Engaging Grounds
Engaging Grounds is a link between your first-year Engagements courses and college life beyond the classroom.
This part of the Engagements Program counts for 10% of your Engagements course grade each quarter.
At the back of your Commonplace Book, you’ll find a section that outlines the different activities you will do to complete the Engaging Grounds component for each of the four quarters. These activities include attending events from our Engagements calendar (below) and responding to reflection questions; you will also complete activities designed to help you consider your major and prepare for meetings with your academic advisor.
All of the information you need to complete “Engaging Grounds” is in your Commonplace Book.
We want you to take full advantage of all the cultural and intellectual experiences that a research university like UVa offers to its community. Each quarter, you will choose one event to attend from the calendar maintained by the Engagements program below. You could choose a concert, a play, a presentation of research, a debate, an event at UVa’s art museum – there are dozens of possibilities each quarter. Check out the calendar early in the quarter to find events that suit your schedule. If you wait until the last minute, options will be more limited.
When attending events across Grounds, make sure you take note of whether it is a "drop-in" event or one where you are required to stay for the entire event. If it is not a "drop-in" event, show up on time, register (if required), and do not leave early or otherwise disrupt the event. Leaving early or arriving late is not only rude, it is a violation of the honor code since this is a "for credit" assignment.
Any event that uses your UVA Arts$ counts for Engaging Grounds!
Quarter 4 Events:
Being Jewish in America Today: Arnold Eisen
Date & Time: Tue March 10, 5:30-7pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Wilson Hall 301
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Author Arnold Eisen will visit UVA for a conversation on God, Torah, and Being a Jew in America Today with Professor Elizabeth Shanks Alexander (Religious Studies). The conversation will center around Eisen's 2024 book, Seeking the Hiding God: A Personal Theological Essay (Ben Yehuda Press).
The event is free and open to the public, and will take place on Tuesday, March 10th at 5:30 PM in Wilson Hall 301. Reception to follow.
Speaker Details
Arnold Eisen is the chancellor emeritus of Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, where he currently serves as a faculty member. Professor Eisen previously served on the faculties of Stanford, Tel Aviv, and Columbia universities. He has contributed regularly to a number of news outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, The Jewish Week, Huffington Post, Tablet, and Fortune.
"Listening for Something" Film Screening and Discussion with Alexandria Smith
Date & Time: Wed March 11, 5-6:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Minor Hall 110
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
African Studies Colloquium Series: Chambi Chachage
Date & Time: Thur March 12, 3:30-5pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Minor Hall 110
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
This talk shows how digital tools and online archives are helping us uncover the hidden stories of African entrepreneurs in East Africa. By exploring social media platforms and interactive websites, we will see how these new sources challenge traditional histories that often ignore African business leaders. The goal is to understand how digital archives can give us fresh perspectives on Africa’s role in global capitalism.
Here to Stay: The Power of Women's Stories
Date & Time: Thur March 12, 5:30-7pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Rotunda Dome Room
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Register online Event concludes with a reception featuring light hors d’oeuvres and refreshments
You’re invited to join an important and inspiring conversation designed especially for students. “Here to Stay: The Power of Women’s Stories” brings together UVA alumni, current students, and faculty for a cross‑generational dialogue about courage, belonging, and the trailblazing women who opened the doors for coeducation at UVA.
Featuring author Gail Burrell Gerry (Col ’74) and a panel of student and alumni voices, this event explores how women’s narratives—once treated as footnotes—can become powerful forces for community, identity, and change. The conversation will focus on claiming space, building supportive networks, and understanding how personal stories shape both the University and ourselves. The first 50 attendees will receive a complimentary copy of Gerry’s book, Here to Stay.
This event invites students to reflect on the women who opened doors at UVA and those walking through them today. We hope to see you there.
This event is co-sponsored by the UVA Alumni Association and the Maxine Platzer Lynn Women's Center.
Fellows-in-Residence Ayesha Jordan and Jennifer Newman present salt-heavy
Date & Time: Thur March 12, Doors open at 7:30pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Helms Theatre, Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Join the Black and Indigenous Feminist Futures Institute for the debut of BIFFI Fellows-in-Residence Ayesha Jordan and Jennifer Harrison Newman's interactive, multi-sensory performance salt-heavy – the culmination of three visits by the movement artists to UVA. Audience Q&A to follow.
