April 2002
Program Notes
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First Week (April 6 - 12)
Mean Screen Babes
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From the female warriors of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to the superhuman
heroines of X-Men, tough women are breaking box office records. Some look at these
screen fighter babes as a sign that Hollywood has finally given in to gender equity.
But others say these female action heroes do nothing to advance society's notions
of women. Sociologist Martha McCaughey (VT), co-editor of Reel Knockouts:
Violent Women in the Movies, wrestles with the questions posed by such films.
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Second Week (April 13 - 19)
The Quantum and the Lotus
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Over the past 20 years, the Dalai Lama and other Buddhist thinkers have shown
a great interest in the convergence - and divergence - between their religion
and science. At conferences with such themes as Science and Compassion and Sleeping,
Dreaming and Dying, Buddhist scholars and scientists have each learned how to
think like the other. Astrophysicist Trinh Xuan Thuan (UVa) was born a
Buddhist in Vietnam. In his book The Quantum and the Lotus he weighs some
of the great questions of moral and physical existence from the perspectives of
his spiritual and academic training. Also featured: For all the advances in science,
no one has yet figured out a way to avoid death. Leslie Blackhall (UVa),
director of the Center for Geriatrics and Palliative Care, offers doctors, patients
and their families insights into dealing with the end of life.
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Third Week (April 20 - 26)
Mass Extinction
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When it comes to mass extinctions, dinosaurs get all the press. But there were
actually five mass extinctions of life in earth's history and the one that wiped
out tyrannosaurus rex wasn't even the largest. Now a majority of the nation's
biologists agree that we are in the midst of the greatest extermination of living
species since the end of the dinosaurs. Is mankind causing the earth's sixth great
mass extinction? Paleontologist Mark Reinhold (JMU) and biologist Barbara
Savitzky (CNU) examine the evidence and recall the great disappearances of
ages past. Also featured: A peek inside dinosaur eggs.
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Fourth Week (April 27 - May 3)
The Many Stories of Nat Turner
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He is a cold-blooded murderer to some, a revolutionary to others. This much
is certain. In August 1831, Nat Turner and about sixty other slaves rampaged through
the countryside of Southampton County, Virginia, killing fifty-seven whites before
their murderous spree was stopped. Turner was captured about two months after
the rampage, tried and hanged. His story has been told by many. And each has offered
a different explanation for his actions. Who was the real Nat Turner? And how
did each of his storytellers shape him to fit their own messages? Archivist Lucious
Edwards (VSU) and historian Scot French (UVa), author of the forthcoming
Remembering Nat Turner: The Rebellious Slave in American Thought, seek
to answer. Also featured: William Styron visits the set of a documentary about
Turner and recalls the controversy surrounding the publication of his Confessions
of Nat Turner in 1967.
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