As announced earlier, The Objectivist Center will host its Spring Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada at the Treasure Island Hotel and Casino on April 17, 2004. You can now see the full program and register for the conference online at TOC’s website.
Category: Events
Liberty English Camp in Lithuania
Atlasphere member Stephen Browne forwards the following newsletter about the Liberty English Camp in Eastern Europe:
Dear Friend of Liberty,
This is just an introductory note for those of you who have expressed an interest in teaching at our next Liberty English Camp. […] Right now I?m in Wroclaw (formerly Breslau in the turbulent history of this region) in West Poland (once Eastern Germany) taking a teacher training course and have limited time and internet access.
To introduce myself; I am an American now resident in Eastern Europe. I have lived in Poland, Bulgaria, Serbia and Saudi Arabia since 1991 and work here as an English teacher, freelance writer and editor for various foundations and the Polish Academy of Science Annual Report. I also teach marital arts to a small clientele. My wife Monika is Polish and is one of the teachers at our camp. We have a son, not quite two years old now, named Jerzy Waszyngton Browne (that?s George Washington in Polish).
I conceived the idea of the English courses more than ten years ago when I had private lessons with a Polish lawyer who wanted to read Adam Smith in the original. (In the old times he defended dissidents and kids caught putting subversive stickers up in public places ? an offense that could get you seven years hard.) I warned him that the dialect was a bit archaic, he replied that it was, but that it was so much easier to understand because the argumentation was so logically laid out. I don?t even want to think about what this means about modern writing?
From this came the idea of an English course designed to teach students how to read, understand and discuss the documents important to the history of liberty in the English speaking world, in the original language. I have been working on the course material on and off for several years and include it as an attachment. It is not complete, nor am I totally happy with its present form, but this will give you an idea of what we are trying to do. And the introduction gives a quick overview of the methodology we use to get people who are not professional ESL teachers into teaching quickly.
It is our hope that as more people get involved, and perhaps more libertarians over here as full-time teachers, we will have more input into the development of liberty-oriented English teaching materials. For example, we badly need a Business English course. There is a tremendous demand here for Business English ? and everywhere I?ve been, nobody is really happy with the available courses.
The idea of a camp for teaching an intensive course was actually suggested by a young Bulgarian girl (now a professor at Cambridge University in England) who had been to a few libertarian-sponsored seminars in Eastern Europe. She remarked to me that a great many of the young participants arrived with inadequate English preparation and were simply sitting through lectures nodding politely, understanding perhaps one word in ten. She suggested that a week-long intensive course before such a seminar would help prepare them to participate more fully in the presentations and discussions.
'We the Living' Movie in San Francisco
Forwarded by Duncan Scott (who was also recently interviewed by the Atlasphere on this subject)….
We the Living is opening in a few days in San Francisco’s historic Castro Theatre. You, or someone you know in Northern California, can save $5.00 on a pair of general admission tickets, but only if you act soon!
Through our website www.wethelivingmovie.com you can purchase your tickets today and get an $8.50 regular price ticket for just $5.50 (plus $1.00 for handling per order). It’s fast and easy to order online and the more tickets you order, the bigger the savings (save $11.00 on four tickets!).
Your tickets will be waiting for you at the theater’s “Will Call” desk — no need to wait on the box office line. These tickets are NOT available at the theater box office and must be ordered online before March 2, 2004. Regular priced tickets may be purchased at the theater prior to each screening.
We are pleased to make this exclusive offer by special arrangement with the Castro Theatre. Visit www.wethelivingmovie.com today to order.
Not in Northern California? Visit www.wethelivingmovie.com to see where We the Living will be playing next. Also at the website, enjoy photos from the movie, highlights of newspaper reviews, biographies of the cast and stars, and the fascinating story of the making of this classic film.
We the Living Screening Schedule
Wednesday & Thursday, March 3rd and 4th, 2004 ONLY!
Screenings at 2:00pm and 7:30pm
The Castro Theatre
429 Castro Street
San Francisco, CA 94114
Tel 415 621-2120
Discount Screening: Wednesday, March 3RD, 7:30PM ONLY
Visit www.wethelivingmovie.com for further details.
TOC Spring Conference in Nevada
The Objectivist Center has announced its Spring Conference, to be held on April 17, 2004 in Las Vegas, Nevada. From the announcement:
Join the Objectivist Center for a weekend in Las Vegas to experience the wild side of Capitalism and explore the values that achievement and business require. In addition to social and entertainment opportunities, the program highlights include:
- Attorney and former law professor Bruce Dalcher assessing the PATRIOT act
- Barbara Lehman, chief marketing strategist with HMI Advertising,
explaining the art of entrepreneurial living- TOC Washington Director Ed Hudgins diagnosing the Republicans’ betrayal of small government
- TOC Director of Programs William Thomas weighing the ethical state of corporate America
The conference brochure and registration materials will be available soon.
TOC Summer Seminar Update
Program information and secure, online registration are now available for TOC’s 15th annual Summer Seminar.
