Sunday Platforms

Last Month     This Month     Next Month     Upcoming

All Sunday Platform Meetings are held at 10:30 A.M. in the Spiegel Auditorium at 56 Brattle St. in Cambridge, Massachusetts and are free and open to the public. The building is accessible by car or public transportation.

In the event inclement weather causes cancellation of a Sunday meeting, the Board of Trusees will call members. A cancellation message will be put on the Society telephone answering machine at (617)739-9050 by 8:00 A.M. and some radio stations will carry our cancellation announcement.

The Platform format is usually as follows:

Welcome
Opening Words
Musical Selection
Speaker's presentation
Music
Announcements
Closing Words
Refreshment Break
Question & answer with the Speaker

We end at 12:30 P.M.

Special Lecture Series on Sustainability and Social Justice

TOP

This Month

March 7 – The Poetics and Politics of Practice: Engagment in African Ethnography

Michelle Kisliuk, Ph.D., Associate Professor at the University of Virginia at Charlottesville

We are in the midst of a post-colonial shift, a zeitgeist, not only in arts, culture, and scholarship, but in the politics of everyday life.  In this presentation, the speaker will address how this shift bears on what we as scholars and artists, teachers and everyday actors may do by reflecting on her experience melding "fieldlife" and "worklife" in her field of study.

Music: David Solstein, piano, and Jane Pollack, flute

March 14 – Humanist Meditation: Neuroscience and Practice

Rick Heller, Humanist Contemplative Group

The Humanist Contemplative Group explores secularized forms of meditation for the purposes of reducing stress and cultivating attention. This presentation will focus on the neuroscience of meditation and will include a 15-minute meditation focusing attention on our breathing.
Music: Harel Githeim, cello, and Ksnoko Nishikawa, piano

March 21 – Think Outside the Bottle

Forrest Whitcher and Fauna Shaw, Action for Corporate Accountability

Action for Corporate Accountability is fighting corporate control of water. Companies such as Coca Cola, Pepsi, and Nestle have succeeded in both convincing customers that their product is better than tap water, and they are selling it at hugely increased costs.
Music: Concordia Consort, recorder ensemble

March 28 – Massachusetts and the Movies

Nicholas Paleologos, Executive Director, Massachusetts Film Office

The speaker will share his experience in marketing Massachusetts as a filmmaking location and marketing filmmaking as a revenue-producing enterprise for the state. As a movie producer himself ("Mississippi Burning", etc.) and a former state legislator who chaired the Joint Committee on Education and the Arts, Mr. Paleologos is an eloquent and knowledgeable spokesperson for this enterprise.

Music: Sylvia Berry, piano

TOP

Next Month

April 4 – TBD

Stanley Wayne

Music: Ben Warsaw, piano

April 11 – Restoring Democracy after Citizens United vs. FEC: Free Speech for People, Not Corporations

Jeffrey Clements, General Counsel for Free Speech for the People Campaign

Mr. Clements will discuss the amicus brief he filed on behalf of citizen democracy groups in the Supreme Court case of Citizens United v. FEC in which he argued that corporations do not have speech rights under the First Amendment, and that the Congress and the States may regulate
corporate money in politics. He will also discuss why the American people must respond with a Constitutional amendment.
Music: Josh Sawicki, piano

April 18 – Iraq: Prospects for Peace

Raed Jarrar, Peace Action

Raed Jarrar is an architect and political analyst currently based in Washington DC. He currently is an advocate with Peace Action on Capitol Hill. Raed will discuss why immediate pull-out of troops from Iraq is necessary, and how the elections will affect the future in Iraq.

Music: Ben Warsaw, piano

April  25 – Why Nuclear Power Is not an Answer to Global Warming

Mary Lambert, Founder, Pilgrim Watch

The founder of Pilgrim Watch will provide an overview of the organization and its mission, and discuss why nuclear power is not an answer to global warming.
Music:  Josh Sawicki, piano

TOP

Last Month

February 7 – Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture

Ellen Ruppel Shell, Boston University

Professor Shell will discuss her recently released book, Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture, that exposes the dangers of consumerism.

Music: Josh Sawicki, piano

February 14 – Johannes Brahms, Opus 119: An Analysis and Comparison

Benjamin Warsaw, Doctoral Candidate, Boston University

Ben Warsaw will deliver a short lecture with various demonstrations about Brahms' music and show through analysis how various aspects of the music in Opus 119 are composed. Following the lecture, Ben will perform the 20-minute work for piano.
Music: Ben Warsaw, piano

February 21 – Dreaming of Designing and Developing a Decent Democracy

Peter Ames, ESB Board Member and Organizational Consultant

This presentation will examine why we should be concerned, identify worldwide principles, and make specific recommendations for America on how to improve the democratic process/system.

Music: Josh Sawicki, piano

February 28 – Greed to Green: Climate Change, Capitalism, and Left Politics in the Age of Warming

Charles Derber, Professor of Sociology at Boston College

This session will start a conversation about how climate change transforms the politics of capitalism, and how the Left must reinvent itself. The ethical foundation of a "Greed to Green" movement will be highlighted and the challenges emerging in the forms of right-wing populism - from Scott Brown to Sarah Palin and the Tea Party - will also be considered.

Music: Ben Warsaw, piano

TOP

Upcoming
 

TOP