Artist Details
Ayesha Jordan is a multidisciplinary performance-based artist and creator. Most recently, alongside her collaborators, she has been developing a new project entitled Shasta Geaux Pop presents: Shasta Greaux Crops. She was awarded a Princeton Hodder Fellowship to support the development of this work. Her research for this project has been based in applied permaculture studies, regenerative community/ecosystem formation and adaptation, event curation, and how these can be explored through performance, or how they can inform performance methodologies. Ayesha’s artistic pursuits extend beyond conventional boundaries, intentionally amplifying marginalized voices, especially from the global majority and disenfranchised communities. Her work encompasses themes such as ritual-making, multigenerational knowledge and exploration, archives, legacy, and collaborative and cooperative modes of production.
New York and New Haven based theater artist Jennifer Harrison Newman works extensively with artists across disciplines pushing the boundaries of dance, opera, and theater. Recent site-specific and theatrical work includes numerous Broadway and regional dance and theatrical productions including The Lion King, and The Radio City Rockettes. Associate Director/Movement Director; Triptych (Eyes of One on Another) (BAM/Next Wave Festival, International Tour); Place (BAM/Next Wave Festival, LA Opera);Three Women (Ojai Playwrights Conference);. Choreography and performance: Gallathea (SCSU); Once on This Island (SCSU); The Code (ACT | Young Conservatory); Angel’s Bone (New VisionsFestival Hong Kong, Beijing Music Festival); Land of Broken Dreams (ParkAvenue Armory); AFROFEMONONOMY (PSNY); when you walk through fire, hold your breath (Little Island NY); Black Lodge (Opera Philadelphia, Prototype Festival. LA Opera); topologies (Gibney Dance NY); We Were Everywhere (Princeton University); The Infinite Hotel (Prototype Festival); within the sand and sea (Chale Wote Festival, Accra Ghana);The Geneva Project ( JACK, BAAD!, Yale University, International Festival of Arts & Ideas, Central Station Festival Seoul Korea); If Pretty Hurts Ugly Must be a Motherfucker (Yale School of Drama), The Children (Yale School of Drama), Seneca Village – A living Memory (Bard Graduate Center for Material Culture’s Focus Festival: Ritual and Capital); la ronde (International Festival of Arts & Ideas); Bread of Heaven (LABA Live); Bulrusher (New Georges); David Rousseve/Reality (company member); Lula Washington Contemporary Dance Theater (company member).
Visiting Artists in Conversation: Cathy Lu, Eve Tagny and Curator Nicoletta Pollara
Date & Time: Sat March 14, 6:30-8pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Campbell Hall 158 (School of Architecture)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The Sculpture concentration will be hosting:
- Nicoletta Pollara – https://www.nicolettapollara.com
Nicoletta is a curator based in LA whose work centers contemporary art, community engagement, and cross-disciplinary collaboration. - Eve Tagny – https://evetagny.com/
Eve is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice engages performance, sculpture, and sound to explore migration, memory, and the politics of space. - Cathy Lu – https://cathyclu.com/
Cathy is a ceramic artist whose work reinterprets traditional Chinese forms to address issues of cultural hybridity, diaspora, and representation.
Please join us for their public lecture:
This visit is sponsored by UVA Arts Endowment and the Department of Art.
Native Voices: Speaking with Virginia's Federally Recognized Nations
Date & Time: Sat March 14, 1:30-3pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Albert & Shirley Small Special Collections Auditorium
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please RSVP online
Livestream event: Swords into Plowshares: Recast/Reclaim
Date & Time: Sat March 14, 6:30-8:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Campbell Hall 158 (School of Architecture)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Students! The Jefferson School African American Heritage Center invites you to share via livestream in the design process of the Charlottesville public arts project Swords Into Plowshares: Recast | Reclaim.
Event Details
The livestream will feature remarks from three internationally known design firms (Hood Design Studio, MASS Design Group, and Push Studio) who have been chosen as the top candidates to present concept proposals for this major public art opportunity. The Swords Into Plowshares project will transform the former Robert E Lee statue across various Charlottesville park settings in ways that will speak to Charlottesville’s broader communities’ values.
