Circuses were a popular form of entertainment in Nazi Germany and across Europe in the decades leading up to World War II. Jewish circus artists helped shape the industry in the late 19th century, and some—including a Jewish acrobat named Irene Danner—were saved by circuses during the Holocaust. Join the Museum for a program exploring […]

China and the U.S. are the two greatest emitters of carbon, so their environmental and economic policies have the power to either save or destroy the planet. Join us as two of the world’s leading climate thinkers—Jeffrey Sachs, an economist who runs Columbia University’s Center for Sustainable Development, and Ma Jun, founder of the Institute […]

Learn and practice Mandarin, while engaging with Chinese literature, poetry, history and more with fellow enthusiasts. Participants will enjoy live, interactive learning sessions with our language and cultural experts from home.

After World War II, Argentina became home to one of the world’s largest communities of Holocaust survivors at the same time as the country provided refuge to many former Nazis. Today, this complex legacy of the Holocaust interacts with other legacies of violence in Argentina, including the 1976 to 1983 dictatorship and the 1994 AMIA […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. Adrian Smith is the architect of more than 4,500 meters ­­– nearly 2.8 vertical miles – of skyscrapers. He has been the designer for eight structures in SUPERTALL! 2020: including Burj Khalifa in Dubai, the current world’s tallest man-made structure at 828 meters, and Jeddah Tower, under construction in Saudi Arabia, which […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. In The Invention of Public Space: Designing for Inclusion in Lindsay’s New York, Mariana Mogilevich details a watershed moment when designers, government administrators, and residents sought to remake New York City in the image of a diverse, free, and democratic society. Bringing together psychology, politics, and design, her new book considers a […]

For thousands of years, Chinese emperors, literati scholars, and great men of letters have waxed poetic about the pleasures of getting drunk. The distilled spirit known as “Baijiu,” 白酒，was developed by the Ming dynasty, but it was during the Communist era that this “working man’s drink” was elevated to the national sensation that we see […]

More than 7,000 Danish Jews were evacuated to Sweden in October 1943. After crossing the Øresund by boat and landing on Swedish shores, approximately 6,000 of the refugees were interviewed by the Swedish Police Authority, to whom they disclosed a wealth of information about their lives in Denmark and the logistics of their escape. The […]

In this lecture, Donald Johnson will discuss his book Occupied America: British Military Rule and the Experience of Revolution. In the midst of British military occupation, men and women from a variety of backgrounds navigated harsh conditions, mitigated threats to their families and livelihoods, took advantage of new opportunities, and balanced precariously between revolutionary and […]

Nobel Laureate Martin Karplus was eight years old when his family fled Nazi-occupied Austria, shortly after the arrival of German forces in 1938. They escaped via Switzerland and France to the United States, where he became a theoretical chemist. Karplus conducted groundbreaking work in the 1970s to develop multiscale models for complex chemical systems, for […]

Online discussion. At its core, economics is about making decisions. In the history of economic thought, great intellectual prowess has been exerted toward devising exquisite theories of optimal decision making in situations of constraint, risk and scarcity. Yet not all of our choices are purely logical, and so there is a long-standing tension between those […]

Literature experts discuss the work of Yu Hua, one of China’s most revered writers, and the state of Chinese literature today. Spanning four decades of modern history, from the Republican Era to the Reform Era, the novel To Live (活着) has enthralled generations of readers around the world. Professors David Der-wei Wang (Harvard University) and […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. Bill Baker is now a structural engineering consulting partner at SOM, where he led the firm’s practice for over twenty years. Since joining SOM in 1981, he has dedicated himself to extending the profession of structural engineering through design, research, teaching, and professional activities. Baker is best known for the development of […]

During the Holocaust, more than 3,000 women fought back against the Nazis in ghettos, forced labor camps, concentration camps, and partisan units. Join Dr. Lori Weintrob, Director of the Wagner College Holocaust Center, for a program exploring the heroic lives and legacies of these female resistance fighters. Weintrob will be in conversation with Rokhl Kafrissen, […]

Much is known about the lives of the emperors who lived behind the vermilion walls of the Forbidden City. But what of the women? In the third program of a series commemorating the 600th anniversary of the Forbidden City, Jan Stuart, top China curator at the Smithsonian, and Di Yajing, architecture expert from the Palace […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. Peter Weismantle spent 31 years in the Chicago office of SOM before moving in 2008 to AS+GG as Director of Supertall Building Technology where he has been responsible for overseeing the firm’s development of supertall projects from onset to completion. Working with the project team, Weismantle develops the design of such technical […]

