilities and support work in sustainable chemistry, human health, advanced materials, quantum science and more.

The design-build team is Skanska and Payette+EHDD. Completion is scheduled for 2029.

For more information, contact Lance Kissler at lkissler@uw.edu.

Source

It’s not unusual for students to ask why he’s so dressed up for class, but his answer often takes them by surprise.

Goldman, a teaching professor of chemistry at the 黑料老司机, often goes directly from work to meetings for his other position: for Lake Forest Park, a suburb of Seattle. He’s been a council member since 2022 and is currently serving his second term, which runs through 2029.

Science came naturally to Goldman. He decided to major in chemistry during an Advanced Placement class in high school and chose to teach as a postdoctoral scholar, but his venture into civics was “more serendipitous.” When a friend on the council first approached him with the idea in April 2021, Goldman all but scoffed.

“That’s not my personality,” he said. “I’m not the most gregarious person. I tend to be much more analytical, so I wouldn’t have envisioned myself being a politician. I also think there is a stereotype that you have to have studied political science or you have to be a lawyer to be in politics. I’m a chemistry teacher.”

But Goldman’s friend insisted he only needed to be passionate about the community to be an effective council member. A month later, he decided to run. In order to run for office in Lake Forest Park, a person must only be a registered voter of the city and have lived there at least one year.

“I think my friend was completely correct in that each council member brings a different scope,” Goldman said. “I really took that to heart. Some people are more experienced in land use while others know construction design or finances or can analyze data.”

Lake Forest Park covers an area of 3.4 miles in King County. The city has an estimated population of 13,630 as of the 2020 Census. More than 18% of the population is aged 65 and over, while 21% of the population is 21 and under.

Goldman’s focus is on environmental issues and public transit. Lake Forest Park tends to be car-centric, Goldman said, so his goal is to make it easier for people to bike or walk to transit.? He doesn’t own a car, so he commutes to work at the UW by bus.?

“There is no reason to be pigeonholed,” Goldman said. “There is no reason for people to think, ‘Oh, I’m in science and you’re in politics and those two things are totally separate.’ Scientific literacy is critical for the general population.”

Goldman has also found overlap in the skills he uses for his two roles. While professors teach individually, they collaborate on topics like course ideas, textbooks and changing the curriculum.

“A lot of the decisions in the chemistry department are made through mutual consensus,” Goldman said. “I bring that mindset to the city council. There will be some disagreements, but it’s the same process of: Where does everyone start from? What are we already in agreement on? What do we need to reach an agreement?”

Sitting on the council has also given Goldman a more complete understanding of what it takes to manage a budget, which has helped him grasp the operational and capital expenses in the chemistry department and the College of Arts & Sciences.

By sharing about his path with students, Goldman hopes to illuminate career options outside the traditional chemistry track. Many graduates remain in academia or pursue pre-med or similar paths, but there is a lot of middle ground, Goldman said. Students could consider going into law or using their chemistry knowledge to become a professional consultant.

“There are a lot of alternative approaches,” Goldman said. “And having politicians who are knowledgeable about science will make any science-related legislation that much more effective. I want to encourage people not to separate science from politics.”

As for Goldman, his political ambitions end here. You won’t see him campaigning for any county or state posts.

“You wouldn’t be the first person to ask,” Goldman said. “Honestly, it took a bit of arm-twisting to get me to run in the first place. This is not a stepping stone. I’m happy in my own little quiet neck of the woods.”

For more information, contact Goldman at goldmanl@uw.edu.

Source

Come curious. Leave inspired.

The UW offers an exciting lineup of in-person and online events. From thought-provoking art and music to conversations on culture, history, and science, the UW community invites you to explore, learn, and connect across disciplines throughout the University.

.

Go directly to the week you’d like to view:

• Week 1: September 28 – October 4
• Week 2: October 5 – 11
• Week 3: October 12 – 18
• Week 4: October 19 – 25
• Week 5: October 26 – November 1

See all that’s to come in the November ArtSci Roundup.

ArtSci On Your Own Time:

Closing October 25 | (Henry Art Gallery)
ojo|-|o?l?? (pronounced oh-ho hol-ohn) is an exhibition of recent and newly commissioned work by Diné artist Eric-Paul Riege (b. 1994, Na’nízhoozhí [Gallup, New Mexico]) that includes sculpture, textile, collage, and video, activated by moments of performance. Across this work, Riege combines customary Diné practices of weaving, silversmithing, and beading with contemporary cultural forms, exploring Diné cosmology, the history of Euro-American trading posts in and adjacent to the Navajo Nation, and the notion of “authenticity” as a value marker of Indigenous art and craft.

(School of Art + Art History + Design)
The annual fall MFA show mediates on accumulation, the underground, labor & capacity, and the movement of systems and objects toward loss, disrepair, and failure. Spanning performance, installation, sound art, and found object sculpture, see the works of Jayden Dukes, Gaeun Kim, Cameron McGaff, and Skye Amber O’Brien. The exhibition runs from September 30 through November 7. Free.

(Biology)
Wednesdays, noon to 4 pm / 2nd and 4th Saturdays, 10 am – 2 pm
For nearly 70 years, the Biology Greenhouse at the 黑料老司机 has played a vital role in research and teaching. Whether focusing on plant-pollinator interactions, paleoclimatology, or other biological questions, the teaching collection has enhanced and inspired UW biological research. Visit the 4 Collection rooms and browse through an amazing diversity of plant species from around the world. Free.

Week 1: September 28 – October 4

September 30 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
The annual fall MFA show mediates on accumulation, the underground, labor & capacity, and the movement of systems and objects toward loss, disrepair, and failure. Spanning performance, installation, sound art, and found object sculpture, see the works of Jayden Dukes, Gaeun Kim, Cameron McGaff, and Skye Amber O’Brien. The exhibition runs from September 30 through November 7. Free.

September 30 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Authors Spencer Greening and Rachel Greening discuss their new book, Gyetk: Coastal Fusion and Ancestral Knowledge from a Ts’msyen Kitchen.?Gyetk (pronounced gy-e-tk and meaning “to feed the people”) immerses readers into the rich food traditions, knowledge, and relationships that have sustained the Ts’msyen (Tsimshian) people for millennia along the Pacific Northwest Coast. Drawing from the authors’ lived experiences practicing a land-based lifestyle, as well as their backgrounds in Indigenous food sovereignty, health and well-being, and cultural research, Gyetk weaves together modern culinary fusion, traditional knowledge, and scholarly insight. Through 60 beautifully photographed recipes, the book follows the Ts’msyen seasonal round, weaving together ancestral foodways, traditional ecological knowledge, dietetic perspectives, and thoughtful harvesting practices — inviting readers to feast in relationship with the natural world.

October 1 | ?(Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Admission to the Burke Museum is FREE, and the museum is open until 8 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month. Get closer to the daily work happening in the Burke Museum’s visible collections storage, labs, and workrooms during Free First Thursday. Free.

October 1 + October 3 | (Henry Art Gallery)
To celebrate the culmination of the exhibition, ojo|-|o?l?, join Eric-Paul Riege with guest artists Olivia Camfield and Kole Galbraith for a multi-day convening of film screenings, performances, and conversations. Inspired by the modularity of Riege’s work in which materials and motifs are re-worked and re-imagined in perpetuity, the artists will explore how history and culture are neither static nor permanent. To close the convening, join Riege, Camfield, and Galbraith as they source new meanings from the sounds, materials, and images of both the past and present, challenging high art through lo-fi means. Free.

October 2 | ?(Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
On Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday, three-time Grammy Award-winning composer Ricky Kej performs music from his acclaimed album Gandhi — Mantras of Compassion. Kej, a UN Goodwill Ambassador and recipient of India’s fourth-highest civilian award, Padma Shri, blends ancient Indian mantras with global musical traditions and contemporary orchestration. His sweeping melodies and meditative soundscapes honor Gandhi’s legacy. Featuring local performers and a youth choir, Kej invites audiences to reflect on the power of nonviolence, compassion and unity in today’s world.

Hybrid – October 2 | (Classics)
Latin poetry is defined by its relationships with poetry in other languages. It was originally constituted by its relation to Greek, and in later times has been constituted by its relation to the European vernaculars. In this bold and innovative book, distinguished Latinist Stephen Hinds explores these relationships through a series of vignettes. These explore ancient conversations between Latin and Greek verse texts, followed by modern (especially early modern) conversations between Latin and European vernacular verse texts, reflecting the linked stories of reception that make up the so-called ‘classical tradition’: conversations across language, across period, and sometimes both at the same time. The book’s range is expansive, ranging from Homer through Virgil and the Augustans to late antiquity, the Renaissance, Romanticism and on to Seamus Heaney. Free.

October 3 | Washington Warm Up at USC (UW Alumni)
The Huskies head to Southern California to take on the Trojans at Memorial Coliseum. Join the UWAA’s official pre-game party!

October 3 | (Philosophy)
In conversation with UW Political Science Professor Jamie Mayerfeld, UW Philosophy Professor Dr. Karen Emmerman will discuss her recently published book, Defending Animals, Disappointing People. Emmerman offers a ground-breaking exploration of what happens when caring deeply about animals places us in conflict with the people we love. Free.

October 4 | (School of Music)
In never leave story, percussionist Bonnie Whiting explores intersections of storytelling and experimental music, integrating text, movement, creative sonification, and technology. Act I features collaborations with dancer Jennifer Salk and ceramicist Timea Tihanyi, plus music by Jeffrey Trevi?o and field recordings of poet Alice Notley. In Act II, Whiting extends her speaking percussionist project via a new commission from composer Kevin Clark and a reimagining of a historic work by Iannis Xenakis. Tennyson’s Ulysses looks back on his life, while Aeschylus’ Kassandra looks forward: in reality, both point to the urgency of “the now.”

Week 2: October 5 – 11

October 6 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
Assistant Professor Miriam Chusid will present her ongoing research on premodern Japanese art history and visual culture, with a particular focus on Buddhist art. In thirteenth-century Japan, beliefs about life after death underwent a dramatic transformation. This era of profound political upheaval and social instability brought with it increasing anxiety around the ability to attain religious salvation, an event dependent on dying with sole focus on the Buddha. Chusid’s book examines the most notable innovation to alleviate such fears: the creation of images of Buddhist hell used to benefit the dead. In this talk, Chusid uncovers the visual, ritual, and material matrix from which these depictions were given form and meaning, and demonstrates how ritual specialists employed them to address a range of postmortem concerns and expectations within increasingly diverse Buddhist communities. Chusid’s book, The Ill-Fated Afterlife: Painting the Buddhist Cosmos in Premodern Japan, is forthcoming from the 黑料老司机 Press in December 2026. Free.

October 7 | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
The American example of the end of Slavery inspired a number of social movements in India. Satyashodhak Samaj was one of them. It was a socio-cultural sect established in 1874 by Jotirao Phule and others, with a view to create a society based on the ideals of equality and justice. Engaging with the writings of Jotirao Phule, Mukta Salve, Dhondiram Kumbhar and Tarabai Shinde, the talk will try to connect the issues of discrimination based on caste and gender in the late nineteenth century Maharashtra and explore the ways in which the Satyashodhak Samaj offered to mitigate the challenges posed by the unequal social structure. Free.

October 7 | (School of Music)
Faculty pianist Cristina Valdés performs works honoring the 100th birthday of 20th century composers Betsy Jolas, Morton Feldman, and Gyorgy Kurtag. Program includes Betsy Jolas’s Signets, hommage à Maurice Ravel; Morton Feldman’s Palais de Mari; and Gyorgy Kurtag’s Eight Piano Pieces, Op. 3, as well as works by Ravel and Haydn.

Hybrid – October 8 | State of the University Address (Office of the President)
黑料老司机 President Robert J. Jones invites you to his first State of the University Address. He’ll reflect on his first year as president and share his vision and the University’s strategy for the future as it navigates the challenges and opportunities ahead. Free.

October 8 | (Jackson School)
As part of the 18th Annual Seattle Latino Film Festival, the event will feature a special screening of this powerful Indigenous-themed documentary, followed by a Q&A with members of the filmmaking team, including directors Guido Bilbao and Elio Cunampio, an Indigenous Emberá filmmaker from Panama. Free.

