Media Buildings - New Concepts Communicate

Nice article in the NYTimes today about 3 new buildings, dedicated to media, breaking new ground on interacting with the public... WGBH in Brighton, MA, the Newseum in Washington, DC and the Newhouse School of Public Communication at Syracuse University. Love it.

On WGBH:

The building’s facade is itself a media element: a digital skin that will project varying LED images every day. (The city prohibits any text display there because of broader concerns about commercialization.) On a gray morning, for example, the electronic mural could display fluffy white clouds in a deep blue sky.

The notion is to have the building consistently engaging with the public. “Hopefully people will think, ‘What is WGBH going to throw at me today?’ ” Mr. Olcott said.


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/arts/design/19pols.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1190194695-pkVG8DJHPUPpFuWMMjzRpQ

EMU Quotable - Amen, Sister

"Things grow here."

-Amy Potter, Program Assistant, Practice Institute at Eastern Mennonite University reflecting on the wonder of life and work in the Shenandoah Valley

http://www.emu.edu/personnel/people/show/pottera

Center for Justice and Peacebuilding Students

Here's a link from Eastern Mennonite University with bios of my fellow Center for Justice and Peacebuilding graduate students. Gosh, they're a pretty amazing bunch:

https://www.emu.edu/ctp/new-students

The Point - The Photojournalist

On this edition of The Point for SUTV, I interview Pulitzer Prize-nominated photojournalist Bernie Boston and his wife Peggy about being witness to the civil rights era, decades at the White House, scores of front page news stories... and their new phase of life in the Shenandoah Valley.

Watch 7 minutes now on YouTube:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=oaNzF6OeHOQ

Peacebuilding This Week - 9/11, Another Lens

On the 6th anniversary of the 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington DC, EMU Conflict Transformation Masters Program student and Fulbright Scholar Boniface Cheembe from Zambia said he was receiving calls from overseas asking how people in this country were observing the day. He told them he couldn't speak for the rest of the country, but he felt right to be in a class called Conflict Analysis examining the root causes of the struggle between the U.S. and Al Qaeda.

Fellow CJP student Michele Edwards forwarded this thought provoking link - about a few cautious voices beginning to suggest the unthinkable... that maybe it is time to consider talking to Al Qaeda. See what you think...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070913/ts_nm/alqaeda_dialogue_dc

Sunday Quotable

"Nothing is so harmful to inventing as a critical sense waiting to pounce on the drawbacks of any new idea. Judgement hinders imagination. "

-Roger Fisher, Warren Ury
"Getting to Yes"
Harvard Negotiation Project

Peacebuilding Idea of the Week - Red Dots

Classes for my Conflict Transformation Masters program at Eastern Mennonite University began this week and among so many interesting thoughts and ideas swirling around, one local effort described by a Virginia teacher named Michele in my Analysis class struck me as simple and important.

After tragedies like Virginia Tech and Colombine, Michele said that teachers and administrators in her school write the names of all of their students on a chart and if any teacher has a connection with a student, a red dot is placed next to the student's name.

Students who have no dots; those who are not communicative, not known, who have the potential to fall between the cracks of society, those students are sought out by teachers and administrators to connect in some way. They schedule lunch, a talk, a deliberate effort of interaction with the student in the hopes of creating a web of community which they hope will stave off a spiraling of those "no dot" students into violence.

Quarryography in Stonington Maine

Here is what I did with my summer vacation! Thanks to co-worker/all around cool guy producer David Norman - I was part of a Shenandoah University crew that made a 14 hour trek to Stonington, Maine (and back!) to film a gorgeous, quirky, touching performance called Quarryography. The dance is directed by renowned choreographer Alison Chase in collaboration with Mia Kanazawa.

The two bring professional dancers, university students and their beloved community together to show us what goes on at the local quarry when no one is watching...

Watch 3 minutes now on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xZccJxuaw0