Swords Into Plowshares draws inspiration from the prophetic vision of Isaiah 2:4, which celebrates turning tools of violence into ones of peace and community-building. Since its inception, the project has shaped national conversations around toppled Confederate statues by modeling a community-engaged democratic process of creative transformation. The goal is to transform historic trauma into an artistic expression of democratic values and inclusive aspirations.
The livestream showing in Campbell Hall marks the opening of the exhibition Swords Into Plowshares: Recast | Reclaim, on view at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center from March 14 to May 30, 2026. The exhibition highlights the design proposals, potential park locations, as well as the democratic process behind the project.
The Lifecycle of a Blackberry
Date & Time: Sat March 14, 7-9pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Helms Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
LIFECYCLE OF A BLACKBERRY is a new devised play starring Morgan M. Younge which honors the stories of Black Appalachian women and girls, using as inspiration the books Blackberries, Blackberries, Birds of Opulence, and Perfect Black, written by Kentucky Poet Laureate Crystal E. Wilkinson, founding member of the Affrilachian Poet movement. This show is a rare opportunity for audiences to get to see three different types of books - poetry, short stories, and novel - combined into one theatrical experience. Wilkinson’s works are centered around the black experience and feminism and art. Her words in storytelling create dynamic pictures of women's lives and the characters make you believe you know these women and her stories have the power to captivate and connect people from all walks of life.
Event Details
Presented by Looking for Lilith Theatre Company, Guest Artists in Residence with UVA Department of Drama,
supported by UVA Arts & the Office of the Provost & the Vice Provost for the Arts.
For more about the production, visit Looking for Lilith's website.
UVA Chamber Music Series #5: I-Jen Fang (Percussion) with Ayn Balija (Viola)
Date & Time: Sun March 15, 3:30-5pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
On Sunday, March 15 at 3:30pm in Old Cabell Hall, the Piedmont Duo will perform a recital as part of the UVA Chamber Music Series. I-Jen Fang, percussion and Ayn Balija, viola will explore how memories shape and re-shape our lives. Some gently rethink a piece like Caroline Shaw’s Limestone and Felt for viola and marimba while others transform the memory, much like the power of a storyteller’s voice, in Brian Simalchik’s Overlooks. This program also looks back to the simple soundtrack of childhood with three Brazilian tunes by Flavio Chamis while Elise Winkler in The Allegory of the Cave reminds listeners that change makes it impossible to remain the same. Enter a world where sound and expectations feel both familiar and new, where new memories are created while in celebration of the old.
Program
Limestone and Felt -- Caroline Shaw (b.1982)
Music for Viola and Percussion -- Charles Knox (1929-2019)
Three Brazilian Children Songs -- Flàvio Chamis (b.1956)
Overlooks -- Brian Simalchik (b.1988)
Four Flashbacks -- Kenji Bunch (b.1973)
The Allegory of the Cave -- Elise Winkler (b.2001)
Performer Details
Founded in 2021, the Piedmont Duo comprised of Ayn Balija, Associate Professor of Viola and I-Jen Fang, Professor of Percussion from the Department of Music at the University of Virginia, is a performance and educational based chamber music group dedicated to expanding the musical presence and the sonic possibilities of viola and percussion. They have toured, performed and given masterclasses in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina as well as at the International Viola Congresses in Campinas, Brazil; Paris, France; and the University of Pécs, Hungary. Committed to outreach and collaboration, they have commissioned original works from composers JoVia Armstrong, Leah Reid, and Judith Shatin to be part of a new album that features women composers. I-Jen Fang is a soloist, chamber musician, orchestral player, and teacher. She serves as the Principal Timpanist and Percussionist for the Charlottesville Symphony. She has performed as a soloist in Austria, France, Hungary, Poland, Romania, South Africa, Taiwan, and U.S., and as a featured performer at PASIC, PAS Day of Percussion, SEAMUS and various festivals. Ayn Balija is a dynamic violist dedicated to expanding the viola's expressive range through innovative performances and collaborations. She holds the position of Principal Violist with the Charlottesville Symphony and has performed as a guest artist across Canada, Hungary, Brazil, New Zealand, and various locations in the United States, premiering new works and highlighting her commitment to musical diversity in performance and education.
Do You Speak Eurovision?