October 8 | ?(School of Art + Art History + Design)
Moderated by Swagato Chakravorty (The Henry Art Gallery), Dr. Jennifer Jolly (Ithaca College) and Dr. Gigi Peterson (SUNY Cortland) will be in conversation about? Mexican Muralism and Networks of Solidarity: The Struggle Against Racial Discrimination” in Seattle and Beyond. This conversation situates Pablo O Higgins’ 1945 mural, currently on display at the UW, in the larger context of mural-making and international organizing to explore the conditions and contradictions that conspired to make this form of expression a radical, if imperfect, tool for social change. Free.

October 9 | (GWSS)
The Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies welcomes the entire campus community to celebrate the start of a new academic year and greet new students. The gathering will feature the presentation of the Doman Excellence in Teaching and Alumni Awards, as well as snacks and festive community celebration. Free.

October 9 | ?(Henry Art Gallery)
Joiri Minaya presents Fabricating the Global Tropics, a talk about textiles, place, identity, and the fantasy realm for the “exotic” that extends from the Caribbean to the Pacific. This public talk is one of two keynote lectures for the 7th Triennial Conference of the Association for Latin American Art, Reclamations: The Afro-Asian-Native Turn in the Arts of Latin America, presented in conjunction with her current exhibition Joiri Minaya: To Hell With Hibiscus. Free.

Week 3: October 12 – 18

October 12 | (History)
2026 Inaugural Linda Nash Memorial Lecture: Drawing on archival research, fieldwork, Indigenous legal theory, and the natural sciences, Dr. Bathsheba Demuth’s talk examines how Indigenous, imperial, and nation-state legal traditions made law with, for, and about the Yukon River over the past two centuries—from seeing law in the actions of salmon to using laws to shape human relations with beavers. In doing so, it offers an argument for how environmental history can widen the scope of the social in ways critical to our understanding of what law is, and who it is for, in an era of climate change and species loss. Bathsheba Demuth is a writer and environmental historian focused on the lands and seas of the Russian and North American Arctic and teaches environmental history and creative nonfiction at Brown University. Free.

Hybrid – October 14 | A Conversation with Paola Ramos (Public Lectures)
Emmy Award-winning journalist, Paola Ramos, in conversation with UW Political Science faculty member Sophia Jordán Wallace, explores the evolving landscape of Latino voter engagement and political participation. This compelling discussion examines demographic shifts, policy priorities, and the critical role Latino voters play in shaping electoral outcomes across America. Free.

October 14 | (Dance)
UW Department of Dance second-year MFA candidates present their research:

• “The Edge of Comfortability: A Phenomenology of Trust and Risk in Contact Improvisation” by Jake Bone
• “Disrupting the Script: Audience Agency, Care, and the Unpredictability of Performance in Public Spaces” by Alice Gosti
• “The Straightening of Bachata: Studio-fication as (mis)Translation” by marco farroni leonardo
• “Litefeet’s Visibility Paradox: Competing Media Narratives and the Politics of Being Seen” by Jillian Amadi Roberts
• “Waacking Battles: Spaces of Translation and Transformation” by Tracey Wong

Free.

October 14 | ?(Jackson School)
Over the past four decades, China has witnessed a shift in its public sphere, transitioning from a period of flourishing to one of decline. Conversely, the realms of culture, arts, and private life have remained highly vibrant. Furthermore, the center stage of social media has shifted from intellectuals to internet celebrities. What does this mean for China’s future? Free.

October 15 | (Speech & Hearing Sciences)
Annette Estes, PhD, is the director of the 黑料老司机 Autism Center. The Center is devoted to supporting autistic individuals and their families, caregivers, and community through clinical services, research, and education. She holds the Susan and Richard Fade Endowed Chair, is a Research Professor in the Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, and an Adjunct Research Professor in the Department of Psychology at the 黑料老司机. She is also a licensed psychologist in the state of Washington. Her research is carried out at the UW Autism Center and Center on Human Development and Disability. Free.

October 15 | ?(Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
The October book club selection is The North Cascades: Finding Beauty and Renewal in the Wild Nearby by William Dietrich. The discussion will be led by Burke Museum Herbarium Collections Manager, David Giblin. Free.

October 15 | ?(Jackson School)
As “hyphenated people” (Chow 1993) and “Taiwanese new immigrants” (Robinson 2020), Chinese diasporic and Southeast Asian directors making films in Taiwan today embody a transnational dimension of Taiwan New Cinema (first wave, 1982–9; second wave, 1990–), raising questions about gender, identity, queerness, migration, mobility, and more crucially, the global structures that fund, produce, circulate, and exhibit world cinema. Their internationally co-produced and circulated films materialize these flows of capital and people, while film festivals mediate their reception and reposition Taiwan geopolitically toward Southeast Asia, renegotiating the island’s uncertain and ambiguous national identity. This talk approaches film festivals as a theoretical framework for understanding how Hou Hsiao-hsien, Tsai Ming-liang, and Midi Z came to represent Taiwan through international circulation and reception. Situating Taiwan New Cinema within this exhibition context, Beth Tsai also considers its persistent feminist caliber within the nation’s cultural imaginary and slow-cinema aesthetics, focusing on female fl?neurs in Hou’s city films as a case study. Free.

October 15 | (Jackson School / Cinema & Media Studies)
The film follows a group of restless young men who leave their fishing village on the Penghu Islands for the port city of Kaohsiung, where new encounters with work, urban life, friendship, and desire mark their passage into adulthood. Through its attention to everyday rhythms, place, and the changing social landscape of 1980s Taiwan, The Boys from Fengkuei anticipates the cinematic style that would make Hou one of Taiwan’s most influential filmmakers. The screening will be followed by a Q&A and discussion with Beth Tsai (Film & Media Studies, Hunter College, CUNY) and James Tweedie (Cinema & Media Studies, 黑料老司机), exploring the film’s place in Hou’s career, Taiwan New Cinema, the histories and environments that shape its coming-of-age story, and how the film continues to speak to audiences today. Free.

October 15 | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
Writing is a relational practice. Like teaching, writing is central to our lives as educators, artists, and university workers. And like teaching, we rarely engage one another on what we are doing when we are writing. As such, writing can be underestimated as a practice, and overlooked as a form of relation. Writing can be a way of knowing, a visitation, a keeping, and a keeping away. Following her lecture, Eve Tuck will be joined by UW professor Dian Million (Tanana Athabascan) for a conversation on writing as one way we attend to our many relations of care and responsibility to communities, to lands and waters, and to one another. Free.

October 15 – 17 | (Scandinavian Studies)
ASTRA/NORTANA/DANA unified symposium explores how archives shape culture, memory, and citizenship, and can be used as a powerful pedagogical tool to help students engage with language and culture. Authors, archivists, and fellow teachers from both sides of the Atlantic will present and lead workshops on why the archives matter more than ever and how we can use them in our teaching and research. Free.

October 16 | (Physics)
Dr. Stephon Alexander (Brown University) revisits the deep interconnection between music and the evolution of astrophysics and cosmology. We explore new ways in which music, particularly jazz, mirrors ideas in modern physics, including quantum mechanics, general relativity, and the physics of the early universe. Finally, we discuss how innovations in physics have been, and may continue to be, inspired by the kind of “improvisational logic” exemplified in jazz performance and practice. Free.

October 16 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
The Arditti Quartet enjoys a worldwide reputation for its spirited and technically refined interpretations of contemporary and 20th-century music. Since its founding in 1974 by violinist Irvine Arditti, the Quartet has inspired hundreds of composers to write groundbreaking works specifically for the ensemble, shaping how this music is heard and played. As explorers of cutting-edge string quartet music, their Meany debut features selections from the wide collection of the Quartet’s repertoire.

October 16 | ?(School of Music)
Following the Quartet’s Oct. 16 Meany Center appearance, the quartet premieres UW School of Music director and faculty composer Jo?l-Francois Durand’s String Quartet No. 4, a new work written for the group for this performance, as well as pieces by James Clarke and Brian Ferneyhough. Free.

October 18 | Alaska Airlines Dawg Dash (UW Alumni)
Hit the road, Huskies! Lace up your sneakers and soak in the fall campus beauty at our annual 10K run and 5K run/walk in support of students. All Dawgs (and dogs) are invited. UWAA members save on registration! From race start to the Post-Dash Bash finish, it’s a day of fun for the whole Husky pack.

Week 4: October 19 – 25

October 19 | (Jackson School)
A journey through the evolution of Peruvian tropical music, beginning in 1950s Lima, when large orchestras embraced Cuban music and mambo, and continuing through the 1960s, when cumbia emerged alongside and competed with Afro-Caribbean sounds. By the end of that decade, cumbia had become the leading genre of Peruvian tropical music, giving rise to Peruvian cumbia. The story continues in the 1970s, as tropical music spread across the country before returning to Lima, bringing diverse regional sounds into the capital’s recording studios. In the 1980s, the growing influence of Andean music gave rise to the term “chicha.” The genre evolved through Peru’s sociopolitical and economic crisis of the 1990s, the rise of tecnocumbia and northern cumbia, and a chicha revival that began in the late 2000s and continues today. The presentation combines active listening to chicha music with an exhibition of neon chicha posters, tracing the musical and visual evolution of this influential Peruvian genre. Free.

October 19 | (Jackson School)
Is Zionism a movement of national liberation or a story of colonialism and dispossession? Most public debate insists it has to be one or the other. This talk makes the case that it’s both, and that treating it as an either/or question gets in the way of actually understanding Zionism’s history, its current crisis, and its possible futures. Drawing on history that ranges from French Algeria to the broader question of Jewish nationalism, this talk will ask whether Zionism should be seen as an exceptional case or as part of larger histories of liberation, nationalism, and colonialism since the late 19th century. By reframing Zionism in a series of wider contexts, the talk clarifies the stakes of the existential choices currently facing Israel and Palestine. The talk also offers a preview of speaker Ethan Katz’s current book project, “Unsettling Histories: Zionism and Colonialism Reconsidered,” forthcoming from Princeton University Press. Free.

October 19 | (Statistics)
The 2026 Blackwell Seminar is presented by Stephanie Cook, Associate Professor in the Departments of Social and Behavioral Sciences and Biostatistics and New York University James Weldon Johnson Professor, New York University. The Blackwell Seminar was established in 2020 to honor the contributions of David Blackwell to mathematical statistics, game theory, probability theory, and information theory. The Blackwell Seminar focuses on topics at the interface between statistics and equity issues such as racial disparities, social justice, and ethics. Speakers are invited based on their contributions to these areas. Free.

October 20 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
Bruce Liu has emerged as one of the most compelling pianists of his generation since winning the 18th International Chopin Piano Competition in 2021. He is praised not only for his dazzling technique but also for his curiosity and artistry, which combine “nimble versatility” (The New York Times) with “playing of breathtaking beauty” (BBC Music Magazine).

Online – October 20 | (Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies)
The Bridge’s Center presents the findings from their research project, “Rights on the Line: Policy and Regulatory Gaps Affecting Migrant Fishers in Washington State Ports.” Free.

October 21 | (Chemistry)
Professor Emeritus Ned Sibert (University of Wisconsin, Madison) presents “Exploring the CH Stretch Spectral Region with Local Mode Hamiltonians.” Free.

October 21 | (College of the Environment)
Conservation has always been about more than protecting species and ecosystems—it is about our relationship with the living world. Drawing on lessons from The Nature Record, the first independent national assessment of nature in the United States, Phil Levin, professor and director of the UW School of Marine and Environmental Affairs and director of The Nature Record, reflects on what four years of scientific synthesis revealed about stewardship, resilience and responsibility. Blending personal stories, ecological science and reflections from ancient wisdom and contemporary literature, this talk explores why nature matters not only for biodiversity but also for our shared future. At a moment of rapid environmental and social change, Levin considers what the evidence tells us about our relationship with nature and the choices before us.

