Finding Common Ground Speaker Series: High Desert Partnership
Learn about the many ways the High Desert Partnership in Harney County supports a community of diverse perspectives to collaboratively solve the complex challenges facing rural America. Speakers include Brenda Smith, executive director of HDP; Mara Polenz, communications director; Josh Hanson, forest and range ecological coordinator; Kaylee Littlefield, community involvement and monitoring coordinator; Melissa Petschauer, Harney Basin ecological coordinator; Camille Torres, collaborative project coordinator; and Denise Rose, Harney internship coordinator.
This event is supported by a Minigrant for Rural Libraries from Oregon Humanities.
Buying In
Michael Heald explores the history and recent reemergence of worker-owned cooperatives in Oregon.
For the People
Jordan Hernandez writes about how Oregon libraries are responding to the evolving needs of their communities.
The Toxins Beneath Us
Ruby McConnell on the long legacy of groundwater contamination in Oregon
Conversation Project: Housing and Belonging
Housing and homelessness is a visible and divisive issue in local media, in politics, and across different communities within our state. Many of us were experiencing housing instability and economic uncertainty even during the “boom” times before the current crisis. This conversation will explore common assumptions and perspectives about the experience of houselessness/homelessness and seek to answer the question, How do we decide who “belongs” in our community?
Learn more and register for this event at cocc.edu/seasonofnonviolence.
"Farming Is So Much More than Food"
An interview with Megan Horst of Portland State University on the future of Oregon's food systems. By Dylan Jefferies
Getting to the Roots of Climate Change
Bob Devine on why the market alone can't solve the problems of a warming planet
Consider This: Why Does Housing Cost So Much?
Join us for a conversation with people who are working in different ways on making housing more affordable for Oregonians: Kim McCarty, executive director of Community Alliance of Tenants; Lorelei Juntunen of ECONorthwest; and developer Eli Spevak.
Connect in Place: From Marijuana to Cannabis - The New Normal
After nearly a century of attempted federal prohibition, cannabis is woven into the fabric of our mainstream society, from entertainment platforms to publicly traded corporations. Join Ryan Stroud to reflect on the impacts of these changes on ourselves and our communities.
Saved by the Bell
Food writer Heather Arndt Anderson on how childhood poverty and working in the school cafeteria shaped her connection with her subject.
Things Gleaned
Gleaning, the ancient practice of salvaging of unsold food for redistribution, has made a big comeback in the 21st Century. Eugene writer Ruby McConnell writes about her experience with striving to let nothing go to waste.
Mama Will Feed You
A mother’s journey through cultural reclamation, changing food systems, and the new wave of mutual aid
Consider This: Women in Business
Jackson County Library Services presents an hourlong panel discussion with local women business owners on how they have navigated challenges in order to find or create opportunity for success, followed by a thirty-minute Q&A. This event is sponsored by Oregon Humanities.
Full Membership
My thoughts, ambitions, and dreams did not have a gender. Why did my pay?
Talking about Independent Labor and Systemic Inequality
A conversation with writer Emilly Prado about freelance work, self-employment, and how our systems not always support workers in informal economies.
Mask Makers
Photojournalist Katharine Kimball documents DIY efforts in Hood River to manufacture personal protective equipment to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.
CANCELED Conversation Project: How Do Our Values Influence Environmental Policy?
Most of us would agree that natural resources and our surrounding environment have value, but what that value is—and how to protect it—are usually up for debate. Given competing interests and visions of the public good, how do we protect our common resources such as land, water, and air? Join philosopher Monica Mueller to explore our environmental values and question how those values are reflected—or not reflected—in current local, national, and global environmental policies.
This event has been postponed and will be rescheduled at a later date.CANCELED - Conversation Project: Seeing the Forest and the Trees
We live in a state with abundant forests, and yet we don’t all see the same thing when we look into the woods. Oregon is known for both its timber industry and its deep environmental values. For many decades now management of our public forests has made headlines and driven apart neighbors. Facilitator Mariah Acton will lead this conversation to explore the values, identities, and beliefs we each have about our forests and what we, as a state, do to steward, manage, and protect this special resource. This event will take place in the large meeting room.
This event has been postponed and will be rescheduled.Talking about Retirement
A conversation with Jason Arias on the importance of talking more about retirement in our communities.
