MIT Center for International Studies January 2020 IAP offerings

MIT Center for International Studies January 2020 IAP offerings

Expand your knowledge and skills this IAP session with several international activities and events.

December 18, 2019 | MIT Center for International Studies
students attending a lecture/event
December 18, 2019

The Center for International Studies is excited to share five unique opportunities for the 2020 MIT Independent Activities Period (IAP).

IAP is a special term at MIT that runs from early January until the end of the month. It provides members of the MIT community (students, faculty, staff, and alums) with a unique opportunity to organize, sponsor and participate in a wide variety of activities, including how-to sessions, forums, athletic endeavors, lecture series, films, tours, recitals and contests. During IAP, students are encouraged to set their own educational agendas, pursue independent projects, meet with faculty, or pursue many other options not possible during the semester. Faculty are free to introduce innovative educational experiments as IAP activities. All members of the MIT Community, are encouraged to create offerings aimed at sharing a particular talent, expertise or interest with others at the Institute.

View all MIT IAP offerings

IAP 2020 Activities

Date:

Thurs, Jan 9

Ikebana: The Art of Japanese Flower Arranging
Advance sign-up required by January 6 | Limited space | $10 fee for materials
2:00PM-3:30PM | E40-496 Lucian Pye Conference Room

Hiroko Matsuyama, an accomplished instructor of the Ohara school of Ikebana, will show you the basics of this ancient art as you create your own flower arrangement.

Sign up

Dates:

Sat, Jan 11 & Sun, Jan 12

KYUDO: Japanese Archery
Advance sign-up required by January 7 | Limited space | $20 fee for instruction
1/11 1:00PM-5:00PM MAC Court | 1/12 9:30AM-3:30PM Rockwell Cage, North Court

Kyudo, Japanese archery, means the "way of the bow" and was considered the highest discipline of ancient Japanese samurai. Kyudo is based on standing Zen meditation used by Zen Buddhist monks as a means of cultivating self-awareness. Beginners will receive instruction in the basic form of kyudo. Training will take place on the first day (1/11), followed by actual shooting on the second day (1/12). People are required to come on Saturday to be trained in order to shoot on Sunday. Open to MIT only.

Website
Cosponsored by Byakko Kyudo

Sign up

Date:

Thurs, Jan 16

Starr Forum Film: Where Powers Live
No advance sign-up required
12:00PM-1:00PM | E40-496 Lucian Pye Conference Room

Where Powers Live: A film that chronicles the lives of indigenous faith believers in Nigeria, and the discriminatory attitudes they face.

About the speaker: Shola Lawal, a Nigerian journalist, is the writer, producer, and director of the recently released film “Where Power’s Live.” She is the recipient of the 2019 International Women’s Media Foundation’s (IWMF) Elizabeth Neuffer Fellowship, which brought her to MIT as a research associate at the MIT Center for International Studies, and provides journalism stays at The Boston Globe and The New York Times. She reports on issues of humanity and injustice, including the women’s rights movement in Nigeria, migrants in Libya, forest reserves in Ghana, political upheaval in Togo, the Boko Haram conflict, and the migrant crisis in Mexico and the US.

The film is ~15 minutes in length and will be followed by a discussion and Q&A with Shola Lawal.

A light lunch will be served.

Sign up

Dates:

(1) Wed, Jan 22

(2) Tues, Jan 28

(3) Wed, Jan 29

Contemporary Military Topics (series)
No advance sign-up | Participants welcome at individual sessions
All sessions held 1:00PM-2:30PM | E40-496 Lucian Pye Conference Room

(1) Emerging tech & warfighter performance with Terry Hahn, US Army

Emerging technologies relevant to augmenting and enhancing Warfighter performance and on future battlefields.  Discussion on the findings of a recent Department of Defense assessment on the potential military-use of human/machine enhancement technologies.

(2) The USN & USMC Fighting Partnership with Jonathan Riggs, US Marine Corps and Evan Wright, US Navy

The Navy & Marine Corps are working thru operational concepts for high-end warfare & have developed a Maritime Fight plan outlining how applying the concepts of Distribute Maritime Operations and Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment would play out in actual operations, and how the naval force in partnership with its USMC counterpart would distribute/concentrate power in an anti-access/area-denial environment.

(3) The Age of the F-35 with Tucker Hamilton, US Air Force

The Age of the F-35 and Autonomy on the Modern Battlefield.  A discussion on F-35 capability and potential; focusing on the implications of autonomous systems and the way in which they will shape the modern battle space.

Sign up

Date:

Thurs, Jan 30

Starr Forum film screening:From Wounded Knee to Standing Rock: A Reporter's Journey
No advance sign-up required
4:30PM-6:30PM | 4-370

Boston premier screening and conversation with director-writer Kevin McKiernan.

About the film: A rookie NPR reporter on his first assignment, covering the armed occupation of Wounded Knee in South Dakota in 1973, is treated as the enemy and ultimately arrested by the FBI for defying a government news blackout to embed with militant Indians. Forty years later, he meets a Yurok Indian fisherman in California, a man he unwittingly had photographed during the 10-week occupation. The two become friends, traveling back to the Dakotas and later to the pipeline protests at Standing Rock, to investigate the legacy of 1970's activism in Indian Country.

About the speaker: Kevin McKiernan is a veteran foreign correspondent, photographer and filmmaker. Nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, McKiernan has covered some of the world's most troubled regions, from El Salvador to Iraq, from West Africa to Afghanistan and Syria. His feature documentary, "From Wounded Knee to Standing Rock: A Reporter's Journey", premiered in October 2019 at the Mill Valley Film Festival (mvff), before continuing on the festival circuit.

Sign up