Online – October 22 | (Classics)
Roman imperialism brought about interconnected world history. So argues the second-century historian Polybius. Beginning in the 140th Olympiad (220-216 BCE), “history became corporeal, so to speak, [hoinoei sōmatoeidē] and Italian and African affairs were woven together with those in Asia and Greece, and the direction of everything became towards one end [telos]” (1.3.4). The rise of Rome marks a historical threshold: the first truly “world” empire and a moment of unification for world history. This talk sets Polybius’ organicist claims about Roman empire in the context of Hellenistic historiography, and examines some aspects of Polybius’ reception history in later Roman historical writing. In so doing, I trace a long tradition of using corporeal metaphor to theorize the intersection of world empire and effective historiography. Free.

October 22 | (Jackson School)
Central Asia is considering a major expansion of nuclear energy. The appeal is clear: nuclear power could support economic growth, reduce reliance on imported fuel, and help meet climate goals. But the region also carries a difficult history with nuclear activity, from Soviet-era testing and mining, and faces ongoing concerns about safety, security, waste management, corruption, and geopolitical competition among major powers. This talk examines these competing pressures and what they mean for the region’s energy future. Free.

October 22 | (Jackson School)
Susan Whiting’s book advances institutional economic theory with original survey and fieldwork data by addressing two puzzles in Chinese political economy: how economic development has occurred despite insecure property rights and weak rule of law; and how the Chinese state has maintained political control amid unrest. She answers these questions by focusing on the role of illiberal law in reassigning property rights and redirecting grievances. The book reveals that, in the context of technological change, a legal system that facilitates reassignment of land rights to higher-value uses plays an important and under-theorized role in promoting economic development. This system simultaneously represses conflict and asserts legitimacy. Comparing China to post-Glorious Revolution England and contemporary India, Whiting offers a critical new argument that brings the Chinese case more directly into debates in comparative politics about the role of the state in specifying property rights and maintaining authoritarian rule. Free.

October 23 | (German Studies)
The Seattle Opera and the German Studies Department are teaming up for a German Night at the Opera for their performance of Richard Strauss’s Salome, followed by a Q&A with Professor Annegret Oehme. There will also be a to discuss the opera on Monday, October 26. Details coming.

October 23 | (Asian Languages & Literature)
From Godzilla to Pokémon, Japan is monster country. And all of Japan’s monsters have their roots in the bizarre menagerie of creatures called yokai. Noted monster scholar and yokai folklorist Zack Davisson guides you through the history behind yokai; a journey from the invisible monsters of the Heian period to the yokai catalogs of Edo. Free.

October 23 | (Philosophy)
The Annual Ethics Lecture features Linda Alcoff (Hunter College). Racism in the United States today cannot be understood in a narrow national frame. Rather, it needs to be understood in relation to the coming end of the US Empire and of Western intellectual and financial dominance, and the resulting precarity of the social contract citizens have expected in the global north. To chart this terrain, Alcoff argues that we need a historical understanding of racial formations, a focus on cultural racism, and an honest approach to the complex history of settler colonialism in this hemisphere that can be the basis of new and stronger coalitions for all working-class peoples. Free.

October 25 | (School of Music)
Members of the UW Wind Ensemble (Christopher Vongvithaymathakul, director) perform music by W.A. Mozart, Claude Arrieu, Joan Tower and others. With Yuman Wu and Joshua Michael Smith, assistant conductors. Free.

Week 5: October 26 – November 1

October 26 | (Jackson School)
Christopher Rea discusses how he and Julie M. Wang rendered an award-winning novel into English, including the process of researching a historical epic of bestial violence also filled with Malaysian vampires, Japanese demons, and Bornean bog monsters. In doing so, he offers answers to a more general question: When faced with a challenging text, how can a translator get out alive? Free.

Hybrid?– October 26 | What Feeds Us: Science, Climate, and the Future of Food with Pamela Ronald (Public Lectures)
Climate change is threatening the crops that feed us all. UC Davis geneticist Pamela Ronald reveals how her discovery of flood-tolerant rice is helping millions of farmers adapt — and what plant science means for the future of food. Free.

October 28 | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
How did the martial artist and actor Bruce Lee vault to global stardom? In this lecture, Daryl Joji Maeda describes how transpacific contacts and migrations created the world in which a singular individual encountered, absorbed, and synthesized multiple philosophical and aesthetic influences to create a hybrid form all his own. Tracing Lee’s evolution as a fighter and performer reveals how macroeconomic and geopolitical forces can manifest new forms of culture and resistance. Free.

October 28 | ?(Jackson School)
The U.S. faces more challenges in East Asia than it has seen in decades: An ascendant China that is threatening American dominance of geopolitics, economics and technology, and a nuclear North Korea that has been newly emboldened by its ties with Moscow and Beijing. Jonathan Cheng, the China bureau chief for The Wall Street Journal and the former Korea bureau chief, will talk about more than a decade reporting from on the ground in China and on the Korean peninsula, and his new book, “Korean Messiah: Kim Il Sung and the Christian Roots of North Korea’s Personality Cult.”?Free.

October 29 | (School of Music)
Dr. Stephen Price is joined by students, colleagues, and friends of the UW Organ Studies program in this concert of spooky organ classics and Halloween fun. Free.

October 29 | (Jackson School)
Tadashi Ishikawa introduces Geographies of Gender, which examines the fringes of family and marriage in imperial Japan and colonial Taiwan in the 1910s through the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937. The talk focuses on daughter adoption as one of the boundaries of family and marriage under study. As elite and ordinary Japanese and Taiwanese men and women exchanged competing social norms and ideals in colonial and anticolonial spaces, daughter adoption became a point of negotiation in the colonial courtroom. Those processes, his book argues, ultimately redefined the Japanese empire along gender lines. As the colony of Japan as a non-Western empire during the interwar era, Taiwan showed both the possibility of progress and its repeated gendered contradictions among both colonizer and colonized, suggesting that it is a promising object of historical research not only as spatially open, but as temporally circular. Free.

October 30 | ?(Simpson Center for the Humanities)
Spot Reservation, Swinomish artist Daniel R. Smith’s newest participatory public art project, is a free event he describes as an “Indigenous, celebratory occupation of the 黑料老司机.” Taking place the day before Halloween, Friday, October 30, from 11:00am – 3:00pm, the project transforms the lower level of the Padelford Parking Garage into an unexpected gathering place centered around participatory art making in a tiny forest, or “nanoforest,” of native plants growing from industrial oil barrels. Featuring photo portraits with costumes and wearable taxidermy in a tiny post-apocalyptic forest, fry bread tacos, live birds of prey demonstrations, and an open mic; all free and open to the public.

October 30 | ?(Middle Eastern Languages & Cultures)
Nearly half a century after the Iranian Revolution, a striking paradox has emerged. Many young Iranians reject 1979 as the origin of the political order they seek to overcome, while many of the revolutionary generation have become estranged from the revolution they once made. Yet successive waves of protest, from the Green Movement to Women, Life, Freedom, have returned to the street—the quintessential space of revolutionary politics—to challenge the Islamic Republic.
In the wake of state brutality, political disappointment, and the ongoing effects of the US and Israeli wars on Iran, the present is increasingly marked by exhaustion and political impasse. This lecture asks what becomes visible when we remember 1979 before its outcome was known: when leftists, nationalists, Islamists, workers, students, intellectuals, merchants, and others occupied the same streets while imagining radically different futures. Free.

October 30 | (School of Music)
David Alexander Rahbee and the UW Symphony present “Hungarian Connections,” a program of music by Leó Weiner, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Bela Bartók. With faculty artist Pala Garcia, violin.

October 30 | ?(Classics)
Learn about recent archaeological excavations at the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Oplontis in the Bay of Naples. Through the two Roman villas found there, we encounter both unbridled luxury and the lives of working individuals.

The ArtSci Roundup

The ArtSci Roundup is your guide to connecting with the UW—whether in person, on campus, or on your couch.

Those who receive monthly emails, with timely updates and engaging content wherever you are. Check the roundup regularly, as events are added throughout the month. Check out the ArtSci On Your Own Time section for everything from podcasts to videos to exhibitions that can be enjoyed when it works for you!

Do you have an event that you would like to see featured in the ArtSci Roundup? Connect with Lauren Zondag (zondagld@uw.edu).

Source

Recent recognition of faculty and staff at the 黑料老司机 includes France’s National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), the Richard R. Ernst Prize for contributions to magnetic resonance, and a National Science Foundation CAREER award from the Division of Materials Research.

UW professor named CNRS?fellow-ambassador?

, UW professor of aquatic and fishery sciences, was welcomed into the 2026 cohort of?fellow-ambassadors by France’s National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). Active across all scientific fields for more than 80 years, CNRS is Europe’s largest fundamental research agency.?

Launched in 2023, the CNRS Fellow-Ambassador program brings internationally recognized researchers to France to foster scientific collaboration. As one of nine members selected this year, Olden joins a group that includes Nobel laureates and other globally renowned researchers, with?nearly 30?active?fellow-ambassadors.?

As part of the program, Olden will spend time in France over the next three summers, collaborating with scientists on research aimed at addressing sustainability challenges facing freshwater ecosystems.?

The opportunity closely aligns with Olden’s broader research program, which focuses on advancing the science and practice of freshwater conservation. His work spans climate change, conservation biology, invasive species, and freshwater community ecology, with an emphasis on bridging fundamental research and practical conservation challenges through quantitative approaches.?

Olden?noted?that France has long been home to some of the world’s most talented scientists.??

“The opportunity to work alongside them—exchanging ideas, tackling shared challenges in freshwater sciences and building lasting research partnerships—is something I look forward to enormously,” Olden said.?

Chemistry professor receives 2026 Richard R. Ernst Prize for contributions to magnetic resonance

, UW professor of chemistry, was one of four researchers awarded the 2026 Richard R. Ernst Prize in Magnetic Resonance, presented at the EUROMAR 2026 conference in Gothenburg, Sweden.?The?annual prize recognizes scientific achievements that expand the capabilities and impact of magnetic resonance.?

Stoll was recognized for his contributions to electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) through widely adopted computational tools and data analysis methods, particularly?EasySpin, software developed and?maintained?by Stoll and colleagues. The software has become a standard resource in magnetic resonance laboratories, allowing researchers to simulate and analyze complex EPR spectra.?

EPR experiments produce signals that scientists use to learn about the structure and behavior of molecules and materials.?EasySpin?helps researchers interpret those signals by allowing them to model what an experiment should look like under different conditions and compare those simulations with real-world data. That capability supports research ranging from understanding how the structure and movement of proteins affect their function to studying molecular systems with potential applications in quantum sensing.?

For Stoll, the award also brings attention to a part of the scientific process that can?operate?behind the scenes: developing and?maintaining?the software researchers rely on to do their work. He noted that although scientific software is essential to many research pipelines and workflows, securing federal or foundation funding for its development can be difficult.?

“It’s very exciting for scientific software development to get some recognition,” Stoll said.?

Stoll?also credited the?EasySpin?user community with helping drive continued improvements to the software’s scope, performance,?accessibility?and usability.

UW professor of physics receives NSF CAREER Award to study electron interactions in quantum materials?

, UW assistant professor of physics, received a 2026 National Science Foundation CAREER Award of more than $600,000 from the Division of Materials Research.

The NSF CAREER Award is the agency’s most prestigious honor for early-career faculty, recognizing those with the potential to become academic leaders in both research and education.

With the award, Barnard and his team will study how interactions between electrons give rise to unusual forms of electronic order in two-dimensional quantum materials, including superconducting states and electronic crystals. The researchers will use a new measurement technique developed in Barnard’s Classical and Quantum Nanosystems Lab that allows them to deliberately change how electrons interact while simultaneously measuring how the material responds.

In other words, rather than only observing the properties of a quantum material, Barnard’s team can adjust one of the forces shaping those properties and watch what changes. Understanding how these interactions produce behaviors such as superconductivity could help researchers learn how to more precisely control the electronic properties of materials, foundational knowledge for the development of future electronic and quantum technologies.

Barnard said his lab has spent the past several years developing what he described as a “one-of-a-kind tool” to help researchers better understand how superconductivity and other phenomena emerge in atomically thin materials.