CANCELED - Seeing the Forest and the Trees: Stewarding Our Public Forests
We live in a state with abundant forests, and yet we don’t all see the same thing when we look into the woods. Oregon is known for both its timber industry and its deep environmental values. For many decades now management of our public forests has made headlines and driven apart neighbors. Facilitator Mariah Acton will lead this conversation to explore the values, identities, and beliefs we each have about our forests and what we, as a state, do to steward, manage, and protect this special resource.
This event has been postponed and will be rescheduled.CANCELED - What We Owe: Living with Debt
Debt has bound people together and driven them apart for millennia. Oppressive debt has played a role in major social revolutions that have resulted in the clearing of debt records, yet there are other debts, like the cost of being born, for which many could not imagine demanding repayment. In the past ten years, US national debt and personal debt have reached all-time highs—levels at which full repayment may seem implausible. But is repayment even necessary? Join educator April Slabosheski in a conversation that asks, What constitutes debt? How does debt shape the way we relate to one another? How do we decide which debts we will repay, and which we will not?
This conversation has been postponed and will be rescheduled.CANCELED - Live to Work or Work to Live?: Exploring What Makes a Job Good
Most adults spend most of their waking hours working. Yet, we rarely have the time to consider why certain work brings us satisfaction and other work does not. Do our jobs define our personal success? Are some jobs more valuable than others? How do jobs contribute to national success or failure? This conversation, led by historian Nikki Mandell, will engage participants in thinking about and discussing work more deeply. Participants will explore the quality and meanings of work in their own lives and those of people different from themselves and the connections between work as a personal endeavor and jobs as part of local and national economies. This conversation can be adapted to the needs and goals of the host organization and group of participants.
This event has been postponed and will be rescheduled.Fair Share: What Makes a Good Tax?
People and businesses expect certain public services—education, transportation, protection, to name a few—and “tax” is the word we use to indicate how we pay for these services. But among taxpayers, areas of frequent and vehement disagreement are what constitutes a needed public service, how much we should pay for those services, and who will be taxed (and how) for them. The conversation, led by facilitator Mary Nolan, will explore the effects—both intended and unintended—of different types of taxes and invite participants to examine and understand their own ideas and their neighbors’ ideas about the best and worst characteristics of local, state, and federal taxes.
Who Are the Deserving Poor?
If you’ve grown up in the United States, chances are you’ve been conditioned to trust that your individual success is earned through hard work. But if this is the case, what do we make of the millions of Americans who struggle with poverty, hunger, and job insecurity? Who is to blame for poverty? What qualities or conditions allow a person to be considered “deserving” of government and community support? Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
The Middle Class and Other Stories About Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? When does talking about class turn into class warfare, or pandering, or simple confusion? To what extent can we talk about class without talking about race, ethnicity, and cultural background? Class is clearly related to wealth and money, but it also involves much more than that, from education to dress to the shows we watch, the words we use, and the clothes we wear. What are the measures and markers that help us recognize class, and to what extent is class useful for seeing our state, our neighbors, and ourselves?
Talking about Wages and Pay Equity
A conversation with Samantha Bakall on how sharing how much we earn can further equality in the workplace.
Conversation Project: Who Are the Deserving Poor?
If you’ve grown up in the United States, chances are you’ve been conditioned to trust that your individual success is earned through hard work. But if this is the case, what do we make of the millions of Americans who struggle with poverty, hunger, and job insecurity? Who is to blame for poverty? What qualities or conditions allow a person to be considered “deserving” of government and community support? Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
The State That Timber Built—2012
Tara Rae Miner considers what Oregon owes to the struggling timber communities that helped shape the state’s identity in this essay from the 2012 “Here” issue.
CANCELED - Conversation Project: Fair Share
People and businesses expect certain public services—education, transportation, protection, to name a few—and “tax” is the word we use to indicate how we pay for these services. But among taxpayers, areas of frequent and vehement disagreement are what constitutes a needed public service, how much we should pay for those services, and who will be taxed (and how) for them. The conversation, led by facilitator Mary Nolan, will explore the effects—both intended and unintended—of different types of taxes and invite participants to examine and understand their own ideas and their neighbors’ ideas about the best and worst characteristics of local, state, and federal taxes. The admission fee for this conversation is $5. This event will take place in the grange hall.