Menachem Kaiser’s new book Plunder: A Memoir of Family Property and Nazi Treasure is the story of his quest to reclaim his family’s apartment building in Poland—and of the astonishing entanglement with Nazi treasure hunters that follows. Kaiser’s story begins when he takes up his Holocaust survivor grandfather’s former battle to reclaim the family’s apartment […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. Structural engineer Robert Sinn is a Principal in the Chicago office of Thornton Tomasetti. Before joining TT in 2007, Bob spent more than two decades at SOM, where he was responsible for such award-winning projects as the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in Spain, and Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago, which when […]

In this lecture, Michael Hattem will discuss his book Past and Prologue: Politics and Memory in the American Revolution. Between the 1760s and 1800s, Americans stopped thinking of the British past as their own history and created a new historical tradition that would form the foundation of what future generations would think of as "American […]

Learn and practice Mandarin, while engaging with Chinese literature, poetry, history and more with fellow enthusiasts. Participants will enjoy live, interactive learning sessions with our language and cultural experts from home. Each session will start with a read-aloud in Mandarin of a carefully selected poem which represents both a touchstone to Chinese culture as well […]

Language reclamation, pressures on language from current and historical dislocation and forced relocations, and filmmaking for educational purposes are some of the through lines that will be explored in our education roundtable, April 2. Smithsonian curator Mary Linn will moderate the live discussion with Ruben Reyes, director of "Garifuna in Peril," Ni Nyoman Clara Listya […]

Wright and New York turns upside down the conventional notion that Frank Lloyd Wright hated the city, and the city was antagonistic to him. In this illustrated lecture based on his new book, Anthony Alofsin outlines the developments in Wright’s life and work that demonstrate how New York turned around his career in the late […]

Until recently, a handful of fleet-footed Chinese companies and Tesla have dominated the Electric Vehicle market, as US “legacy” carmakers dragged their feet. But with a new administration in Washington and GM & Ford both recently announcing a full-fledged switch to EVs, the race is on. And the auto industry—from supply chains to labor force […]

Webinar. What exactly is a SPAC, or special purpose acquisition company? What would make some companies pick a SPAC over an IPO? And why are investors lining up to jump on the trend? Join us for an evening panel conversation explaining one of Wall Street’s hottest trends.

A shape-shifting trickster on a kung-fu quest for eternal life, Monkey King is the unforgettable protagonist of Journey to the West, one of China’s four great classic novels. Join us as China historian Julia Lovell, who recently translated the text for Penguin Classics, talks about her experience bringing the story to life for modern readers, […]

Webinar. Diversification is a core principle of investing. Yet money managers have not applied it to their own ranks. Only around 10% of portfolio managers—the people most directly responsible for investing your money—are female, and the numbers are even worse at the ownership level. What are the causes of this underrepresentation, and what are its […]

This is part of a series called Debate Defends Democracy. The Constitution intends the House to reflect the political will of each state’s populace, but are we all equally represented? With the decennial redistricting process getting underway, and state legislatures considering a raft of voting regulations in response to the record voter turnout of the […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. Mark Sarkisian is the structural and seismic engineering partner in SOM's San Francisco office. He holds fourteen U.S. and international patents for high-performance seismic structural mechanisms and environmentally responsible structural systems. Mark will discuss the structural design of SOM’s Jin Mao Tower, which when completed in 1999 at 420 m / 1,380 […]

This Pen Parentis Literary Salon features readings and a roundtable with the writers Marion Winik, Melanie Hatter and Marian Fontana. The theme is love and loss. Interactive Q&A with audience participation.

How can design and innovation bring life back to an ailing community? It’s a global challenge. Join us as XU Tiantian, one of China’s most innovative architects, presents inspiring projects in Zhejiang’s countryside and shares notes with Joel Mills of the American Institute of Architects about how great design can make a difference. In the […]

Webinar. Has there ever been a time when Abraham Lincoln has gone silent? Our immortal conscience on civil rights and individual freedom is speaking to us yet again in the time of COVID and public unrest. Yet Lincoln has managed to become even more relevant as we tackle infrastructure, healthcare, climate change and human rights. […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. Supertall projects have been central to Dennis Poon’s career as a structural engineer. Poon worked on the teams for the Petronas Towers (1998) in Kuala Lumpur and Taipei 101 (2004) in Taiwan, the first skyscrapers outside of the United States to become, in succession, the world’s tallest buildings. Dennis has extensive experience […]

What does a Chinese artist do in a time of chaos and oppression? Flee to the mountains, to the wilderness, of course, to cultivate upright Confucian values, write poetry, paint paintings, and, naturally, drink some tea and lots of wine. And in the paintings, he might hide some delicately rendered political commentary. But Arnold Chang, […]

Less than two months after hatching, the tiny Spoon-billed Sandpiper begins the long journey from Russia’s arctic tundra to the coast of China. No guide, no map, no GPS. But the baby birds instinctively know exactly where to go: to the mudflats of Jiangsu province. Unfortunately, industry and reclamation threaten the birds’ habitats. Spoon-billed Sandpipers […]