“Now, with NSF CAREER funding, we are beginning to put this tool to work and looking forward to what we will discover,” Barnard said.

The project will also provide research training opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students and support the development of open-source hardware and STEM modules that offer hands-on experience with van der Waals material assembly and electronic measurements.

Source

Motion-triggered cameras showcase the prevalence of ‘nectar robbing’ in Hawaiian flowers

Some long curved bills are the perfect implement for drawing sweet nectar from deep within a lobelioid flower. As birds reach into flowers to access the nectar stored near the base, their bills can brush against the ‘ pollen-bearing structures, making hungry honeycreepers important pollinators. But some of these specialized honeycreepers have gone extinct. Shorter-billed species can now “rob” nectar — without contacting the flower’s pollen-bearing structures — from the endangered flowers. A UW-led team used motion cameras to gauge how often nectar robbing occurs. The results, in Ecology and Evolution, reveal both nectar robbing and pollination visits, showcasing a broader pattern that the team previously identified . Nectar robbing can damage flowers and leave less nectar for other potential pollinators. The researchers 3D printed a bird bill to simulate nectar robbing and track changes in nectar availability and the plants’ ability to reproduce. Damaged flowers often struggled to replenish their nectar stores, but were still able to produce fruit and viable seeds. These studies are part of a that aims to catalog Hawaiian bird-plant interactions through time, specifically tracking how these interactions are reshaped by extinction.

For more information, contact lead author , a UW research scientist in the biology department, at sam.case24@gmail.com.

The other UW co-authors are , Christopher Steinbronn and . A full list of co-authors and funding is .

People with anxious attachment styles are more likely get emotionally involved with ChatGPT

rose to popularity in the late 20th Century as a way to categorize how people bond with others. Someone with an anxious attachment style, for instance, fears abandonment and rejection, whereas someone with an avoidant attachment style is independent at the cost of personal closeness. In , UW researchers explored how peoples’ attachment styles affect their interactions with ChatGPT. The team analyzed the chat histories of 105 young adults, each of whom completed an attachment-style survey. Researchers found that they could automatically detect peoples’ attachment styles based on their interactions with the chatbot. People with an anxious attachment style were more likely to be emotionally involved with the AI system, writing things like “Can you please love me?” and “I miss my ex and I can’t sleep because of it.” Anxious users were also more prone to trust ChatGPT and to follow its recommendations. The team argues that this highlights the need for policies that prohibit companies from psychologically profiling users without their consent, since it leaves them vulnerable to manipulation.

For more information, contact senior author , a UW associate professor in the Information School, at alexisr@uw.edu or lead author , a doctoral student in the Information School, at marxwang@uw.edu.

The other UW co-authors are , , and .

Nursing is a major energy suck, but it’s difficult to estimate the toll for many marine mammals

Marine mammals lactate like any other mammal, but the energetic demands are difficult to measure in wild animals and thus not well understood.? Researchers are concerned that some marine mammals may not be getting enough food, which can lead to failure to reproduce and . To understand the link between nutritional status and reproduction, researchers need to know what marine mammals require to rear offspring. A published in PLOS One modeled the daily costs of lactation using data from semi-aquatic and terrestrial mammals to explore whether results could be generalized to other species, like whales and dolphins. Modeling could approximate lactation costs of certain understudied marine mammals, including seals and sea lions, but appeared unable to produce accurate estimates for whales and dolphins. Lactation costs increase over time for most animals, but seem to be higher early in lactation for marine mammals, possibly due to their fully aquatic lifestyle. The study highlights a need for other methods to fill the remaining data gap to better understand the impacts of environmental change on marine mammals.

For more information, contact lead author , a research scientist in the UW Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean, & Ecosystem Studies, at emchuron@uw.edu. Funding information is .

Simulations suggest that lasers could ‘calm’ persnickety plasma

could supply humanity with — provided that scientists and engineers can work out how to create sustained fusion reactions safely, efficiently and affordably. The trick is in the taming of , a superhot state of matter made of free-floating electrons and atomic nuclei. When compressed to outlandish pressures and temperatures in a reactor, the nuclei fuse with one another, releasing energy. In that extreme environment, plasma forms instabilities that can derail a fusion reaction; much fusion research is focused on “calming” volatile plasma. published in Physics of Plasmas, UW researchers and other collaborators simulated a novel strategy to control instabilities using two opposing laser beams. By tuning the lasers’ properties — such as their frequency and polarity — the researchers prevented instabilities from growing and cascading. Surprisingly, the lasers also delayed other instabilities within the plasma, even though they were not directly targeted by the laser fields. By taking advantage of interactions within the plasma, the researchers found a way to calm instabilities indirectly. The results could help experts develop algorithms that stabilize plasma in real time, sustaining fusion conditions long enough to produce useful energy.

For more information, contact , UW professor of aeronautics and astronautics at shumlak@uw.edu.

A full list of co-authors and funding is .

When exposed to air, new nanomaterial becomes magnetic at high temperatures

While fridge magnets are great for saving favorite recipes, modern magnetic materials are useful for improving fiber optics or quantum information sciences technology. If you zoomed in on most fridge magnets, you’d see the atoms arranged in a repeated lattice structure called a “spinel.” These structures are made up of three types of atoms, generically referred to as atoms “A,” “B” and “X.” In a paper in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, UW researchers describe two new spinels made of silver, chromium and selenium ions. These are among the first spinels to include a silver ion in the “A” slot, the slot that determines the “vibe” of the spinel, or how it will react to various stimuli, such as light, heat or air. When exposed to air, the original spinel loses silver ions and transforms into the second spinel. The second spinel maintains its magnetic properties up to 400 Kelvin, or 260 degrees Fahrenheit; the original loses its magnetism at 152 K, or -185 F. This is the largest change ever documented in what is known as the Curie temperature, or the highest temperature at which a material is still magnetic. The researchers plan to continue to explore these two materials and what they can teach us about the fundamentals of magnetism.

For more information, contact lead author , UW doctoral student in chemistry, at ekbacong@uw.edu.?????

The other UW co-authors are Charlize Agag, , , , Yinuo Xu, , , and . A full list of co-authors and funding is .

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New images of cigar-shaped M82 galaxy capture millions of stars

The Messier 82 galaxy, known as M82 or the Cigar galaxy, has long fascinated researchers with its astronomical rate of star formation — approximately 10 times faster than the Milky Way. Researchers have pored over grainy, low-resolution, images taken by previous generations of telescopes, which weren’t powerful enough to see through the thick cloud of dust surrounding the galaxy. The , however, can pierce straight through with extremely sharp vision. That enabled a team of astronomers from multiple institutions, including NASA and the UW, to capture new high-resolution images. Posted June 23, the images include more than 16.5 million individual stars and provide the clearest look yet at M82’s , the flattened central hub that contains most of the galaxy’s stellar mass. That could help scientists understand how M82 formed and for how long it has been producing stars so prodigiously.

For more information, contact team member a UW research professor of astronomy, at benw1@uw.edu.

All images are included in NASA’s

New study maps pollution disparities by state and sector across almost 20 years

Air quality in the United States has improved markedly since the landmark Clean Air Act passed in 1970. However, the gains have not been equally shared: Today, communities of color and low-income communities are exposed to disproportionately more air pollution than the overall population. In in Science Advances, UW researchers created the first comprehensive map cataloging how air quality inequity has changed per state and economic sector from 2002 to 2019. The study confirmed that, despite improvements in overall air quality, pollution tends to be concentrated in Black, Hispanic and low-income communities. The findings include specific state-level opportunities for improvement across 11 sectors — for example, disparities in construction-related emissions in Florida increased significantly during the study period. The findings and resulting database could help policymakers across the country prioritize environmental justice projects.

For more information, contact senior author , UW professor of civil and environmental engineering at jdmarsh@uw.edu.

The other UW co-authors are , , and . A full list of co-authors is .?

Researchers observe ultrafast chemistry happening in real time

Molecules are not static. Instead, they are having little dance parties — their atoms wiggle and twist around in space. Occasionally, upon receiving a burst of energy, the bonds holding atoms together in a molecule can break and reform with the atoms in a different configuration. While the number of atoms stays the same, the orientation of these atoms determines a molecule’s chemical properties — an important part of its identity. In , a UW-led team witnessed firsthand, and for the first time, a molecule turning into its “alter ego.” The researchers observed a hydrogen atom, also known as a proton, jump to a new position by bonding to a different atom in the same molecule. This process, which happens within a few millionths of billionths of a second, is important for various fundamental processes, including photosynthesis, and when DNA acquires mutations. To understand why, and how, this happens so fast, the researchers developed a new tool that probes molecular structure on an ultrafast timescale. They were able to use this technology to detect how the molecule’s wiggles allowed the proton transfer to happen. These findings will help researchers test existing theories about these ultrafast chemical dynamics and develop new molecules for clean energy processes.

For more information, contact senior author , UW professor of chemistry, at mkhalil@uw.edu.???

Co-authors , and completed this work while at the UW. Funding information is .

Random events leave lasting signature on the atmospheric methane record, new study shows

Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas with a complicated life cycle. It’s released into the atmosphere by both natural and industrial processes, and there are multiple pathways by which it’s broken down. Recently, atmospheric methane levels have reached record highs but the rate of accumulation has been somewhat inconsistent over time. To understand why, researchers are looking at climate records preceding the industrial era, via ice cores. These deep cylinders of glacial ice document slow swings in atmospheric methane levels spanning decades, or even centuries. This pattern is typically associated with gradual climate change, but in , UW researchers show that it doesn’t have to be. Instead, they reveal that short-term, random events, such as fires or changes in wetlands, can spark gradual shifts. Not only does this clarify the historical record, but it also adds nuance to modern trends.

For more information, contact senior author , UW doctoral student of atmospheric and climate science at emei@uw.edu.

The other UW co-authors are and . A full list of co-authors is .

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Recent recognition of the 黑料老司机 includes American COuncil of Learned Societies Fellowship, Arnold O. Beckman Postdoctoral Fellowship and Humboldt Award from Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

Assistant professor awarded 2026 ACLS Fellowship?

, assistant professor in the Department of Asian Languages & Literature at the UW, was awarded a 2026 ACLS Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies. The fellowship recognizes excellence in humanities and social sciences research and supports scholars whose work is poised to make original and significant contributions to their fields.?Rominger?will be the 2026 ACLS Pauline Yu Fellow.??

“It means a great deal to hold a fellowship in Pauline Yu’s name,” Rominger said. “Her scholarship on Chinese poetics is part of why I do this work.”?

This year, the program awarded more than $3.5 million to 63 scholars selected from a pool of more than 2,000 applicants.?

Rominger specializes in early Chinese literary and intellectual history. His project, “Aurality and the Search for Sound and Meaning in Early Chinese Texts,” examines how sound-based patterning?shaped meaning in early Chinese?philosophical texts, particularly in?writings?from the Warring States period to the Han dynasty.??

Rominger’s research shows how early Chinese thinkers employed the sound of language not only for style but also to build arguments and express complex ideas. The project brings together close readings of ancient texts, historical reconstructions of Old Chinese pronunciation, and computational tools to offer new insight into the relationship between literary form and philosophical thought.

Postdoctoral scholar awarded Arnold O. Beckman Fellowship in Chemical Instrumentation?

, a UW postdoctoral scholar?in?chemistry, was awarded the Arnold O. Beckman Postdoctoral Fellowship in Chemical Instrumentation. The fellowship supports advanced research by postdoctoral scholars in fundamental chemistry and the development and construction of chemical instrumentation.?

The award provides two years of funding, along with an?additional?$200,000 budget to support instrumentation costs.?

With the fellowship, Rebstock will build a new vibrational spectroscopy instrument designed to?observe?chemical reactions as they happen at surfaces. The instrument will allow researchers to see how molecules move and interact in real time, offering insight into surface chemistry that could help improve technologies such as batteries and clean fuels.?

This fellowship provides Rebstock with a rare opportunity to combine instrument development with fundamental chemistry questions. “I’m excited to pursue both and to explore new ways of probing the chemistry that happens at interfaces.” Rebstock said.?