This event has been postponed and will be rescheduled.Conversation Project: Who Are the Deserving Poor?
If you’ve grown up in the United States, chances are you’ve been conditioned to trust that your individual success is earned through hard work. But if this is the case, what do we make of the millions of Americans who struggle with poverty, hunger, and job insecurity? Who is to blame for poverty? What qualities or conditions allow a person to be considered “deserving” of government and community support? Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
Cancelled: Conversation Project: Hunger in Our Communities
Hunger and its related problems are steadily increasing in the state of Oregon. At the same time, many Oregonians experience pride from living in an area with such abundant and sustainable food production. How can these truths about our state—both the hunger and the abundance—coexist? To understand the root causes of why hunger exists in our communities, we must also look at how we view hunger. Do we see hunger as an individual problem or a systemic one? How does hunger affect our individual identities as well as our sense of community? Facilitator Surabhi Mahajan will lead participants in a conversation to explore the connections between the constructed story of hunger and the current and possible solutions to end hunger. This event will take place in the Flora room.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories About Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? When does talking about class turn into class warfare, or pandering, or simple confusion? To what extent can we talk about class without talking about race, ethnicity, and cultural background? Class is clearly related to wealth and money, but it also involves much more than that, from education to dress to the shows we watch, the words we use, and the clothes we wear. What are the measures and markers that help us recognize class, and to what extent is class useful for seeing our state, our neighbors, and ourselves? This event will take place at PCC Rock Creek Event Center, Section A.
Conversation Project: Seeing the Forest and the Trees
We live in a state with abundant forests, and yet we don’t all see the same thing when we look into the woods. Oregon is known for both its timber industry and its deep environmental values. For many decades now management of our public forests has made headlines and driven apart neighbors. Facilitator Mariah Acton will lead this conversation to explore the values, identities, and beliefs we each have about our forests and what we, as a state, do to steward, manage, and protect this special resource.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories About Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? When does talking about class turn into class warfare, or pandering, or simple confusion? To what extent can we talk about class without talking about race, ethnicity, and cultural background? Class is clearly related to wealth and money, but it also involves much more than that, from education to dress to the shows we watch, the words we use, and the clothes we wear. What are the measures and markers that help us recognize class, and to what extent is class useful for seeing our state, our neighbors, and ourselves?
Conversation Project: Live to Work or Work to Live?
Most adults spend most of their waking hours working. Yet, we rarely have the time to consider why certain work brings us satisfaction and other work does not. Do our jobs define our personal success? Are some jobs more valuable than others? How do jobs contribute to national success or failure? This conversation, led by historian Nikki Mandell, will engage participants in thinking about and discussing work more deeply. Participants will explore the quality and meanings of work in their own lives and those of people different from themselves and the connections between work as a personal endeavor and jobs as part of local and national economies. This conversation can be adapted to the needs and goals of the host organization and group of participants.
Conversation Project: Who Are the Deserving Poor?
If you’ve grown up in the United States, chances are you’ve been conditioned to trust that your individual success is earned through hard work. But if this is the case, what do we make of the millions of Americans who struggle with poverty, hunger, and job insecurity? Who is to blame for poverty? What qualities or conditions allow a person to be considered “deserving” of government and community support? Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
Conversation Project: Who Are the Deserving Poor?
If you’ve grown up in the United States, chances are you’ve been conditioned to trust that your individual success is earned through hard work. But if this is the case, what do we make of the millions of Americans who struggle with poverty, hunger, and job insecurity? Who is to blame for poverty? What qualities or conditions allow a person to be considered “deserving” of government and community support? Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories About Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? When does talking about class turn into class warfare, or pandering, or simple confusion? To what extent can we talk about class without talking about race, ethnicity, and cultural background? Class is clearly related to wealth and money, but it also involves much more than that, from education to dress to the shows we watch, the words we use, and the clothes we wear. What are the measures and markers that help us recognize class, and to what extent is class useful for seeing our state, our neighbors, and ourselves?