Date & Time: Mon March 16, 5-6:30pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Monroe 130
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Behind the Music of Eurovision
Date & Time: Tue March 17, 12-1:30pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Gilmer 341
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Lost Boys: The Digital Revolution, the Retreat from Marriage, and the Decline of Men
Date & Time: Tue March 17, 7-8pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Practical AI Ethics: The Ethical Dimension of AI Literacy Series
Date & Time: Wed March 18, 11am-12pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Scholars' Lab Common Room, Shannon Library (room 330)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online
Join us for this talk as part of The Ethical Dimension of AI Literacy Series. In this session, David Danks, Polk Jefferson Scholars Foundation Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, Artificial Intelligence, and Data Science, will present the following talk:
Event Details
Practical AI Ethics
Much of the work on the ethics of AI has focused on high-level principles and frameworks that provide aspirational goals, but no guidance about how to reach them. This talk will instead focus on practical AI ethics. I will outline a translational approach that yields practices, processes, and tools for AI designers, developers, regulators, and users each to achieve more ethical outcomes. Throughout, I will illustrate this practical AI ethics through various real-world case studies.
All are invited to register and attend. For questions, please contact Meridith Wolnick (maw2tj@virginia.edu) or Bethany Mickel (bethanym@virginia.edu).
Enforcement and Opportunity: The Economics of Deportation and Lawful Immigration by Michael Clemens
Date & Time: Wed March 18, 12-1:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Great Hall in Garrett
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Moloka'i Bound Film Screening
Date & Time: Wed March 18, 5:30-8:45pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Campbell Hall 160
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online
Join UVA’s American Studies department for a film screening and conversation with Molokaʻi Bound’s director, Alika Tengan. Alika Tengan is a Native Hawaiian/Asian American writer-director based out of Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, whose short films Mauka to Makai and Moloka’i Bound have garnered multiple awards including “Best Short” at ImagineNATIVE – which granted them Oscar Consideration for the 2021 Academy Awards. The Molokaʻi Bound short film inspired a feature-length adaptation which was selected by Google and Array with full production funding. Alika continues to focus on Native Hawaiian narratives, with a commitment to uplifting the Pacific Islander filmmaking community.
Small bites from Mochiko.
Director Details
Kainoa De Silva, a wayward Hawaiian man, is on parole and committed to reconnecting with his family. Most important to Kainoa is rebuilding his relationship with his adolescent son Jonathan after years of being incarcerated. But acclimating to a normal life in Hawai‘i is harder than it seems and Kainoa tends to do all the wrong things for the right reasons. In trying to prove himself worthy of his family and his native heritage, Kainoa's journey is a story of both reconciliation and redemption.
Eurovision Clip Show
Date & Time: Wed March 18, 6:30-8pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: New Cabell Hall 298 (Language Commons)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Eurovision for All?
Date & Time: Thur March 19, 12-1:30pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Gilmer 341
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Barry Trachtenberg Lecture: The Holocaust & the Exile of Yiddish
Date & Time: Thur March 19, 5-6:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Monroe 110
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
“The Holocaust & the Exile of Yiddish” This talk traces the remarkable and little-known history of the Algemeyne Entsiklopedye (General Encyclopedia), a multivolume Yiddish reference work conceived in Berlin in 1930 and completed in New York more than three decades later. Created by a generation of Yiddish intellectuals shaped by the Russian Revolution of 1905 and committed to secular Jewish self-determination, the encyclopedia began as an ambitious effort to present world knowledge in Yiddish – and to situate Yiddish-speaking Jews firmly within modern global culture. As the rise of Nazism, war, exile, and genocide shattered the world of Eastern European Jewry, the encyclopedia itself was repeatedly displaced – from Berlin to Paris, across the Atlantic, and finally to the United States. Over time, its mission shifted dramatically. What began as a universal encyclopedia became a vehicle for documenting Jewish life, culture, and ultimately the Holocaust itself. Along the way, the project registered profound debates about nationalism and cosmopolitanism, diaspora and statehood, socialism and liberalism, memory and survival. Drawing on encyclopedias as material and intellectual artifacts, this talk uses the Algemeyne Entsiklopedye as a lens through which to explore the fate of Yiddish, the transformation of Jewish political and cultural ideals, and the ways knowledge projects respond to historical catastrophe. The encyclopedia emerges not as a failed or obsolete endeavor, but as a rare thread of continuity linking pre- and post-Holocaust Jewish intellectual life, and as a powerful example of how scholars sought to preserve, reinterpret, and transmit a shattered world.
