Welcome to the Gaede Institute!
Welcome to the Gaede Institute’s website. Here you’ll find information on our programs for strengthening liberal arts education and for providing liberal arts learning opportunities to the many communities Westmont intersects with beyond the academy. With the growing complexity of real world problems there is an ever greater need for people who bring a range of perspectives to social issues, and who recognize that their education is connected to the whole of their lives: their community involvement, their political engagement, their spiritual development, as well as their profession. We hope you’ll find the resources of the Gaede Institute helpful as together we seek to learn and teach for a complex world.
- Chris Hoeckley, Director
The Gendered Liberal Arts? Femininity, Masculinity, and the Future of Liberal Education
The Eleventh Annual Conversation on the Liberal Arts
February 24–25, 2012 • Santa Barbara, California
Register here.
How can the liberal arts help us understand gender as it intersects with race, class, sexuality, religious identity and global position?
How do the institutional and cultural functions of liberal education resist, or reinscribe, traditional notions of gender?
Is the liberal arts campus becoming a "feminized space"?
What, if anything, is liberating about the liberal arts for gendered beings?
Join faculty members and administrators from around the country as we explore the relationship between gender and the liberal arts. Click here for more on the unique format of the Conversation on the Liberal Arts.
2012 Conversation Planning Committee:
Jamie Friedman--assistant professor of English
Cheri Larsen Hoeckley--professor of English, coordinator of gender studies
Omedi Ochieng--associate professor of Communication Studies
Christian Hoeckley--director, Gaede Institute for the Liberal Arts.
MISS REPRESENTATION co-hosted by Dr. Deborah Dunn, Westmont's Gender Lecture Series, the office of Residence Life, and the Gaede Institute for the Liberal Arts.
A documentary by Jennifer Siebel Newsom
February 9 - Page Hall MPR - 7pm
Like drawing back a curtain to let bright light stream in, Miss Representation (90 min; TV-14 DL) uncovers a glaring reality we live with every day but fail to see. Written and directed by Jennifer Siebel Newsom, the film exposes how mainstream media contribute to the under-representation of women in positions of power and influence in America. The film challenges the media’s limited and often disparaging portrayals of women and girls, which make it difficult for women to achieve leadership positions and for the average woman to feel powerful herself.
Deborah Dunn is professor of Communication Studies at Westmont. The 2011-2012 Gender Lecture Series is directed by Dr. Cheri Larsen Hoeckley, associate professor of English. Dannny Clapp is the Assistant Director of Residence Life. Dr. Chris Hoeckley is director of the Gaede Institute for the Liberal Arts.
Last year's Gaede Institute programs
The Fine Art of the Liberal Arts
The Tenth Annual Conversation on the Liberal Arts
February 25–26, 2011 • Santa Barbara, California
How do the fine arts contribute to liberal arts education?
What are the challenges of teaching the fine arts in a liberal arts context?
What are the benefits?
to fine arts students?
to the broader liberal arts curriculum?
to the wider campus community?
Faculty members, administrators, and artists from around the country wrestled with the role of the fine arts in a liberal arts education. Our speakers were outstanding: poet and essayist Lewis Hyde, author of The Gift; visual artist Janet Echelman, creator of magnificent art installations for urban spaces; and composer and music educator, Harold Best, dean emeritus of the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music. We also enjoyed music, theater and dance performances throughout the weekend. Best of all, we learned from each other as we explored shared challenges and opportunities from our different perspectives. (Learn more.)
Gaza Mom Book Tour Stops at Westmont College
Laila El-Haddad, political analyst and social activist, shares her experiences in Gaza Mom: Palestine, Politics, Parenting, and Everything In Between . Watch the video.
February 14, 2011 • Santa Barbara, CA
Laila El-Haddad, a Palestinian journalist, chronicles her time spent in (and outside) Gaza from December 2004 through July 2010, in her new book Gaza Mom: Palestine, Politics, Parenting, and Everything in Between. El-Haddad weaves together her experiences as a Palestinian woman, journalist, political analyst, wife, and mother through a compilation of autobiographical stories, poetry, and photographs.
El-Haddad received her B.A. from Duke University and her MPP from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. She contributes regularly to the BBC and the Guardian Unlimited. She has made two Gaza-based documentaries for Al-Jazeera International and has contributed to the Beit-Sahur based Alternative Tourism Guide's Palestine guidebook. She has also written for The New Statesman, The Daily Star, Electronic Intifada, Le monde diplomatique, Pacifica Radio, and many other media outlets. She will visit Westmont to promote Gaza Mom and share her personal experiences as a Palestinian living in contemporary Gaza.
Join Laila El-Haddad Monday, February 14th, at 3:30pm in Hieronymous Lounge to hear a first-hand perspective on the Gaza conflict and to hear selected readings of Gaza Mom. Books will be available for purchase and signing.
For directions to campus click here.
Gaede Institute Hosts Woodrow Wilson Fellow
Bobbie Gottschalk of Seeds of Peace
Co-Creator of Seeds of Peace Discusses Reconciliation through Empowerment
November 1-5, 2010 • Santa Barbara, California
Seeds of Peace works with young leaders from regions of conflict, particulary Palestine, Israel, and Egypt, to encourage a movement towards reconciliation and cross-cultural cooperation. Through summer camps and workshops, Seeds of Peace empowers these youth with the leadership skills and confidence necessary to be bold, global, peacemakers. Westmont, in partnership with The Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellows program, will host co-creator, Bobbie Gottschalk, for a week-long conversation on the history of Seeds of Peace and our own role in seeking coexistence among global neighbors.
"Seeds is making a difference—one day at a time, one person at a time, one mind at a time, one heart at a time."
- Colin Powell, Former US Secretary of State
Join us Wednesday, November 3, at 7:00pm in Page Hall to learn more of the work of this remarkable woman and this remarkable organization. For directions to campus click here.
A full look at Ms. Gottschalk's week at Westmont can be found here.