UW researcher receives Humboldt Research Award?

a UW professor of Earth and space sciences,?received a Humboldt Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. The award recognizes internationally leading researchers across all disciplines for their academic record and significant contributions to their fields.?

Each year, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation grants up to 100 Humboldt Research Awards to researchers from abroad. Awardees receive personal award?money and?are invited to carry out research projects of their?choosing?in cooperation with specialist colleagues in Germany.?

Teng said he was deeply honored by the recognition and grateful to Professor?Harry?Becker, head?of the Geochemistry Group at?FU-Berlin, for?the nomination. The award will allow?Teng?to spend extended periods over the next few years conducting research at Freie University Berlin, beginning with his?sabbatical this?summer.?

“It is a wonderful opportunity to spend extended periods over the next few years conducting cutting-edge research at Freie University Berlin,” Teng said.?

The award will also enable Teng to develop new collaborations across Germany and become part of the Humboldt Foundation’s international network of distinguished researchers.?

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Recent recognition of the 黑料老司机 includes the Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award, the Rosentiel Award for contributions to ocean science, and the 2026 Distinguished Community Engagement Award

Assistant professor of chemistry awarded 2026 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award?

, assistant?professor?of?chemistry?at the?UW, received?a 2026 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award from the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation. The award supports early-career faculty in the chemical sciences who have created an outstanding independent body of scholarship and?demonstrated?a strong commitment to education.??

Each Camille Dreyfus?teacher-scholar?receives an unrestricted research grant of $100,000. Golder was one of 17 scholars selected for the 2026 award.??

Golder’s research focuses on the design and reconstruction of plastics, with an emphasis on improving polymer integrity and sustainability. The work explores how chemical design can support stronger, more adaptable materials while addressing broader challenges in plastic waste and long-term environmental impact.?

Golder said the foundation’s support will give his group the flexibility to continue pursuing “the boldest and most exciting ideas” over the next five years.?The?recognition?also?reflects the hard work and creativity of his research group over the past six years, he said.?

Principal oceanographer receives Rosenstiel Award?

, principal oceanographer at the UW Applied Physics Laboratory?and affiliate?assistant?professor?at the School of?Oceanography, received the?2026 Rosenstiel Award. The award, created in 1971 by the Rosenstiel Foundation, honors mid-career scientists whose work has made significant and growing impacts in their fields.??

The award is presented each year on a rotating basis across marine geosciences, atmospheric sciences, marine biology and ecology, ocean?sciences,?and environmental science policy. Whalen was invited to present a lecture at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine,?Atmospheric,?and Earth Science, where the award was presented in April.??

Whalen studies small-scale physics?in the ocean, including processes that generate turbulence?and mix the water, along with how these processes?interact with the dynamics of the water across ocean basins. Her work helps scientists better understand the physical drivers that shape climate and marine environments.?

Whalen said she was honored to receive the award and to join the ranks of oceanographers whose work she admires. Receiving the award also gave Whalen the opportunity to visit the Rosenstiel School, where she met with faculty and students and learned more about their work.

Professor receives Distinguished Community Engagement Award?

,?professor of ethnic, gender and labor studies and American Indian studies and adjunct professor of education at UW Tacoma?received the 2026 Distinguished Community Engagement Award in the project category. Montgomery is also an adjunct professor of bioethics and humanities at the UW School of Medicine.?The award recognizes her leadership of the Indigenous Speaker Series and Community Engagement: Promoting Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Multigenerational Community Learning.?

Through support for the Haida Sails Resurgence Project and the Northwest Maritime Center, Montgomery’s work has created meaningful opportunities for co-learning, cultural?exchange,?and the uplifting of Indigenous Knowledge Systems through place-based and multigenerational learning experiences.?

Montgomery’s community-engaged scholarship focuses on amplifying Indigenous voices, supporting dialogue around cultural and traditional lived experiences and strengthening partnerships that connect academic spaces with community knowledge. The Indigenous Speaker Series, which Montgomery created in 2015, has become a platform for sharing place-based Indigenous?knowledges?and expanding conversations across communities.??

“As a visitor to the Pacific Northwest, it is an honor to continue the responsibility to uplift place-based Indigenous?knowledges?and nurture the reciprocity of community partnerships,” Montgomery said.?

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Come curious. Leave inspired.

The UW offers an exciting lineup of in-person and online events. From thought-provoking art and music to conversations on culture, history, and science, the UW community invites you to explore, learn, and connect across disciplines throughout the University.? And as May comes to a close, see what’s happening in June.

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ArtSci On Your Own Time:

Video | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
Emily M. Bender’s talk on “AI” hype and resisting dehumanization, from a linguistic and humanities perspective, drew the largest crowd we have seen for a Katz Distinguished Lecture in years. For those who weren’t able to join us, and those who would like to revisit, you can now watch the full recording on our YouTube page. Free.

Podcast | (Biology)
This is a podcast centered around the humans who study the myriad biological processes that shape our world, specifically, the humans who are students and faculty in the Department of Biology at the 黑料老司机. They are scientists who study everything from the ways cells move through complex tissues to ancient communities of long-extinct mammals, from the ways plants interact with their surroundings to the ways bats fly and hummingbirds feed. Plunge into the vast world of biology, students sharing paths to becoming scientists and the lessons they have learned along the way. Free.

Online Events | See all events offered online.

EXHIBITIONS:

April 28 – June 5 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
Celebrate the graduating seniors across the art programs: 3D4M, Photo/Media, Painting + Drawing, and Interdisciplinary Visual Art (IVA) during the 2026 BA in Art Graduation Exhibitions at the Jacob Lawrence Gallery. Opening nights: Group 1 – April 28, Group 2 – May 12, Honors – May 26. Free.

Through May 24 | (Henry Art Gallery)
Rodney McMillian (b. 1969, Columbia, South Carolina; based in Los Angeles, California) works with the social and political histories of the United States and how they shape our daily lives. Using existing texts and domestic materials—such as house paint on thrifted fabrics and bedsheets, or “post-consumer objects” as he calls them—he traces both the visible and invisible forces that shape civic life, particularly for the lives of African Americans. Inspired by the lush surroundings of the Henry, McMillian brings together sculpture, video, and painting that present an outdoor landscape overgrown with the lingering effects of physical, political, and social violence. Free.

Through May 30 |
UW School of Art + Art History + Design Instructional Technician Kim Van Someren’s solo exhibition Holding the Line is on view at J. Rinehart Gallery. As an artist and mother, Van Someren observes structural forms embedded in daily routines—objects and arrangements that may seem trivial but are imbued with deep meaning. The often-gendered domestic practice of sewing enters her practice, with the lines of thread echoing marks and forms she employs in her etching and printmaking practice. Through this new material, sewing and stitching, invisible threads are mended, connected, and reveal the line holding structures together, embracing imperfections and irregularities as generative forces. Free.

May 16 – June 14 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
The Henry is pleased to present the 黑料老司机’s School of Art + Art History + Design Master of Fine Arts and Master of Design Thesis Exhibition. Throughout their programs, fine arts and design students work with advisers and other artists to develop advanced techniques, expand concepts, discuss critical issues, and emerge with a vision and direction for their own work. Henry staff conduct studio visits and work closely with the students to facilitate their projects and prepare them for exhibition at the museum. A digital publication will be produced in conjunction with the exhibition to highlight the students’ artistic endeavors and the Henry’s commitment to this exciting and important step in the students’ development as practicing artists and designers. Free.

Exhibition | (Henry Art Gallery)
ojo|-|o?l?? (pronounced oh-ho hol-ohn) is an exhibition of recent and newly commissioned work by Diné artist Eric-Paul Riege (b. 1994, Na’nízhoozhí [Gallup, New Mexico]) that includes sculpture, textile, collage, and video, activated by moments of performance. Across this work, Riege combines customary Diné practices of weaving, silversmithing, and beading with contemporary cultural forms, exploring Diné cosmology, the history of Euro-American trading posts in and adjacent to the Navajo Nation, and the notion of “authenticity” as a value marker of Indigenous art and craft. Free.

April 27 – May 3

Online – April 27 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Presented by Niki Akhavan, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Media and Communication Studies at The Catholic University of America. The World (Cup) Comes To Seattle 2026 Lecture Series is an online series of talks and discussions hosted by the Global Sport Lab, featuring local and global experts to discuss the geopolitical, local, and sporting implications of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup in Seattle. Free.

April 28 | ?(School of Music)
Students of Dr. Stephen Price present a UW Organ studio spring recital. Dr. Price teaches Organ performance, Church music, and Keyboard Harmony courses. In addition, he leads ongoing initiatives to develop and revitalize the UW program, continuing the legacy of his predecessor, Dr. Carole Terry. Free.

April 28 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
Celebrate the graduating seniors across the art programs: 3D4M, Photo/Media, Painting + Drawing, and Interdisciplinary Visual Art (IVA) during the 2026 BA in Art Graduation Exhibitions at the Jacob Lawrence Gallery. Ways of Becoming is split into three shows between April 28 – June 5, 2026. Free.

April 28 | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
Stephanie LeMenager, Professor of English and Environmental Studies, considers the role of fiction as a form of resistant truth-telling in an era of lies, bullish*t, propaganda, GenAI fakes, and conspiracy theory, and in the shadow of the climate crisis. In our media atmosphere filled with falsehoods, fiction becomes a means of capturing messy realities unassimilable to propaganda. Moreover, the flexibility of fictional imagination allows for social responses to radical uncertainties, via new genres of storytelling that call climate-change publics into being. In this talk, we’ll consider stories of megafire. Free.

Online option – April 28 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
This panel features talks on conducting research in the Peruvian Amazon by Justin Perez (UCSC) and Amanda Smith (UCSC). Perez will present “Queer Emergent: Scandalous Stories from the Twilight of AIDS in Peru” and Smith will present, “Situating Mothering in a Geography of Digital Colonialism: The Digital Biblioteca Amazónica,” a project to create an open-access digital archive of materials housed at the Biblioteca Amazónica in Iquitos, Peru. Free.

April 29 | (Philosophy)
The idea of space as the stage on which physical events play out dates at least as far back as the 5th century BC. The twentieth century saw a shift from theorising about space and time separately to thinking about spacetime, but the metaphor of spacetime as a stage or arena has continued. Twenty-first century physics looks likely to render this untenable – theories of quantum gravity do not appear to postulate spacetime as a fundamental container for physical contents. This talk examines an alternative way of thinking about spacetime based on the role that it plays in our physical theories – spacetime philosophy should focus on what spacetime does, rather than what it is. Free.

April 29 | (Psychology)
Presented by Maureen Craig, Associate Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience, Duke University. Free.

April 30 | (School of Music)
The Wind Ensemble and Symphonic Band (Erin Bodnar, director) presents “Scenes and Portraits,” featuring music by Gustav Holst, Martin Ellerby, and others.

April 30 |(Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
What does it mean to live well as wildfire and smoke season becomes more a part of life in the Pacific Northwest and many other places around the world? As much as we focus on preparedness and reducing materials that fuel wildfires, we must also reckon with the human dimensions of fire, which shape how we interact with it. “Fire Humanities” is a book project and an emerging field of study that draws on the humanities and arts to center stories, representations, collaborations, and values that promote adaptation, resilience, and justice as we adapt to a world with more fire.

This program will feature a panel discussion with five contributors to the book, who will share their approaches to this emerging field of research. After the panel, you’ll be invited to share your stories of fire and smoke with each other, speak with the panelists, and participate in hands-on activities connected to the Fire Humanities project. Free.

April 30 | ?(Jackson School of International Studies)
Panel discussion featuring Wang Feng, University of California, Irvine, and Yong Cai, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, along with UW faculty James Lin and Sara Curran. Free.

May 1 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Writing history entails good editing—and accepting when material can’t make the final cut. Lengthy research projects require a command of sources but also analytical flexibility. Such flexibility can ensure rigor, sometimes at the expense of findings that, alas, must be shelved for some other future use. “The B-Sides of Unmaking Botany” will examine a set of sources that did not make it into the recently published monograph Unmaking Botany: Science and Vernacular in the Colonial Philippines (Duke University Press, 2025). The objectives of the talk are thus twofold: to provide a behind-the-scenes take on the production of a scholarly monograph and to offer a conceptual argument gleaned from the sources that nonetheless resonates with some of Unmaking Botany’s principal interventions. Free.