Conversation Project: Crime and Punishment in Oregon
From prisons and youth correctional facilities to schools and county jails, we’re surrounded by institutions that punish. But why do we punish? Why is punishment sometimes sanctioned by the state? Critics of the “prison industrial complex” argue that our methods and scale of punishment are informed by profit, while tough-on-crime policymakers believe that punishment must be meaningful enough to prevent recidivism and ensure public safety. Are there other ways to punish—such as restorative justice—that may be more effective, reasonable, or desirable? Philosopher and writer Monica Mueller facilitates a conversation around these questions and others regarding our motivation, purpose, and methods of punishment.
Conversation Project: Fish Tales
Oregonians love the wild beauty of our 363 miles of coastline, but finding truly local seafood can be hard, even on the coast. The US imports approximately 90 percent of its seafood and ships out nearly as much to the global market. Why aren’t we eating more local seafood, now that preserving and distribution technologies are the most sophisticated they have ever been? Why do we consider seafood more a delicacy now than it has been in the past? In this conversation, food writer Jennifer Burns Bright helps participants explore our relationship with the products of the sea and cultural traditions involving fishing, eating seafood, and understanding the ocean’s bounty and challenges.
The Life We Pay For
Tina Ontiveros writes about the different paths her life and her sister's have taken since their shared childhood experiences of poverty and abandonment.
Conversation Project: Sharing Our Lives with Animals
Whether we find ourselves on farms or ranches, in cities, or in other places between, our lives are entangled with the lives of other species. Our experiences with domestic animals—in particular those considered pets or livestock—affect the ways we understand relationships with them, who we value and depend upon in wildly different ways. As scientific research and broader cultural shifts challenge common notions about the intelligence and emotional lives of other beings, we face complex quandaries of how to respectfully recognize and care for the needs of domestic companions. For this conversation, artist and educator Karin Bolender Hart invites us to share our own animal stories, consider how our personal experiences and beliefs about the lives of animals shape the stories we tell, and reflect on how these stories in turn affect our choices as caretakers, farmers, consumers, and companions.
Conversation Project: What We Owe
Debt has bound people together and driven them apart for millennia. Oppressive debt has played a role in major social revolutions that have resulted in the clearing of debt records, yet there are other debts, like the cost of being born, for which many could not imagine demanding repayment. In the past ten years, US national debt and personal debt have reached all-time highs—levels at which full repayment may seem implausible. But is repayment even necessary? Join educator April Slabosheski in a conversation that asks, What constitutes debt? How does debt shape the way we relate to one another? How do we decide which debts we will repay, and which we will not?
Conversation Project: What Makes a Good Tax?
People and businesses expect certain public services—education, transportation, protection, to name a few—and “tax” is the word we use to indicate how we pay for these services. But among taxpayers, areas of frequent and vehement disagreement are what constitutes a needed public service, how much we should pay for those services, and who will be taxed (and how) for them. The conversation, led by facilitator Mary Nolan, will explore the effects—both intended and unintended—of different types of taxes and invite participants to examine and understand their own ideas and their neighbors’ ideas about the best and worst characteristics of local, state, and federal taxes.
Conversation Project: Hunger in Our Communities
Hunger and its related problems are steadily increasing in the state of Oregon. At the same time, many Oregonians experience pride from living in an area with such abundant and sustainable food production. How can these truths about our state—both the hunger and the abundance—coexist? To understand the root causes of why hunger exists in our communities, we must also look at how we view hunger. Do we see hunger as an individual problem or a systemic one? How does hunger affect our individual identities as well as our sense of community? Facilitator Surabhi Mahajan will lead participants in a conversation to explore the connections between the constructed story of hunger and the current and possible solutions to end hunger.
Conversation Project: Seeing the Forest and the Trees
We live in a state with abundant forests, and yet we don’t all see the same thing when we look into the woods. Oregon is known for both its timber industry and its deep environmental values. For many decades now management of our public forests has made headlines and driven apart neighbors. Facilitator Mariah Acton will lead this conversation to explore the values, identities, and beliefs we each have about our forests and what we, as a state, do to steward, manage, and protect this special resource.
Conversation Project: Who Are the Deserving Poor?