Speaker Details
A historian of modern Jewish history, the Holocaust, and genocide, Barry Trachtenberg is the author of The Holocaust & the Exile of Yiddish (Rutgers, 2022), The United States and the Nazi Holocaust: Race, Refuge, and Remembrance (Bloomsbury, 2018), and The Revolutionary Roots of Modern Yiddish, 1903-1917 (Syracuse, 2008). He is a member of the Academic Advisory Boards of Jewish Voice for Peace and the Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism and is Faculty Affiliate of the Center for Security, Race and Rights at Rutgers Law School. He holds the Michael H. and Deborah Rubin Presidential Chair in Jewish History at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, NC.
Rea Visiting Writer Diana Khoi Nguyen Poetry Reading
Date & Time: Thur March 19, 5-6pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Newcomb Hall Commonwealth Room
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Please join us for a poetry reading with Rea Visiting Writer Diana Khoi Nguyen.
Poet and multimedia artist Diana Khoi Nguyen is the author of two poetry collections, Root Fractures (Scribner, 2024) and Ghost Of (Omnidawn Publishing, 2018), which was a finalist for the National Book Award and the L.A. Times Book Prize. She is also the author of the chaplet Unless (Belladonna*, 2019), which received the 2019 Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the Colorado Book Award. Her video work has recently been exhibited at the Miller Institute for Contemporary Art. Nguyen is a Kundiman fellow and member of the Vietnamese artist collective She Who Has No Master(s). A recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, and winner of the 92Y Discovery Poetry Contest and 2019 Kate Tufts Discovery Award, she currently teaches at the University of Pittsburgh.
Barry Trachtenberg Lecture: The End of Antisemitism: How the Fight Against Antisemitism Became a Tool of Political Repression
Date & Time: Fri March 20, 3-4:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Monroe Hall 130
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
"The End of Antisemitism: How the Fight Against Antisemitism Became a Tool of Political Repression” makes the case that antisemitism – a phenomenon emerging in mid-19th century Europe – has ceased to be a useful analytical category to name and combat anti-Jewish hatred. This talk traces the term's origins in racial science, its post-Holocaust transformation linking Jewish safety to Israeli statehood, and its contemporary weaponization to silence criticism of Israel through frameworks like the IHRA definition. The presentation demonstrates how antisemitism accusations have been systematically deployed to justify Israel's genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, revealing that the term has been fundamentally inverted from its original purpose of protecting vulnerable Jewish communities into a mechanism for expanding state power, suppressing Palestinian human rights advocacy, and advancing authoritarian agendas.
Speaker Details
A historian of modern Jewish history, the Holocaust, and genocide, Barry Trachtenberg is the author of The Holocaust & the Exile of Yiddish (Rutgers, 2022), The United States and the Nazi Holocaust: Race, Refuge, and Remembrance (Bloomsbury, 2018), and The Revolutionary Roots of Modern Yiddish, 1903-1917 (Syracuse, 2008). He is a member of the Academic Advisory Boards of Jewish Voice for Peace and the Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism and is Faculty Affiliate of the Center for Security, Race and Rights at Rutgers Law School. He holds the Michael H. and Deborah Rubin Presidential Chair in Jewish History at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, NC.
Chinese Diplomacy on the Ground: Northeast Asia in the Fifteenth Century, Lecture by David M. Robinson
Date & Time: Fri March 20, 3:15-4:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Monroe Hall 118
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The most common image of East Asian diplomacy prior to 1800 or so is the tributary system. In essence, East Asia countries organized their diplomatic relations along clear hierarchical lines with the Chinese emperor at the top and lesser leaders arrayed below. The result was a smoothly working international order, it is argued, that ensured stability and peace for centuries, a sharp contrast to the chaos and violence that characterized Westphalian foreign relations in West Europe throughout those same centuries.
But how did Chinese diplomacy really work? Using examples from Northeast Asia in the early fifteenth century, in this talk we explore how, far from the glitter of the capital, recent immigrants of Korean and Manchurian the Ming throne as its envoys abroad, braving unpredictable, often dangerous, conditions to negotiate regional security and project the emperor’s will.