During the summer of 1776, patriots worked frantically to head off a British invasion from Canada. Their effort culminated in a wild three-day naval battle on Lake Champlain in northern New York. In this lecture, Jack Kelly will argue that, although the campaign has often been neglected by historians, its success was an important impetus […]

Person Place Thing is an interview show based on this idea: people are particularly engaging when they speak not directly about themselves but about something they care about. Guests talk about one person, one place, and one thing that are important to them. The result? Surprising stories from great speakers. Host Randy Cohen will be […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. In 1998 the twin Petronas Towers in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur took the title of "world's tallest building" away from the United States for the first time. The towers’ developers, private investors working with the Malaysian government and Petronas, the national oil company, sought to create a headquarters and a […]

A year since China opened up its financial markets on paper, have foreign firms been able to grab a bigger slice of its $48 trillion financial sector businesses? What does China’s deepening of financial integration into the world mean for the country and U.S. institutions? How do U.S. financial sanctions impact China’s financial regulatory reform? […]

One of the most famous rulers in Chinese history, the Yongle emperor (r. 1402–24) gained renown for constructing Beijing’s Forbidden City, directing ambitious naval expeditions, and creating the world’s largest encyclopedia. On May 6, art historian Aurelia Campbell will take us from the heart of Beijing, to a Daoist architectural complex on Mount Wudang, to […]

In this lecture, historian Mike Bunn offers the first comprehensive history of the British colony of West Florida. For a host of reasons, including the fact that West Florida did not rebel against the British government, the colony has long been dismissed as a loyal but inconsequential fringe outpost, if considered at all. But the […]

Learn and practice Mandarin, while engaging with Chinese literature, poetry, history and more with fellow enthusiasts. Participants will enjoy live, interactive learning sessions with our language and cultural experts from home. Each session will start with a read-aloud in Mandarin of a carefully selected poem which represents both a touchstone to Chinese culture as well […]

Anti-Asian racism is skyrocketing in the United States. Sadly, this is not a new phenomenon: for centuries, American views of China have oscillated between rapturous enchantment and angry disillusionment. In recent years, American public opinion toward China has plummeted, and the consequences have been profound. Even as American and Chinese interests have become inexorably intertwined, […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. As the first in-depth book to explore the role of branding in the design of corporate modernism, Building Brands re-tells the stories of four corporate headquarters in the context of both business and architectural histories: the PSFS Building by Howe and Lescaze, the Johnson Wax Building by Frank Lloyd Wright, Lever House […]

Season finale of the Pen Parentis literary salon features readings and a roundtable with the writers Alice Elliott Dark, Sergio Troncoso, and Joshua Henkin. Interactive Q&A with audience participation.

Person Place Thing is an interview show based on this idea: people are particularly engaging when they speak not directly about themselves but about something they care about. Guests talk about one person, one place, and one thing that are important to them. The result? Surprising stories from great speakers. Host Randy Cohen will be […]

Exploring the 2021 theme, the healing power of storytelling, this panel will highlight the unique ability of film to project stories to places they might have never traveled before—bringing connection, understanding, and healing. Moderated by festival co-director Joshua Bell and Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center curator Kālewa Correa, a variety of directors will discuss the […]

Skyscraper Museum webinar. In her book The Black Skyscraper: Architecture and the Perception of Race (JHUP, 2019), Adrienne Brown examines works produced by writers, painters, architects, and laborers who grappled with the early skyscraper’s outsized and disorienting dimensions. She explores its effects on how race was seen, read, and sensed at the turn of the […]

During World War I and World War II, American Indians made a unique contribution to the U.S. Armed Forces by using their tribal languages in secret battle communications. Join us via zoom as author and anthropologist/historian William C. Meadows of Missouri State University reveals how these Native American “code talkers” played a key role in […]

After eight years of holding office, George Washington stepped down from the presidency. Embittered by partisan criticism and eager to return to his farm, Washington assumed a role for which there was no precedent at a time when the kings across the ocean often yielded their crowns only upon losing their heads. Horn discusses the […]

The Writers in Performance workshop is designed to give writers the opportunity to explore performing their written pieces. Whether they are playwrights, poets, monologists, writers of prose, or spoken word artists, this workshop gives the writers an opportunity to create a performance piece out of their writings. Workshop participants are chosen on the strength of […]

Sometimes referred to as “the 5th invention of China”, the civil service examination system in imperial China was designed to select candidates for the state bureaucracy. This system was in place between 650 CE and 1905, making it the world’s longest-lasting meritocracy. In the course of over 1200 years, the examination system helped shape China’s […]