If you’ve grown up in the United States, chances are you’ve been conditioned to trust that your individual success is earned through hard work. But if this is the case, what do we make of the millions of Americans who struggle with poverty, hunger, and job insecurity? Who is to blame for poverty? What qualities or conditions allow a person to be considered “deserving” of government and community support? Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
Conversation Project: Sharing Our Lives with Animals
Whether we find ourselves on farms or ranches, in cities, or in other places between, our lives are entangled with the lives of other species. Our experiences with domestic animals—in particular those considered pets or livestock—affect the ways we understand relationships with them, who we value and depend upon in wildly different ways. As scientific research and broader cultural shifts challenge common notions about the intelligence and emotional lives of other beings, we face complex quandaries of how to respectfully recognize and care for the needs of domestic companions. For this conversation, artist and educator Karin Bolender Hart invites us to share our own animal stories, consider how our personal experiences and beliefs about the lives of animals shape the stories we tell, and reflect on how these stories in turn affect our choices as caretakers, farmers, consumers, and companions.
Conversation Project: Does Higher Education Matter?
Higher education is considered essential for individuals seeking employment opportunities, social and cultural advancement, and a more secure financial future. No matter your background or privilege, a college degree is automatically assumed to multiply your opportunities. But in the current cycles of escalating tuition costs, ballooning student loan debt, and a crumbling secondary education infrastructure in Oregon, we have an increasing need to examine the purposefulness and meaningfulness of higher education in our day-to-day lives. Join educator and activist Paul Susi in a discussion that will examine our assumptions and values around education and its impact on our lives.
Conversation Project: Seeing the Forest and the Trees
We live in a state with abundant forests, and yet we don’t all see the same thing when we look into the woods. Oregon is known for both its timber industry and its deep environmental values. For many decades now management of our public forests has made headlines and driven apart neighbors. Facilitator Mariah Acton will lead this conversation to explore the values, identities, and beliefs we each have about our forests and what we, as a state, do to steward, manage, and protect this special resource.
Returned
Caitlyn May covers the complicated story behind the closure of Douglas County's libraries and their difficult paths to reopening sustainably.
Conversation Project: Seeing the Forest and the Trees
Stewarding Our Public Forests
Conversation Project: Hunger in Our Communities
Facilitator Surabhi Mahajan will lead participants in a conversation to explore the connections between the constructed story of hunger and the current and possible solutions to end hunger.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories About Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? When does talking about class turn into class warfare, or pandering, or simple confusion? To what extent can we talk about class without talking about race, ethnicity, and cultural background? Class is clearly related to wealth and money, but it also involves much more than that, from education to dress to the shows we watch, the words we use, and the clothes we wear. What are the measures and markers that help us recognize class, and to what extent is class useful for seeing our state, our neighbors, and ourselves?
Conversation Project: Fish Tales
Oregonians love the wild beauty of our 363 miles of coastline, but finding truly local seafood can be hard, even on the coast. The US imports approximately 90 percent of its seafood and ships out nearly as much to the global market. Why aren’t we eating more local seafood, now that preserving and distribution technologies are the most sophisticated they have ever been? Why do we consider seafood more a delicacy now than it has been in the past? In this conversation, food writer Jennifer Burns Bright helps participants explore our relationship with the products of the sea and cultural traditions involving fishing, eating seafood, and understanding the ocean’s bounty and challenges.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories About Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? When does talking about class turn into class warfare, or pandering, or simple confusion? To what extent can we talk about class without talking about race, ethnicity, and cultural background? Class is clearly related to wealth and money, but it also involves much more than that, from education to dress to the shows we watch, the words we use, and the clothes we wear. What are the measures and markers that help us recognize class, and to what extent is class useful for seeing our state, our neighbors, and ourselves?
Conversation Project: Hunger in Our Communities
Hunger and its related problems are steadily increasing in the state of Oregon. At the same time, many Oregonians experience pride from living in an area with such abundant and sustainable food production. How can these truths about our state—both the hunger and the abundance—coexist? To understand the root causes of why hunger exists in our communities, we must also look at how we view hunger. Do we see hunger as an individual problem or a systemic one? How does hunger affect our individual identities as well as our sense of community? Facilitator Surabhi Mahajan will lead participants in a conversation to explore the connections between the constructed story of hunger and the current and possible solutions to end hunger.