May 1 | (Political Science)
Presented by Rachel Krause, Professor, School of Public Affairs and Administration, University of Kansas. Free.

May 1-2 | (American Indian Studies)
Indigenous scholars, artists, community leaders, and practitioners come together to reflect on food sovereignty, wellness, cultural resurgence, and collective healing through land-based knowledge and practice. Keynote by Vina Brown (Haí?zaqv and Nuu-chah-nulth), a scholar, artist, and wellness advocate, whose work centers on Indigenous law, cultural healing, and community well-being. Raised in her Haí?zaqv homelands, Vina’s work is deeply grounded in cultural resurgence, ceremony, and Tribal Canoe Journeys. She is the founder of Copper Canoe Woman and co-founder of Rooted Resiliency, an Indigenous women-led nonprofit dedicated to community wellness, cultural healing, and reclamation. Across her work, Vina advocates for land, culture, and collective well-being, with particular attention to healing intergenerational and historical trauma through community, movement, and Indigenous knowledge systems.

Week of May 4

Online – May 4 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Presented by Teresa Mosqueda, Councilmember of the Metropolitan King County Council and Anita Ramasastry, Barer Chair and Professor of Law and the 黑料老司机. The World (Cup) Comes To Seattle 2026 Lecture Series is an online series of talks and discussions hosted by the Global Sport Lab, featuring local and global experts to discuss the geopolitical, local, and sporting implications of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup in Seattle. Free.

May 4 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
The foundation of the Abe consensus — the LDP, together with Komeito, governing with large, stable majorities to promote growth as part of the global economy and develop Japan’s military power and international partnerships under the aegis of US leadership — has crumbled after little more than a decade. The LDP has lost public trust, its relationship with Komeito, and its large majorities. The US is in retreat and no longer defending the international order from which Japan had benefited. This talk will look at how this order crumbled and where Japan’s politics goes from here. Free.

May 4 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Tina Turner’s (1939–2023) successful recording career and electrifying stage performances earned her the moniker of “Queen of Rock and Roll.” At the same time, Turner was perhaps one of the most famous Black Buddhist celebrities. In this talk, I will highlight the ways that Turner’s Buddhist practice combined her Afro-Protestant upbringing, the trans-Atlantic flow of metaphysical religious ideas, and SGI Nichiren Buddhism. The talk will show how Turner’s combinatory religious sensibilities are indicative of trends in Black Buddhism. Free.

May 4 | (Chemistry)
Presented by Professor Maksym Kovalenko, Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, ETH Zurich. Hosted by UW Professor David Ginger. Free.

May 5 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
It seems like two separate realms. One is occupied by acclaimed dancers from Brooklyn’s world-renowned Mark Morris Dance Group, the other by people with Parkinson’s disease. CAPTURING GRACE is about what happens when those two worlds intersect. Filmed over the course of a year, Dave Iverson’s remarkable documentary reveals the hopes, fears, and triumphs of this newly forged community as they work together to create a unique, life-changing performance. There will be a post-screening discussion with Shawn Roberts, a Dance for PD? teaching artist? and Dr. Pravin Khemani, MD, Medical Director of the Movement Disorders Clinic, Swedish Neuroscience Institute, Providence Health & Services. Free.

Online option – May 5 | (Physics)
Dr. John Martinis, recipient of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics, presents “Prehistoric quantum bits: experiments testing the fundamental physics of superconducting quantum devices.” Quantum mechanics was developed to describe the physics of the small, for fundamental particles, atoms and molecules. But does it still work for macroscopic systems? Martinis’ PhD thesis experiment in 1985 tested this idea, showing the macroscopic current and voltages in a 1 cm chip obey the quantum phenomena of tunneling and energy-level quantization, proving that a superconducting circuit can behave as a single `artificial atom.’ Over the last four decades, many physicists around the world have continued research on quantum devices. The field has evolved from fundamental tests into a high-stakes effort to build quantum bits and a quantum computer. At Google, the ‘quantum supremacy’ experiment was the culmination of this system-level optimization, proving that a processor could outpace classical supercomputers by maintaining high-fidelity control over a huge computational (Hilbert) space. Now, at his startup Qolab, they are leveraging 300mm semiconductor fabrication to achieve the extreme uniformity and yield necessary to build a useful general-purpose quantum computer. Free.

May 6 | (History)
Presented by Angela Zimmerman, George Washington University. Zimmerman’s recent research has focused on the global history of the U.S. Civil War, Reconstruction, and the New South. She is the author of Alabama in Africa: Booker T. Washington, the German Empire, and the Globalization of the New South (Princeton, 2010) and the editor of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Civil War in the United States (International Publishers, 2016). Her first book, Anthropology and Antihumanism in Imperial Germany (Chicago, 2001), studied imperialism, science, and popular culture. Her next book, To Seek a Newer World, will be published by Alfred A. Knopf in 2027. Free.

May 6 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
How do science writers and illustrators collect the data, information, and stories that inform their art? Join three Pacific Northwest artists — two writers and one illustrator — to learn how they distill their research on our local seabirds into engaging stories and compelling illustrations. You’ll hear stories from Madison Mayfield, a science illustrator, taxidermist, and Assistant Collections Manager of the Burke Museum’s ornithology collection. You’ll find out how author and community scientist, Maria Mudd Ruth, turned data — and a lack of data— into her new book on the Pigeon Guillemot, The Bird with Flaming Red Feet. Eric Wagner, author and professional scientist, will share secrets for collecting and interpreting data on nocturnal Rhinoceros Auklets for his new book, Seabirds as Sentinels.

May 7 | (Simpson Center for the Humanities)
Move beyond the headlines and hot takes for a deeper conversation on labor and identity within women’s hoops with Dr. Courtney M. Cox, author of Double Crossover: Gender, Media, and Politics in Global Basketball (University of Illinois Press, 2025). In her book, she considers how athletes maneuver their lives and labor across leagues and borders, whether in the NCAA, WNBA, Athletes Unlimited, or overseas leagues. Cox is Associate Professor in the Department of Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies (IRES) at the University of Oregon. She previously worked for ESPN, Longhorn Network, NPR-affiliate KPCC, and the WNBA’s Los Angeles Sparks. Free.

May 7 | (Henry Art Gallery)
Artist Nour Mobarak shares an unscripted journey charting the varied media, material, and methods central to her work. With a practice spanning performance, sound, and sculpture, Mobarak explores the intersensory potential of language and the human voice. Recent presentations at MoMA and as part of the Whitney Biennial highlight Mobarak’s ongoing investigation into the sound and language moving across time and bodies, both human and mycological. This talk is co-presented with the UW School of Art + Art History + Design with an audience Q&A to follow. Free.

May 7 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Presented by Dredge Byung’chu Kang, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, San Diego. The aesthetics of K-Pop flower boy masculinity, the narratives of K-Drama cross-gender characters, and imagined Korean lesbianism have refashioned contemporary tom (Thai butch lesbian) gender presentation, partnership patterns, and sexual roles. Many Thai youth are “ba kaoli” (crazed for all things Korean), including young lesbians. In this talk, Kang examines how Korean media, consumer goods, and cultural assets are mobilized to imagine, enact, and embody Asian cosmopolitan identities. Kang describes a case in which Thai tom become “tom-gay,” by coupling with another tom. This masculine homogender pairing was previously considered inconceivable when tom-dee relationships between a lesbian and a “normal” woman were the heterogender norm. Kang argues that tom participation in K-pop fandoms, adoption of soft masculine style, and identification with female leads playing male roles in K-drama have allowed for the emergence of new lesbian sexualities. Kang thus shows how Korean Wave media has shaped Thai gender and sexuality. Free.

May 7 | ?(Teaching@UW)
UW’s Five for Flourishing Initiative is a project designed to foster social connection and belonging among students in large enrollment courses. The project team will share the initiative’s 5 core strategies and preliminary data. UW faculty members who implemented the strategies will also report on their experiences. The UW Five for Flourishing Initiative is a collaboration between the UW Center for Teaching & Learning, the UW Resilience Lab, and UW Academic Strategy & Affairs. Free.

May 7 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Presentations and discussions with:

• Raymond Jonas (UW History Dept), “France’s Five Republics and what they tell us about how republics are born and how they die”
• Terje Leiren (Emeritus, UW Scandinavian Studies), “From Royal Absolutism to Parliamentary Government: Political Transition in Scandinavia (Denmark, Norway, and Sweden).”
• James Felak (UW History Dept), “The Perils of a Problematic Constitution: the Cases of Interwar Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.”

Free.

May 8 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Hidden for decades in a locked cabinet at the Center for Asia Minor Studies in Athens, Eva Palmer Sikelianos’s love letters (1900-1910)—personal, creative, and revealing networks of desire and kinship—challenge expectations about what belongs in Greece’s archival record.?These scattered, stuttering papers sat uneasily within an institute dedicated to Orthodox Christian refugee history, raising new questions about whose lives and stories find a place in official memory. What happens when a collection resists straightforward histories—when archiving itself becomes an act of negotiation, improvisation, and listening for what’s unsaid? What can these fragments teach us about the possibilities of cultural memory, and how listening to stutters and silences might open new ways of understanding the past? In this talk, Artemis Leontis (University of Michigan) explores the process of archiving Palmer’s collection: the hurdles, improvisations, and acts of care involved in bringing these materials from secrecy to public view. Inspired by Patricia Keller’s idea of the “stutter in the archive,” she shows how gaps, interruptions, and incomplete stories invite us to rethink what archives can do, and how they respond to lives lived beyond conventional narratives. Free.

May 7 – 9 | (Meany Center for the Performing Arts)
Celebrate America’s 250th anniversary with Dances to American Music: Soul of America, a captivating performance by one of the country’s leading dance companies. Choreographed by the legendary Mark Morris, this program blends jazz, classical and folk music by iconic American composers, including George Gershwin, Louis Moreau Gottschalk, James P. Johnson and John Luther Adams. Morris brings his unique creativity and musical precision to life, fusing dance and live music to honor the vibrant spirit and diversity of America’s artistic heritage.

May 9 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Botanical illustrator Crystal Shin guides participants through the process of starting a sketch journal, showing what botanical features to observe and how to translate them into clear, expressive sketches. With hands-on guidance and time to explore the greenhouse collections, participants will practice drawing directly from living plants while developing stronger observational and sketching skills.

May 10 | ?(School of Music)
Performance by John-Carlos Perea, chair of UW Ethnomusicology and Grammy-winning multi-instrumentalist. He is joined by guests Marc Seales, piano, Gary Hobbs, drums, and Michael Brockman, saxophone. Free.

Week of May 11

Online – May 11 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Presented by Stéphane Mourlane, Senior Lecturer, Aix-Marseille University; Yvan Gastaut, Lecturer, University of C?te d’Azur; and Paul Dietschy, Professor, Marie and Louis Pasteur University. The World (Cup) Comes To Seattle 2026 Lecture Series is an online series of talks and discussions hosted by the Global Sport Lab, featuring local and global experts to discuss the geopolitical, local, and sporting implications of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup in Seattle. Free.

May 11 | (Asian Languages & Literature)
What was the impact of colonialism on listening in nineteenth-century north India? How did conceptual vocabularies and explanations for emotional responses to music evolve? Did the way listeners processed their feelings about music dramatically change? In this lecture, Richard Williams, Reader (Associate Professor) in the Department of Music and South Asian Studies at SOAS University of London, explores the place of music in the history of the emotions. Williams begins in the early modern period, and consider theories of embodied response and systems for visualizing music through painting and poetry. He then explores how colonial-era authors writing in vernacular languages drew these older theories into conversation with modern ontologies of music and emotion, often inspired by developments in European understandings of the physics of sound and psychological models of emotion. Despite these developments, he argues that nineteenth and twentieth-century sources show that older concepts continued to shape the discourse in Indian music studies, and were not simply overwritten by new, European theories. Free.