Speaker Details
David Robinson is the Robert H.N. Ho Professor in Asian Studies and History at Colgate University. His most recent monographs include Korea and the Fall of the Mongol Empire: Alliance, Upheaval, and the Rise of a New East Asian Order (2022) and Ability and Difference: A Mongol Family at the Ming Court (2025). His current work explores early modern Chinese diplomatic practice.
Archaeology Day
Date & Time: Sat March 21, 12-3pm (drop-in event)
Location: Fralin Museum of Art
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Join us for a fun family day celebrating International Archaeology Day! Scheduled activities include a Q&A with The World Between: Egypt and Nubia in Africa exhibition curators, craft activities and more!
Charlottesville Symphony at UVA presents "All American- Celebrating America 250"
Date & Time: Sat March 21, 7:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The Charlottesville Symphony invites audiences to celebrate the spirit, energy, and richness of American music at their March concert “All American – Celebrating America250,”
Program
The program showcases three additional iconic composers whose music reflects the individuality of the American voice:
Charles Ives – Variations on “America.” A witty and imaginative early work by one of America’s most original musical thinkers, Ives’ variations transform a familiar patriotic tune into a playful and inventive orchestral showpiece.
Joining the orchestra is pianist John Mayhood, performing Gershwin’s Piano Concerto in F, one of the most beloved works in the American repertoire. A brilliant fusion of jazz rhythms and classical form, Gershwin’s concerto sparkles with energy, lyricism, and unmistakable American flair. Pianist John Mayhood brings both virtuosity and style to this electrifying masterpiece.
Valerie Coleman – Umoja: Anthem of Unity. Meaning “unity” in Swahili, Umoja is an uplifting and rhythmically vibrant work that celebrates community and collective strength. Coleman’s music has become an essential voice in contemporary American composition.
Aaron Copland – Four Dance Episodes from Rodeo. From the lively “Buckaroo Holiday” to the beloved “Hoe-Down,” Copland’s music captures the wide-open spirit of the American West with exuberance and warmth.
Together, these works form a powerful musical tribute aligned with the national America250 commemoration, honoring 250 years of American history through sound.
Conductor Details
The program will feature acclaimed French American guest conductor Mélisse Brunet renowned as a conductor of “uncommon emotional intensity” (Marie-Celine) and a “force at the podium” (Eugene Scene), her dynamic podium presence and expressive interpretations have earned praise across the United States and abroad. She was featured in the documentary Maestra by Director Maggie Contreras.
Virginia Festival of the Book: Hair Stories/ A Poetry Workshop
Date & Time: Sun March 22, 3-4:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Fralin Museum of Art
Tickets or RSVP? Free! But you must register online
Take part in a generative workshop led by poet Rosa Castellano. Explore the special exhibition gallery at The Fralin Museum of Art at UVA, and write in response to the photographs of artist Nakeya Brown whose new exhibition, Refutations, explores the complex entanglement of identity, memory, femininity, family legacy, and the marketing of cultural assimilation in the context of textured hair. Join us as we write our way in and out of the intersections Brown creates in her work and tell our own "hair stories."
Opening Reception and Showcase for "Leftovers: Rethinking Waste in Design"
Date & Time: Mon March 23, 5-6:30pm (drop-in event)
Location: Campbell Hall 1st and 2nd floors (School of Architecture
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
In this annual showcase and reception at the School of Architecture, Campbell Hall is activated with the ideas and work of our students and faculty that foregrounds sustainability, creative reuse, and ethical making as central to design, history, and planning education today.
The showcase is part of Leftovers: Rethinking Waste in Design—a larger series of programs, exhibitions, and events that invite the A-School and University community to rethink how we make, reuse, and imagine materials—and more holistically, environments—in a time of climate urgency.
The Optimal Paper Moebius Band, Mathematics Lecture by Richard Schwartz (Brown University)
Date & Time: Mon March 23, 5-6pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Wilson 402
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
If you take a long and thin rectangular strip, you can smoothly twist it in space, tape the ends together, and produce a Moebius band. If the strip is close to being a square, this is impossible. What is the cutoff? In this talk I will prove that you can make a Moebius band out of a rectangular strip of paper if and only if the aspect ratio of the paper is greater than √3. This result solves the 1978 conjecture about this, due to Ben Halpern and Charles Weaver. I will also explain that any paper Moebius band with aspect ratio close to √3 is very close to kind of 3-fold wrapping of an equilateral triangle. (I will make this precise in the talk.) So, in a limiting sense, this triangular Moebius band is the optimal paper Moebius band.