Conversation Project: What We Owe
Debt has bound people together and driven them apart for millennia. Oppressive debt has played a role in major social revolutions that have resulted in the clearing of debt records, yet there are other debts, like the cost of being born, for which many could not imagine demanding repayment. In the past ten years, US national debt and personal debt have reached all-time highs—levels at which full repayment may seem implausible. But is repayment even necessary? Join educator April Slabosheski in a conversation that asks, What constitutes debt? How does debt shape the way we relate to one another? How do we decide which debts we will repay, and which we will not?
POSTPONED: Conversation Project: Hunger in Our Communities
Hunger and its related problems are steadily increasing in the state of Oregon. At the same time, many Oregonians experience pride from living in an area with such abundant and sustainable food production. How can these truths about our state—both the hunger and the abundance—coexist? To understand the root causes of why hunger exists in our communities, we must also look at how we view hunger. Do we see hunger as an individual problem or a systemic one? How does hunger affect our individual identities as well as our sense of community? Facilitator Surabhi Mahajan will lead participants in a conversation to explore the connections between the constructed story of hunger and the current and possible solutions to end hunger.
Conversation Project: Sharing Our Lives with Animals
Whether we find ourselves on farms or ranches, in cities, or in other places between, our lives are entangled with the lives of other species. Our experiences with domestic animals—in particular those considered pets or livestock—affect the ways we understand relationships with them, who we value and depend upon in wildly different ways. As scientific research and broader cultural shifts challenge common notions about the intelligence and emotional lives of other beings, we face complex quandaries of how to respectfully recognize and care for the needs of domestic companions. For this conversation, artist and educator Karin Bolender Hart invites us to share our own animal stories, consider how our personal experiences and beliefs about the lives of animals shape the stories we tell, and reflect on how these stories in turn affect our choices as caretakers, farmers, consumers, and companions. Admission Fee: $5
Conversation Project: Fish Tales
Traditions and Challenges of Seafood in Oregon
Conversation Project: Seeing the Forest for the Trees:
Stewarding Our Public Forests
Conversation Project: Does Higher Education Matter?
Join educator and activist Paul Susi in a discussion that will examine our assumptions and values around education and its impact on our lives.
Conversation Project: Why DIY? Self-sufficiency and American Life
This conversation investigates why we strive to be makers and doers in a world that provides more conveniences than ever before. How might the “new industrial revolution” of tinkerers and crafters affect American schools and workplaces?
Conversation Project: Fish Tales
Traditions and Challenges of Seafood in Oregon
Conversation Project: How Do Our Values Influence Environmental Policy?
Given competing interests and visions of the public good, how do we protect our common resources such as land, water, and air? Join philosopher Monica Mueller to explore our environmental values and question how those values are reflected—or not reflected—in current local, national, and global environmental policies.
Conversation Project: Who Are the Deserving Poor?
Join facilitator Erica Tucker for a conversation that explores our beliefs about poverty and asks us to consider our assumptions about who should—and shouldn’t—be eligible for support.
Conversation Project: Sharing Our Lives with Animals
Artist and educator Karin Bolender Hart invites us to share our own animal stories, consider how our personal experiences and beliefs about the lives of animals shape the stories we tell, and reflect on how these stories in turn affect our choices as caretakers, farmers, consumers, and companions.
How Do Our Values Influence Environmental Policy?
Given competing interests and visions of the public good, how do we protect our common resources such as land, water, and air? Join philosopher Monica Mueller to explore our environmental values and question how those values are reflected—or not reflected—in current local, national, and global environmental policies.
What Makes a Good Tax?
The conversation, led by facilitator Mary Nolan, will explore the effects—both intended and unintended—of different types of taxes and invite participants to examine and understand their own ideas and their neighbors’ ideas about the best and worst characteristics of local, state, and federal taxes.
Conversation Project: Fish Tales
Traditions and Challenges of Seafood in Oregon
True Costs
Editor Kathleen Holt on the immeasurable obligations between parents and children
Never Paid in Full
April Slabosheski on what Holocaust reparations can teach us about seemingly immeasurable debts
Buying Time
Wendy N. Wagner on what we owe our children
Conversation Project: What Makes a Job Good?
This conversation engages participants in exploring the quality and meanings of work in their own lives and in the lives of others.
Conversation Project: What We Owe
Living With Debt
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories about Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention?