This year’s seminar is titled “Objectivism in Theory and Practice” and will be held July 3-10, 2004 at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
The week-long program is filled with many well-known names in Objectivism: David Kelley, Nathaniel Branden, Robert Bidinotto, Lindsay Perigo, Tibor Machan, Ed Hudgins, Douglas Rasmussen, Robert Poole, Stephen Hicks, Eric Mack, Mimi Gladstein, Michael Newberry, and many, many more.
Bidinotto Lecturing on 'Guerrilla Activism'
Robert Bidinotto will be delivering a lecture in New York City on March 4th titled “Guerilla Activism: How One Individual Can Wage and Win Ideological Battles.”
From the announcement:
Thursday, March 4, 2004, 7:00 p.m.
The Shelburne Murray Hill Hotel
Ballroom, main floor
303 Lexington Avenue @ 37th St. (see map)
Free admission-no reservation necessary
Social change depends primarily upon the spread of new ideas. And spreading those ideas depends, in turn, upon effective persuasion. But how can one person be heard amid the din of millions of other voices clamoring for public attention? How can a single individual hope to compete with organized non-profits, well-heeled propagandists, slick politicians, and famous pundits? Does it take a lot of money and sophisticated resources? Or are there principles that anyone can apply to wage and win philosophical and political battles in the public arena?
See Bidinotto’s announcement for further details.
International Ayn Rand Meetup Day
Meetup.com provides a new way for people of common interests to gather for mutual benefit. Admirers of Ayn Rand’s novels may be particularly interested in aynrand.meetup.com, which enables participants to:
Meetup with other local fans of author Ayn Rand and her philosophy, Objectivism ? a philosophy of Reason, Purpose and Self-Esteem that holds human life on this Earth as the standard of all values and your life as an end in itself.
From the ?About Meetup? page on the Meetup web site:
Meetup helps people get together with a group of neighbors that share a common interest. We power global, monthly “Meetup Days” for almost any interest group. Meetup is an advanced technology platform and global network of local venues that helps people self-organize local group gatherings on the same day everywhere. Meetups take place in up to 612 cities in 51 countries at local cafés, restaurants, bookstores, and other local establishments.
Meetup earns its money from:
- Establishments that pay to be listed as possible Meetup venues (MVPs)
- Users that sign up for Meetup+
- Organizations that want special services to help strengthen their community
- Sponsors that have relevant messages for Meetup chapters (text ads only)
We believe that it’s possible to be profitable while doing great things for people.
For more info, see messages from people that have gone
to a Meetup and press reports about Meetup.
Visit aynrand.meetup.com to register, or to host an Ayn Rand Meetup near you. [Thanks to Luke Setzer for this news tip.]
IHS Summer Seminars
Interested in receiving training to help advance the cause of liberty? The Institute for Humane Studies is offering a variety of free seminars targeted towards students and recent graduates who want to bolster their understanding of the economic, political, and cultural foundations of liberty.
From their seminar overview:
If you’re like many students, you’re not quite satisfied with standard answers to social and political issues. You like to think for yourself, and you often come up with answers that don’t fit neatly into “left” or “right” pigeonholes.
In the face of new global challenges, IHS seminars provide an opportunity to re-examine society and politics from outside the usual boundaries. They open a window on the classical liberal or libertarian perspective – a perspective that begins with individual liberty and explores where that leads for the individual, community, government, economy, culture…
The seminars are offered in a number of locations across the country. Visit the IHS summer seminars page for further details.
Lecture on Kay Nolte Smith in Washington, D.C.
Atlasphere columnist Michelle Fram-Cohen will be delivering a lecture entitled “A Tribute to Kay Nolte Smith” at the Washington Metro Objectivism Discussion (WMOD) group on Saturday, January 31st.
From her recent column for the Atlasphere on this same topic:
This year is the tenth anniversary of Kay Nolte Smith’s death. It is hard to believe that less than twenty years ago, her novels stirred up an audience of admirers of Rand’s work yearning for romantic writings, and were the topic of animated discussions, while today, all but one of her eight books are out of print. Yet Kay Nolte Smith was the most prolific, successful and original
novelist to come out of Ayn Rand’s inner circle.
For more information about her upcoming lecture, see the WMOD announcement on their web site.
Maryland Seminar on Ayn Rand's Vision
In February, the Fountainhead Institute will be sponsoring a seminar in Maryland on applying Ayn Rand’s vision to your own life:
Ayn Rand’s Vision: Understanding It And Using It In Your Life
A weekend seminar on applying Objectivism to your life. The seminar will be taught by Marsha Enright of The Fountainhead Institute on February 7-8 in Columbia, Maryland.
Topics covered will include but not be limited to “The Importance of Art in Human Life,” “Rand’s Heroes: How To Be More Like Them,” “The Psychology of Individualism,” and “Rand’s View of Capitalism and the Social Order.” Marsha will combine short lectures with guided discussions to maximize the intellectual and personal value of the seminars.
It will be assumed that the student will have read at least Atlas Shrugged. A limited number of essays and articles will be assigned to read in preparation for the course.
Additional information and registration instructions are available on the Fountainhead Institute web site.