Sustainability Matters

The sudden Russian aggression on Ukraine, besides wreaking havoc on the latter, has created a ripple effect impacting the socio-economic conditions of the rest of Europe and the world. The carefully built security order has been dismantled, necessitating the forging of new trade ties and alliances.  In the second episode of our new themed series War and Peace , Dr. Wolfgang Ischinger, former Germa...

Access to adequate food and nutrition is an essential human right. But ensuring food security has become a real challenge today. Climate change, natural disasters, and inefficient political systems are roadblocks in fortifying this basic need of human existence.  In this new episode, Dr. Olga Śniadach, Assistant Professor of European law at the University of Gdańsk, talks about the changing defini...

The UN has established a legal framework for marine and maritime activities called the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). It is a convention that allows fishing, shipping, and exploration rights, among others, to countries over waters owned by them. However, with wars and annexations of territories, the rights of ownership become ambiguous. In such cases, how far is the UNCL...

The climate crisis is here; its impacts are tangible. But surviving heat waves and hurricanes doesn’t mean we get through the crisis safe. What we need are systemic changes to the way we live and think.  If science tells us about the climate crisis and its consequences, the humanities tell us how to navigate the crisis through systems’ changes.  So, in this episode, we stitch together our conversa...

Amid recent debates on racial injustice in the U.S.A, it is important to acknowledge the brutal historical roots of modern-day racism. To truly understand this problem and stimulate more meaningful societal change, one cannot disconnect the present from the past. In this episode of Humanities Matter, Dr. Christine Sleeter, Professor Emerita at California State University Monterey Bay, discusses he...

One of the outcomes of globalization is the growth of diasporic communities worldwide. This population has continued to face a lot of complexities due to differences in ethnicities. However, these communities have the potential to contribute immensely to a nation’s development through their knowledge and skills. What is needed is to shed the ethnocentric lens for an inclusive one.  In the third ep...

The Soviet Republic once held tremendous sway over the politics of Central Asia as the grand hegemon of the region. But now, in the post-Soviet world, geopolitics in this region is influenced by other powers, including the European Union (EU), and Central Asia’s own tilt towards China. In this changed environment, is the EU adjusting its policies to foster strong democracies in the region free fro...

Yiddish is part of the family of Germanic languages with influences of Hebrew and Aramaic and encompasses many dialects spoken in several parts of Europe. This renders a diversity to the language, the development of which merits exploration through a close scrutiny of its history.  In this new episode, Dr. Bart Wallet, Professor of Jewish History at the Universiteit van Amsterdam, and Dr. Laura Al...

The Schengen area consists of 26 European states, most members of the EU but some not, and consists of two main features: the absence of intra-Schengen state border controls on persons and a common external border control on entry into the Schengen area. However, this inclusivity has been threatened over time by events like refugee crises, terrorism, and a global pandemic. In light of the present...

The Samaritans have been around since biblical times. They share history with the Jews, Christians, and Muslims; yet their identity is at odds with the people who trace their roots to ancient Israel. Who actually are Samaritans? And why did these biblical people turn into a micronation in this age?  In this new episode, Steven Fine, Dean Pinkhos Churgin Professor of Jewish History at Yeshiva Unive...

Populism has been at the center of academic and non-academic discussions over the past century and one may argue that there has been an upsurge in populist movements in recent times, often with prominent religious ideals determining the course of political thought. Is populism, then, the source of politics in religion, or does political theology beat at the heart of populism?  In this episode, Dr....

The emergence of self-government in the Jewish community in Eastern Europe has been a slow process, often encouraged by invitations of existing regimes and sometimes to escape state persecution. Nonetheless, the Jewish community has succeeded in establishing its autonomy as well as maintain a certain degree of control over its traditions.  In this new episode, François Guesnet, Professor of Modern...

