“How Social Inequities Create Health Inequities: An Integration of Social and Biological Mechanisms,” with Zaneta Thayer, associate professor of Anthropology, Dartmouth College
2-3:30 p.m. Nov. 13

This is the first lecturer in the speaker series, “Diversity, Decolonization, and the Discipline of Anthropology,” which will be hosted by Pitt Anthropology during 2020-21 as part of the department colloquium. This speaker series features leading anthropologists and archaeologists who have sought to illuminate and contest legacies of oppression, both in their research and other aspects of their professional life. Thayer will use data from Aotearoa New Zealand and the United States to discuss how exposure to early life stressors can shape inequities in health across the life course, and explore why environmental sensitivity to early life stress may have evolved in the first place. Contact Sloane Kozyak, SHK124@pitt.edu, for the Zoom link. 

An Evening with Ben Weiss
5 p.m. Nov. 9

As part of Global Entrepreneurship Week, Pitt presents Ben Weiss, founder of Bai Brands and author of “Basementality,” in this new talk designed to inspire budding entrepreneurs to get their ideas off of the ground. Weiss founded Bai Brands in the basement of his townhouse in 2009 and, in just seven years, built Bai into the fastest-growing brand in the industry, leading to its $1.7 billion acquisition by Dr. Pepper Snapple Group. Register through the Innovation Institute to get the Zoom link.

“The Subaltern Can Swing: Tracing the Haitian Revolution’s Afterlives in New Orleans Jazz,” with Benjamin Barson, grad student in Jazz Studies
12:30-2 p.m. Nov. 19

Ben Barson’s work lives at the intersection of academic, activist and performing arts worlds. His research on jazz musicians’ activism will be published as a chapter in a forthcoming volume “Black Power Afterlives: The Enduring Significance of the Black Panther Party” (2020). He is an ASCAP award-winning composer and protégé of the late baritone saxophonist and composer, Fred Ho. He has been unrelenting is his commitment to make music that fights racism, inequality, and the destruction of the planet. Access the lecture through the University calendar.