May 12 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
Celebrate the graduating seniors across the art programs: 3D4M, Photo/Media, Painting + Drawing, and Interdisciplinary Visual Art (IVA) during the 2026 BA in Art Graduation Exhibitions at the Jacob Lawrence Gallery. Ways of Becoming is split into three shows between April 28 – June 5, 2026. Free.

May 12 – 14 | ?(Mathematics)
Richard W. Kenyon, Erastus L. DeForest Professor of Mathematics at Yale University, will give a series of three lectures on “Dimers and webs,”

• May 12 | Webs, multiwebs, traces. The main theorem statement
• May 13 | SL3 case: reduced webs, scaling limits. Connection to the 4-color theorem
• May 14 | Positive connections and generalizations

Kenyon received his PhD from Princeton University in 1990 under the direction of William Thurston. After a postdoc at IHES, he held positions at CNRS in Grenoble, Lyon, and Orsay and then became professor at UBC, Brown University and then Yale where he is currently Erastus L. Deforest Professor of Mathematics. He was awarded the CNRS bronze medal, the Rollo Davidson prize, the Loève prize, is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and is a Simons Investigator. His central mathematical contributions are in statistical mechanics and geometric probability. He established the first rigorous results on the dimer model, opening the door to recent spectacular advances in the Schramm–Loewner evolution theory. In his most recent work, he introduced new homotopic invariants of random structures on graphs, establishing an unforeseen connection between probability and representation theory. Free.

May 12 – 14 | (Stroum Center for Jewish Studies)

• May 12 | Did ‘Men’ and ‘Women’ Always Exist? What the Talmud Can Tell Us
• May 14 | Monsters, Hybrids, and Holy Images – Rethinking Bodies in Ancient Jewish Art

Rafael Neis is a scholar and artist. Neis is the Jean and Samuel Frankel Professor of Rabbinic Literature and is appointed in the Department of History and Frankel Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan. As Faculty Director of Arts Learning at Michigan’s Arts initiative, Neis supports campus-wide art-integrated pedagogy. Their second book, When a Human Gives Birth to a Raven: Rabbis & the Reproduction of Species, was published in 2023 by University of California Press. Their artwork has been featured in shows and in many publications. Free.

Online option – May 13 | My Greatest Save with Briana Scurry (Public Lectures)
From winning two Olympic gold medals and a World Cup championship to enduring a career-ending concussion that left her “temporarily totally disabled” and forced her to pawn her Olympic medals, Briana Scurry delivers a raw and inspiring account of resilience. With unflinching candor, she guides audiences through the soaring highs and devastating lows of her journey—sharing a story of triumph, adversity, and ultimate redemption. Along the way, Scurry reflects on the global influence of soccer and the enduring significance of the World Cup, offering a deeply personal perspective on the sport that shaped her life and legacy. Free.

May 14 | (Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture)
Seattle has one of the most diverse street tree programs in the country — double the diversity of the East Coast, and triple the diversity of the Midwest. Today, only 5% of the city’s trees in the public right-of-way are originally native to King County. Taha Ebrahimi, author and illustrator of Street Trees of Seattle: An Illustrated Walking Guide, discusses notable trees near the Burke Museum and their connections to our cultural history.

May 14 | ?(Political Science)
Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations was published 250 years ago and illustrated how prosperity is created by an invisible hand (specialization, competition, and a well-governed society). Was it a coincidence that sustained economic progress began shortly thereafter? Smith’s framework and his spirit remain a wise guide to modern betterment and a powerful antidote against today’s reflex for control, protectionism, and political allocation. Join us for a discussion of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations and its continued relevance. Free.

May 14 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Fu Pei-mei (1931-2004), Taiwan’s beloved and pioneering postwar cook book author and television celebrity, was often called the “Julia Child of Chinese cooking.” Fu appeared continuously on television for forty years, wrote dozens of best-selling Chinese cookbooks, owned a successful cooking school and traveled the world, teaching foreigners about Chinese food. Women in her generation, which included both housewives and career women, turned to Fu because she taught them how to cook an astounding range of unfamiliar Chinese regional dishes, in ways their own mothers and grandmothers never could. Her cookbook also represents the transpacific journeys of thousands of migrants, as they carried her recipes in their suitcases, traveling far from home. Fu’s story offers us a window onto not just food, but also family, gender roles, technology, media, foreign relations, and cultural identity. This is not a story of timeless culinary tradition, but one of modern transformation– of self and family, of cuisine and society. Free.

May 15 | (Undergraduate Academic Affairs)
More than 1,700 students from all three UW campuses and other local institutions will present their research in a wide range of disciplines, including oceanography, performing arts, physics, education, archeology, molecular biology and just about everything in between. The Symposium takes place on the UW campus in Seattle, with opening remarks from UW President Robert J. Jones and Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Academic Affairs Ed Taylor. Free.

May 15 | (School of Music)
William Dougherty is an American composer, sound artist, educator, and writer who joined the 黑料老司机 faculty in January 2025. Dougherty’s works have been performed internationally by ensembles including BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra (Glasgow), The Sun Ra Arkestra (Philadelphia), Yarn/Wire (New York), Ensemble Phoenix (Basel), TILT Brass (New York), Ensemble for New Music Tallinn(Estonia), JACK Quartet (New York), and Talea Ensemble (New York). His music has been featured in festivals such as Tectonics Glasgow (2023), IRCAM’s ManiFeste (2019), musikprotokoll (2018), Donaueschingen Musiktage (2017), New Music Miami (2017), Tectonics Festival New York (2015), the New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival (2015), the 47th Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt (2014), the New York Philharmonic Biennale (2014), and broadcast on BBC Radio 3. THEME: A colloquium of UW faculty and students of Theory, History, Ethnomusicology, and Music Education held on select Friday afternoons during the academic year. Free.

May 15 | (School of Music)
Faculty pianist Craig Sheppard is joined by current and former UW students in this concert celebrating the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

May 15 | (Political Science)
Presented by Daniel Krcmaric, Associate Professor of Political Science and Law, Northwestern University. Free.

May 16 | ?(Biology)
Welcoming all families and science enthusiasts of all ages. The UW Department of Biology’s experts in the field whose research and teaching span cellular and molecular biology, global climate change, paleontology, and plant biology. Through experimentation and conversation, explore questions such as: How have penguins adapted to survive climate change? How is neuron fate decided during development? Why are mosquitoes attracted to us? Do plants really “defend” themselves against insect predators? How does the brain really work? And does the Greenhouse really have a stinky corpse plant and when will it bloom next? You’ll also be able to touch invertebrates, brains, fossils…and more! Free.

Online – May 16 |

May 16 | (Henry Art Gallery)
As part of the U District Street Fair, Meet Me at the Henry is a twice-a-year celebration of contemporary art and ideas. Explore new exhibitions, catch captivating performances, get hands-on with an all-ages art-making workshop and museum bingo, and discover rarely seen works from the Henry’s collection. Free.

May 14 – 17 | (Dance)
The MFA Dance Concert features original dances created by the current MFA Cohort, with over fifty undergraduate dancers. The artists explore humanity and community drawing from a variety of movement languages including contemporary modern, wh/aacking and punking, groove, body percussion, and more.

Week of May 18

Online – May 18 – rescheduled to June 8 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Presented by Jen Barnes, Co-Chair of the Pride+ Match Impact Committee with SEA2026 and founder and CEO of both Rough & Tumble Pub and Salmon Bay FC. The World (Cup) Comes To Seattle 2026 Lecture Series is an online series of talks and discussions hosted by the Global Sport Lab, featuring local and global experts to discuss the geopolitical, local, and sporting implications of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup in Seattle. Free.

May 18 | (School of Music)
UW music students perform music from the Baroque era under the direction of Tekla Cunningham. Free.

Online option – May 19 | Five Ways to Watch the World Cup with Ron Krabill (Public Lectures)
As Seattle gears up to host the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup, the city finds itself at the center of a heated debate: Is the tournament an economic catalyst or a misuse of public funds? A celebration of Seattle’s cultural vibrancy or a distraction from pressing regional challenges? A thrilling chance to witness the world’s greatest athletes—or a calculated profit grab by global elites? This talk invites audiences to explore five distinct perspectives on the political and cultural impact of the tournament—offering a more nuanced, thought-provoking look at what the World Cup means for Seattle and the world.?Free.

May 19 | (Stroum Center for Jewish Studies)
Visiting author and scholar Jacob Daniels will discuss his new book, The Jews of Edirne: The End of the Ottoman Europe and the Arrival of Borders. At the turn of the twentieth century, the city of Edirne was a bustling center linking Istanbul to Ottoman Europe. It was also the capital of Edirne Province—among the most religiously diverse regions of the Ottoman Empire. But by 1923, the city had become a Turkish border town, and the province had lost much of its non-Muslim population. With this book, Jacob Daniels explores how one of the world’s largest Sephardi communities dealt with the encroachment of modern borders. Free.

May 19 | (School of Music)
UW voice students of Thomas Harper and Carrie Shaw perform art songs and arias from the vocal repertoire. Free.

May 19 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
Thea Riofrancos is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Providence College, a Strategic Co-Director of the Climate and Community Institute, and a fellow at the Transnational Institute. She is the author of Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism (W.W. Norton, 2025) and Resource Radicals: From Petro-Nationalism to Post-Extractivism in Ecuador (Duke University Press, 2020), and the coauthor of A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green New Deal (Verso Books, 2019). Free.

May 19 | (Astronomy)
Enjoy evening talks, interactive exhibits, and on clear nights, sky viewing through our historic 1895 telescope. Viewings are held on the first and third Tuesday evenings from April through September, rain or shine. A public talk followed by telescope viewing once the sky darkens. Explore the universe with the UW! Free.

May 20 |
Presenting an evening of electronic music showcasing works by Richard Karpen, Joseph Anderson and Juan Pampin. The works will be played through the DXARTS 3D audio system, a state-of-the-art, high-fidelity multi-channel system designed for immersive, spatial audio experiences. Free.

May 21 | (School of Music)
The master Javanese gamelan musician Heri Purwanto from Indonesia performs with his students in this evening of music from central Java, Indonesia.

May 21 – 31 | (School of Drama)
At “God’s” command, “Death” summons “Everybody” to go on the long and difficult journey to give a presentation to “God” on Everybody’s life and why they have lived it the way that they have. Everybody wants to bring along a friend, and Death says it’s fine if Everybody can find someone to volunteer. Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins adapted the play from the 15th-century morality play Everyman. Professor Chi-wang Yang directs this production, in which each night the performers’ roles are determined by a lottery. Everybody reveals to us the value of our relationships and how to live with intention amid uncertainty. Two special on Sunday, May 24, and Saturday, May 30.

May 21 |
Hosted by the Seattle Art Museum, SAM Curator Aaron Rio and UW Assistant Professor Mimi Chusid discuss the key role of pictures in navigating the processes of death and dying in premodern Japan. Centering on paintings associated with the Pure Land sects of Buddhism from SAM’s renowned collection of Japanese art, we will examine visions of hells and paradise, as well as explore notions of the afterlife and salvation.

May 21 | (American Indian Studies)
Sacred Breath features Indigenous writers and storytellers sharing their craft at the beautiful w???b?altx? Intellectual House on the UW Seattle campus. Storytelling offers a spiritual connection, a sharing of sacred breath. Literature, similarly, preserves human experience and ideals. Both forms are durable and transmit power that teaches us how to live. Both storytelling and reading aloud can impact audiences through the power of presence, allowing for the experience of the transfer of sacred breath as audiences are immersed in the experience of being inside stories and works of literature. Free.

May 21 | ?(Middle Eastern Languages & Cultures)
Shawkat M. Toorawa is the Brand Blanshard Professor of Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations and Professor of Comparative Literature at Yale University. He is a scholar, translator, and editor. He has published studies on the history of Arabic literature, translated the poetry of Adonis and the Quran, and he has been involved in numerous translation projects in his role as an executive editor for the Library of Arabic Literature. In this talk, Professor Toorawa will share his unique insights to his research and translations over the course of his long career. Free.