The Pandemic led to a massive shift in the course of education as the world was forced to switch to distance learning. And with a new model comes new barriers, whether institutional, pedagogical, technical, or personal. These need to be solved through inclusive and strategic planning, comprehensive support infrastructure, collaboration among stakeholders, modern digital tools, and the creation of...

The pandemic has rapidly changed the world, making it one rife with online activity and information abundance. Education systems must be modified to match this new world. It must cater to the entrepreneurial, competitive, and independent generation that thrives in this world. In this podcast, Susana Gonçalves and Suzanne Majhanovich discuss their book Pandemic, Disruption and Adjustment in Higher...

Formal education became widespread only as recently as the end of the 19th century, as a way to train people for jobs created by the boom in industrialization. Today, with most of those jobs phasing out, world politics radically changing at both the individual and macro levels, diverse cultures and disciplines increasingly coming together as communities, and the pandemic catalyzing a global move t...

Education is one of our main weapons in the fight against climate change. The need of the hour, therefore, is to enhance the world’s commitment to climate education, and incorporate climate change into our education systems. In a special episode that combines two of our ongoing themed series, Survival by Degrees and Quality Education , Radhika Iyengar and Christina T. Kwauk, co-editors of the book...

Over the past few years and especially now— with COVID-19-related lockdowns necessitating that families stay at home—an increasing number of parents have chosen to home-school their children. This choice stems from several reasons: political views and distrust in the education system; anxiety about their children’s safety; or simply as an expression of their right to freedom. In the newest episode...

With radical changes being engineered in society, education systems everywhere need to match up. As part of our podcast, Humanities Matter, the all-new series, Quality Education , looks at ways to improve these systems.  Higher education has traditionally been viewed as a privilege affordable to only specific strata of society, mainly higher income groups. However, this trend is now changing, with...

The global trends of increasing climate change are predicted to intensify over the next few decades. General consensus remains that climate change is caused by actions of various entities at various levels, and it is nearly universally accepted that it is morally unacceptable. However, who does the onus of taking action against climate change lie with? In the fourth episode of our new themed serie...

The lives of ancient Egyptians were truly colorful, and of them, the royals led the most vivid lives. The military pharaohs have left behind many records that give us a glimpse into their warfare style and accounts. In this new episode, Anthony John Spalinger, Emeritus Professor of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Auckland, paints a captivating picture of the pharaoh court, based...

Oceans are inextricably linked to the climate. Today, oceans are warming far more rapidly than they have in the past 65 million years, placing the spotlight on the important nexus between climate change and the ocean. While there’s no doubt that climate change affects all people across the board, its effect is manifold among socioeconomically vulnerable communities, and among women in particular....

In May 2021, a landmark court order from a district court in the Netherlands ruled that Royal Dutch Shell, one of the largest fossil fuel companies in the world, needs to reduce its CO2 emissions by 45% by 2030. How did a court in the Netherlands pass a ruling on a global company? Does the Paris Agreement hold for transnational private entities like Shell? What does this mean for corporations goin...

As we see in the news every day, climate change is already upon us. The climate crisis is no longer a bridge to be crossed in the future. It must be dealt with today.  In this first episode of our new themed series Survival by Degrees , Dr. Nicolas Graham describes the influence of fossil fuels in sustaining our unending quest for economic growth and profit. He also highlights the drastic changes...

Gender, and regulations of and discourses on it, have historically been a cornerstone of the conservative Christian belief system. The stance of the Catholic Church on feminism, for instance, has often been criticized for being reductive and exclusionary. As Christianity has exerted a profound influence on the government and principles of the United States from the time of its founding, in this mo...

The rich and complex prose of the celebrated Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky provides a detailed look at the fabric of European literary and social discourse and continues to attract scholarly attention, even 200 years after his birth. 2021 marks the bicentenary of Dostoevsky’s birth. To commemorate this occasion, join us in conversation with Prof. Slobodanka Vladiv-Glover, Adjunct Associate Prof...