Opening ACGS

On May 24, the Amsterdam centre for Globalisation Studies was launched with a lecture by Prof. Patrice Petro (Professor of English, Film Studies, and Global Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) .  Affiliated with the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Amsterdam, the ACGS studies globalization and cultural transformation from a multidisciplinary perspective. The ACGS aims to become a key research centre providing a strong humanities contribution to current academic and public debates on the cultural, political and social implications of globalization.

The Lecture

Globalization and the Humanities:  Cosmopolitanism, Cities, Security

To mark the launch of the Amsterdam Centre for Globalisation Studies, this talk will explore the ways in which the humanities contribute to globalization research and how globalization research, in turn, engages with key issues in the humanities today. With a special focus on film and media studies, this talk will address concepts and issues that overlap and engage with the Amsterdam’s Centre’s research clusters (mobility, sustainability, aesthetics, and connectivity). These concepts and issues include cosmopolitanism, urbanism, and security, which benefit from a humanities perspective that mediates between diverse traditions, popular cultural aesthetics, and communities on a global scale.

Patrice Petro is Professor of English, Film Studies, and Global Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where she also serves as Vice Provost for International Education. She is the author and editor of ten books, including, most recently, Beyond Globalization: Making New Worlds in Media, Art, and Social Practices, (2011), Idols of Modernity: Movie Stars of the 1920s (2010), Rethinking Global Security: Media, Popular Culture, and the ‘War on Terror’ (2006), Global Cities: Cinema, Architecture, and Urbanism in a Digital Age, (2003), and Aftershocks of the New: Feminism and Film History (2002). She served as President of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies from 2007-2011.