Think & Drink with Rinku Sen and Mary Li
The 2017–18 Think & Drink series on race, power, and justice concludes with a conversation with Rinku Sen. Sen is a senior strategist for Race Forward, a national organization that advances racial justice through research, media and practice, and a contributing writer for the organization’s daily news site, Colorlines.
Conversation Project: What Makes a Job Good?
This conversation, led by historian Nikki Mandell, will engage participants in thinking about and discussing work more deeply. Participants will explore the quality and meanings of work in their own lives and those of people different from themselves and the connections between work as a personal endeavor and jobs as part of local and national economies.
Protecting Inequality
Anoop Mirpuri on the economic causes of racist policing
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories about Wealth, Status, and Power
Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation. What exactly, for example, is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention?
On Bearing Bad News
Robert Leo Heilman writes about trying and failing to save library services in Douglas County.
Conversation Project: What Makes a Job Good? *POSTPONED*
Most adults spend most of their waking hours working. Yet, we rarely have the time to consider why certain work brings us satisfaction and other work does not. This conversation, led by historian Nikki Mandell, will engage participants in thinking about and discussing work more deeply.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories about Wealth, Status, and Power
What exactly is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation.
Conversation Project: The Middle Class and Other Stories about Wealth, Status, and Power
What exactly is the middle class, who does it include and exclude, and why does it get so much attention? Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that explores what we think and how we talk about class in Oregon and the nation.
My Brother's Keeper: "Waging a Living"
This fall, Four Rivers Cultural Center in Ontario will present My Brother's Keeper, a series of eight documentary film screenings exploring the lives of marginalized peoples and issues such as mental health, addiction, and mass incarceration. Each screening will be followed by a presentation and Q&A session by a local nonprofit or government agency.
Think & Drink on Tourism in Tillamook County
Tillamook County Pioneer Museum and Oregon Humanities present a conversation on the challenges and benefits of tourism in Tillamook County.
Conversation Project: Are International Trade Agreements Good for Oregon?
Oregonians have been active and vocal participants in global debates over trade since the creation of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). Lawyer and researcher Michael Fakhri will lead participants in a conversation about how we assess the value of international trade agreements.
Think & Drink on Poverty, Displacement, and Inequality
A conversation with Portland leaders and activists working on creative ways to mitigate the effects of the city's housing shortage and build more stable, prosperous communities.
Gaining Ground Film Screening and Discussion
This is an Oregon Humanities grant-funded event.
Future: Portland 2
Grappling with values, change, and nostalgia has shaped—and continues to shape—the largest city in Oregon. A film by Ifanyi Bell
Sunday, Laundry Day
Every quarter counts in subsidized senior housing. An essay by Josephine Cooper
Stolen Land and Borrowed Dollars
Creative resistance bloomed in the lead up to the Vancouver Olympics. An excerpt from Power Games: A Political History of the Olympics by Jules Boykoff
The Problem with the Immigration Problem
Elliot Young writes about the origins of the belief that immigrants harm our society
Origin Stories
The surprising beginnings of six of Oregons claims to fame
This Land Planned for You and Me
J. David Santen Jr. on what Oregon's communities look like forty years after the passage of Senate Bill 100
Who Cares About the Future of Music?
Opportunities and ethics in the age of Internet music streaming. An essay by Dave Allen
Food Forward
Robert Paarlberg on the history of the Green Revolution and the future of global food production
The State That Timber Built
Tara Rae Miner on what Oregon owes the struggling timber communities that helped shape the state’s identity
Clinging to the Dream
Why do Americans have such a hard time talking about class? An essay by Leigh van der Werff
Immobile Dreams
How did the trailer come to be a symbol of failure? An essay by Rebecca Hartman
Home Economics
Using the house to bridge the public/private divide.
A Nation of Can-Do Optimists
A brief history of American cheerfulness by Ariel Gore
Second Opinions
Camela Raymond asks economists, activists, public officials, and financiers for advice for Oregon's ailing economy.
Blank Slate
In a single day, a forty-year-old man finds himself unmarried and unemployed. What to do next? An essay by Dave Weich
Continual Watching
Historian Bob Bussel on Oregon's long history of protecting workers
The Working Class
Bette Lynch Husted argues that hard times are good times to rethink our attitudes about the fungibility of workers.
The Guilty Traveler
The complexities of being an American tourist in an inequitable world. An essay by Lucy Burningham