May 22 | (Undergraduate Academic Affairs)
From a former Gonzaga basketball player and current 黑料老司机 Dean and Vice Provost comes a memoir steeped in the universal truths and human pursuits of love, grace, forgiveness, and continued growth. Ed Taylor takes readers on a journey from Lompoc, California through a childhood marked with loss but grounded in the love and support of family and community, to a singular moment that changed everything for a boy set up by the system to be a cog in the machine.

But Taylor’s story is only beginning on the day Gonzaga University offers him a full ride: Faced with questions every young Black man on a basketball scholarship has heard—questions like “Do you even belong here?” and “Do you really think you can cut it?”—Taylor answers by examining himself, everything that brought him to this place, and all that he hopes to bring to the world, and by rising to the ever-increasing challenges he sets for himself.

In The Power of the River, Ed Taylor offers perspective on his journey as it relates to the larger, human one we’re all on together, inviting us to celebrate the many individuals—family members, teachers, coaches, colleagues, friends, and chance acquaintances—who lifted him up and taught him along the way and reminding us that even while we are responsible for our impacts on those in our lives, we all deserve some measure of grace.?Free.

May 22 | (School of Music)
Guitar students of Michael Partington present their quarterly studio recital. Michael Partington is one of the most engaging of the new generation of concert players. Praised by Classical Guitar Magazine for his “lyricism, intensity and clear technical command,” this award-winning British guitarist has performed internationally as a soloist and with ensemble to unanimous critical praise. Audiences are put at ease by his charming stage manner and captivated by his musical interpretations. His innate rhythmic understanding and sense for tonal colour combine to form some of the most memorable phrasing to be heard on the guitar. Free.

May 22 | (School of Music)
The UW’s graduate-student-led choral ensembles—the University Singers, UW Glee, and Treble Choir—present an eclectic year-end concert.

May 22 | ?(Political Science)
Presented by Valentina González-Rostani, Assistant Professor, University of Southern California. Free.

Through May 24 | (Henry Art Gallery)
Rodney McMillian (b. 1969, Columbia, South Carolina; based in Los Angeles, California) works with the social and political histories of the United States and how they shape our daily lives. Using existing texts and domestic materials—such as house paint on thrifted fabrics and bedsheets, or “post-consumer objects” as he calls them—he traces both the visible and invisible forces that shape civic life, particularly for the lives of African Americans. Inspired by the lush surroundings of the Henry, McMillian brings together sculpture, video, and painting that present an outdoor landscape overgrown with the lingering effects of physical, political, and social violence. Free.

Week of May 25

Through May 31 | (School of Drama)
At “God’s” command, “Death” summons “Everybody” to go on the long and difficult journey to give a presentation to “God” on Everybody’s life and why they have lived it the way that they have. Everybody wants to bring along a friend, and Death says it’s fine if Everybody can find someone to volunteer. Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins adapted the play from the 15th-century morality play Everyman. Professor Chi-wang Yang directs this production, in which each night the performers’ roles are determined by a lottery. Everybody reveals to us the value of our relationships and how to live with intention amid uncertainty. Two special on Sunday, May 24, and Saturday, May 30.

May 26 | (School of Art + Art History + Design)
Celebrate the graduating seniors across the art programs: 3D4M, Photo/Media, Painting + Drawing, and Interdisciplinary Visual Art (IVA) during the 2026 BA in Art Graduation Exhibitions at the Jacob Lawrence Gallery. Ways of Becoming is split into three shows between April 28 – June 5, 2026. Free.

May 26 | (Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies)
In a time marked by mounting challenges to the field of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies (GWSS), as well as higher education at large, we gather to share appreciation for the folks that make what we do possible, and welcome new faces interested in the important scholarship and community work GWSS has and continues to undertake. Despite the precarities of the time, GWSS has much to celebrate: 55+ years of groundbreaking interdisciplinary scholarship, 20 years since the graduation of the very first doctoral student, and, most importantly, a continued commitment to building a strong intellectual community on campus and beyond.? Free.

Online – May 26 | (Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies)
The last decade has seen a sharp rise in state-sponsored homophobia and transphobia in East Africa, including discriminatory legislation and religious condemnation, and many LGBTQI+ people have been forced to flee their homes. But East Africa is also a site of activism, community, and enterprise where the contexts of belonging are redefined. The 黑料老司机 African Studies Program and Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies are pleased to host a dialogue among the editors of the first book to explore these subjects—East African Queer and Trans Displacements—which features critiques and creative works by LGBTQI+ diasporic writers and artists from the region with first-hand experiences of displacement. Free.

May 26 | (School of Music)
The UW Percussion Ensemble (Bonnie Whiting, director) performs contemporary music of many genres composed for percussion ensembles ranging in size from trios to nonets and dectets. Free.

May 27 | (Chemistry)
Presented by Professor Benedetta Mennucci, Department of Chemistry, University of Pisa. Free.

Online Option – May 27 | Is A River Alive? Exploring the lives, deaths and rights of rivers with Robert Macfarlane (Public Lectures)
Across the globe, rivers are dying—choked by pollution, parched by drought, and shackled by dams. The prevailing narrative treats freshwater as a mere resource, water as a liquid asset, existing solely for human use. This lecture offers a different current: an ancient and urgent story in which rivers live, die, and even possess rights. It reimagines rivers as vital, sentient life-forces, intertwined with our own survival. Spanning Ecuador, India, Aotearoa New Zealand, northeastern Canada, and the speaker’s native southern England, the talk weaves together the voices of activists, artists, and lawmakers. Passionate and immersive, it promises to spark debate, shift perspectives, and invite listeners to recognize a profound truth: our fate has always flowed with the rivers. Free.

May 28 | (History)
Professor Matthew Sommer’s new book The Fox Spirit, the Stone Maiden, and Other Transgender Histories from Late Imperial China (Columbia UP, 2024) considers a range of transgender practices and paradigms in Late Imperial China, illuminating how certain forms of gender transgression were sanctioned in particular contexts and penalized in others. This talk will focus on the crime of “a male masquerading in female attire” (男扮女裝), which was prosecuted by applying the statute against “using deviant ways and heterodox principles to incite and deceive the common people” (左道異端煽惑人民). Anatomical males who presented as women sometimes took a conventionally female occupations such as midwife, faith healer, or even medium to a fox spirit — yet, suspected of sexual predation, they risked death for the crime of “masquerading in women’s attire,” even when they had lived peacefully in their communities for years. Free.

May 28 | (Center for American Indian and Indigenous Studies)
Graduate and undergraduate students and Indigenous Knowledge Families present their original research in the field of Indigenous Studies. Free.

May 29 | (School of Music)
Students of John Popham present a chamber music showcase. Free.

May 29 | (School of Music)
The Modern Music Ensemble (Cristina Valdés, director) performs music from the mid-20th century and beyond, including world premieres of works by living composers. Free.

May 30 | (School of Music)
The Campus Philharmonia Orchestras (Robert Stahly, Zach Banks, conductors) present an end-of-quarter concert. Free.

Online Events

Online option – April 28 | (Jackson School of International Studies)
This panel features talks on conducting research in the Peruvian Amazon by Justin Perez (UCSC) and Amanda Smith (UCSC). Perez will present “Queer Emergent: Scandalous Stories from the Twilight of AIDS in Peru” and Smith will present, “Situating Mothering in a Geography of Digital Colonialism: The Digital Biblioteca Amazónica,” a project to create an open-access digital archive of materials housed at the Biblioteca Amazónica in Iquitos, Peru. Free.

May 5 | (Physics)
Dr. John Martinis, recipient of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics, presents “Prehistoric quantum bits: experiments testing the fundamental physics of superconducting quantum devices.” Quantum mechanics was developed to describe the physics of the small, for fundamental particles, atoms and molecules. But does it still work for macroscopic systems? Martinis’ PhD thesis experiment in 1985 tested this idea, showing the macroscopic current and voltages in a 1 cm chip obey the quantum phenomena of tunneling and energy-level quantization, proving that a superconducting circuit can behave as a single `artificial atom.’ Over the last four decades, many physicists around the world have continued research on quantum devices. The field has evolved from fundamental tests into a high-stakes effort to build quantum bits and a quantum computer. At Google, the ‘quantum supremacy’ experiment was the culmination of this system-level optimization, proving that a processor could outpace classical supercomputers by maintaining high-fidelity control over a huge computational (Hilbert) space. Now, at his startup Qolab, they are leveraging 300mm semiconductor fabrication to achieve the extreme uniformity and yield necessary to build a useful general-purpose quantum computer. Free.

Live (not recorded) | (Jackson School of International Studies)
This lecture series is hosted by the Global Sport Lab, featuring local and global experts to discuss the geopolitical, local, and sporting implications of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup in Seattle. Topics include:

• April 27 | Iran and Seattle’s World Cup
• May 4 | Workers’ Rights in Seattle during the World Cup
• May 11 | Seattle’s World Cup: The View from Europe
• May 18 | The Pride Match and LGBTQ+ Rights
• June 1 | Egypt Comes to Seattle

Free.

May 13 | My Greatest Save with Briana Scurry (Public Lectures)
From winning two Olympic gold medals and a World Cup championship to enduring a career-ending concussion that left her “temporarily totally disabled” and forced her to pawn her Olympic medals, Briana Scurry delivers a raw and inspiring account of resilience. With unflinching candor, she guides audiences through the soaring highs and devastating lows of her journey—sharing a story of triumph, adversity, and ultimate redemption. Along the way, Scurry reflects on the global influence of soccer and the enduring significance of the World Cup, offering a deeply personal perspective on the sport that shaped her life and legacy. Free.\

May 19 | Five Ways to Watch the World Cup with Ron Krabill (Public Lectures)
As Seattle gears up to host the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup, the city finds itself at the center of a heated debate: Is the tournament an economic catalyst or a misuse of public funds? A celebration of Seattle’s cultural vibrancy or a distraction from pressing regional challenges? A thrilling chance to witness the world’s greatest athletes—or a calculated profit grab by global elites? This talk invites audiences to explore five distinct perspectives on the tournament’s political and cultural impact—offering a more nuanced, thought-provoking look at what the World Cup means for Seattle and the world. Free.

May 26 | (Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies)
The last decade has seen a sharp rise in state-sponsored homophobia and transphobia in East Africa, including discriminatory legislation and religious condemnation, and many LGBTQI+ people have been forced to flee their homes. But East Africa is also a site of activism, community, and enterprise where the contexts of belonging are redefined. The 黑料老司机 African Studies Program and Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies are pleased to host a dialogue among the editors of the first book to explore these subjects—East African Queer and Trans Displacements—which features critiques and creative works by LGBTQI+ diasporic writers and artists from the region with first-hand experiences of displacement. Free.

May 27 | Is A River Alive? Exploring the lives, deaths and rights of rivers with Robert Macfarlane (Public Lectures)
Across the globe, rivers are dying—choked by pollution, parched by drought, and shackled by dams. The prevailing narrative treats freshwater as a mere resource, water as a liquid asset, existing solely for human use. This lecture offers a different current: an ancient and urgent story in which rivers live, die, and even possess rights. It reimagines rivers as vital, sentient life-forces, intertwined with our own survival. Spanning Ecuador, India, Aotearoa New Zealand, northeastern Canada, and the speaker’s native southern England, the talk weaves together the voices of activists, artists, and lawmakers. Passionate and immersive, it promises to spark debate, shift perspectives, and invite listeners to recognize a profound truth: our fate has always flowed with the rivers. Free.

ArtSci Roundup goes monthly!

The ArtSci Roundup is your guide to connecting with the UW—whether in person, on campus, or on your couch.

Previously shared on a quarterly basis, those who sign up for the Roundup email will receive them monthly, delivering timely updates and engaging content wherever you are. Check the roundup regularly, as events are added throughout the month. Make sure to check out the ArtSci On Your Own Time section for everything from podcasts to videos to exhibitions that can be enjoyed when it works for you!

In addition, if you like the ArtSci Roundup, sign up to receive a monthly notice when it’s been published.

Do you have an event that you would like to see featured in the ArtSci Roundup? Connect with Lauren Zondag (zondagld@uw.edu).uw.edu).

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