Exciting batch of visitors comes to town with ‘Scripps Presents’

Each academic year Claremont’s esteemed women’s institution, Scripps College, provides students, staff and the public alike with a fascinating and eclectic mix of storytellers, artists, policymakers and musicians, and everything in between, with its Scripps Presents series.

This year’s slate of free and open to the public events includes another roster of accomplished women offering “eye-opening, mind-bending, genre-defying tête-à-têtes with iconic and emerging thinkers and doers, writers and performers, whose passion and perspective are changing the way we see the world.”

More information, including the full season’s lineup, is at scrippscollege.edu/events/scrippspresents or (909) 607-8508. Folks can also watch past presenters on the Scripps Presents YouTube channel. Here’s a selection of the female-centric events Scripps has for us in the coming weeks:

On Tuesday, January 29 Scripps’ MLK Commemorative Lecture will feature Bettina Love from 6 to 7 p.m. at Garrison Theater, 241 E. 10th St., Claremont. Ms. Love is an award-winning author and hip-hop scholar. In her new book, We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom, the University of Georgia associate professor of educational theory and practice weaves together personal stories, research, and history to offer visions of education and justice inspired by the teachings and revolutionary spirit of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

At 12:15 p.m. Monday, February 4 Scripps’ @Noon series explores “The Roles of the Museum Curator,” in the Hampton Room, 1030 Columbia Ave., Claremont. Geneva Griswold’s work as the associate objects conservator at the Seattle Art Museum is both an art and a science. The 2007 Scripps graduate oversees the installation, storage, display, and preservation of the museum’s pre-modern collections. She returns to Scripps to discuss three ongoing projects: a recent treatment and loan of the bronze sculpture The Lamentation Over the Dead Christ (c. 1714) by Massimiliano Soldani; a technical study of the 14th century Chinese sculpture The Monk at the Moment of Enlightenment; and the conservator’s role in the exhibition planning and reinstallation for the Seattle Asian Art Museum’s fall 2019 opening.

Iconic choreographer Liz Lerman returns to Claremont Tuesday, February 5 for “Work-in-Progress: Wicked Bodies,” from 7 to 9 p.m. at Balch Auditorium, 1030 Columbia Ave. Ms. Lerman’s history of sly, grotesque, sensual, and wildly creative women debuts as a work in progress on the Scripps stage. Inspired in part by the college’s Denison Library’s Witches and Healing archive as well as by workshops and conversations with the campus community, this performance is the culminating event in the choreographer’s yearlong engagement with Scripps.

On Tuesday, February 12 the college’s @Noon series continues with poet Sally Wen Mao reading from 12:15 to 1:15 p.m. in the Hampton Room. Ms. Wen Mao’s poetry collection Oculus is an eerie, powerful exploration of technology.

The 2017 Pushcart Prize winner deploys sharp wit and a speculative imagination to confront the spectacle of the Internet, artificial intelligence, the past and the future, and the roles and representations that women of color endure in order to survive a culture that seeks to consume them.

On Wednesday, February 20 Scripps Presents hosts “Gaby Dunn, Bad with Money,” from 6 to 7:15 p.m. at Balch Auditorium. Ms. Dunn’s podcast, Bad with Money, features episodes such as “Screaming Into a Jar (aka Student Loans),” “It’s Not Just a Few Feet of Sea Level Rise (aka Climate Change is an Economic Issue),” and “Who Can Afford to Have Sex? (aka Babies).” The podcast delves into issues that affect both our global and personal economies. It is pitched to millennials and gen z-ers, but is for anyone trying to figure out how to survive financially (aka everyone). The show is the inspiration for her new book, Bad With Money: The Imperfect Art of Getting Your Financial Shi*t Together.

“Morgan Parker and Nicole Sealey: An Evening of Poetry,” takes place from 6 to 7:15 p.m. at Balch Auditorium on Tuesday, February 26. The talk features Ms. Parker and Ms. Sealey, who mine the personal and political in their poetry, both reveling in and revealing the issues at the heart of contemporary life. Ms. Parker’s most recent collection, There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyoncé, was hailed by The New Yorker as “exquisite poems [that] defy categorization,” while Essence magazine called Ms. Sealey “one of today’s most interesting poets…she steers us on a fantastic voyage through her infinitely brilliant mind.” The two will read from their latest works, including Ms. Parker’s Magical Negro and Ms. Sealey’s Ordinary Beast.

Thursday, February 28 the school’s Girard Psychology Lecture will feature Iris Mauss from 6 to 7:15 p.m. at Balch Auditorium. Mindfulness, self-care, and “positive thinking” are all touted as panaceas for negative emotions, but according to University of California, Berkeley researcher Ms. Mauss, if you’re feeling down, the self-imposed pressure to change your tune can actually make you feel even worse.

“We found that people who habitually accept their negative emotions experience fewer negative emotions, which adds up to better psychological health,” Ms. Mauss wrote.

She visits to discuss scientific findings like these from her research in the field of emotion regulation.

More information, including the full season’s lineup, is at scrippscollege.edu/ events/scrippspresents or (909) 607-8508.

—Mick Rhodes

mickrhodes@claremont-courier.com

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