The Virginia Mathematics Lectures are supported by the University of Virginia Department of Mathematics and the Institute of Mathematical Sciences.
A New Playbook: Val Ackerman on the Crossroads of College Athletics
Date & Time: Mon March 23, 3:30-4:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Bavaro Hall, Holloway Hall room 116
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Please join us for a fireside chat with Val Ackerman (COL’81), current commissioner of the Big East Conference. Ackerman was a four-year starter and three-year captain on the UVA women’s basketball team and served as the first president of the WNBA among other roles. She and EHD Dean Stephanie Rowley will discuss the changing landscape of intercollegiate athletics and its impact on students and higher education alike.
This event is sponsored by the Higher Ed Founders Fund and Lumina. No registration needed. Seating is available on a first come, first served basis. A reception will follow the talk.
Andrew Zawacki Poetry Reading
Date & Time: Mon March 23, 5-6pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Bryan Hall 229
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Please join us for Poetry Reading with Andrew Zawacki, co-sponsored by the Department of Art.
Andrew Zawacki is the author of six poetry books: These Late Eclipses(Verge, 2025); Unsun : f/11 (Coach House, 2019); Videotape (Counterpath, 2013); Petals of Zero Petals of One (Talisman House, 2009); Anabranch (Wesleyan, 2004); and By Reason of Breakings (Georgia, 2002). His photo/poetry project Endscape is due this winter from Photoworks UK / Jane & Jeremy.
The 2018 recipient of the university's Albert Christ-Janer Award for creative research, he was a 2016 Howard Foundation Fellow in Poetry. A former Rhodes Scholar and Fulbright Scholar, Zawacki earned his doctorate from the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago and coedited the international journal VERSE from 1995 to 2019. He is an alumnus of the Charcoal Books photography retreat Chico Review and of the photobook Long Term Program offered by Penumbra Foundation and Image Threads Collective.
Zawacki is a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Georgia.
Andrew Zawacki artist talk: "Sound Will Fall Through This Light"
Date & Time: Tue March 24, 6:30-8pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Campbell Hall 160 (School of Architecture)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Andrew Zawacki is the author of six poetry books: These Late Eclipses(Verge, 2025); Unsun : f/11 (Coach House, 2019); Videotape (Counterpath, 2013); Petals of Zero Petals of One (Talisman House, 2009); Anabranch (Wesleyan, 2004); and By Reason of Breakings (Georgia, 2002). His photo/poetry project Endscape is due this winter from Photoworks UK / Jane & Jeremy.
The 2018 recipient of the university's Albert Christ-Janer Award for creative research, he was a 2016 Howard Foundation Fellow in Poetry. A former Rhodes Scholar and Fulbright Scholar, Zawacki earned his doctorate from the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago and coedited the international journal VERSE from 1995 to 2019. He is an alumnus of the Charcoal Books photography retreat Chico Review and of the photobook Long Term Program offered by Penumbra Foundation and Image Threads Collective.
Zawacki is a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Georgia.
Touchstones of Democracy Series: Home
Date & Time: Thur March 26, 12-1:15pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Bond House
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online. Lunches served on a first-come, first-served basis beginning at 11:30am
As the British occupied cities from Boston to Philadelphia and Savannah during the American Revolution, how did the dynamics of households become a crucial zone of conflict and transformation? Join us for a conversation with Lauren Duval, Gibson Fellow at the Karsh Institute of Democracy, about her book The Home Front: Revolutionary Households, Military Occupation, and the Making of American Independence. Duval shows how the experiences of occupation in the household shaped the political culture in the new nation around the nature of property and authority, particularly in defining the terms of citizenship. The conversation will be moderated by Jane Kamensky, president and CEO of Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello and author of A Revolution in Color (2016) and co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of the American Revolution.
The Nau Lab's “Touchstones of Democracy” series explores key events, places, thinkers, and texts that inform the history and principles of democracy. Leading up to the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Declaration of Independence in July 2026, this event series is showcasing recent books that expand and deepen our understanding of the era of the American Revolution—and illuminate the connections of that period to the present.
Speakers
Lauren Duval is an assistant professor of history at the University of Oklahoma. She is historian of early North America and the Atlantic World, specializing in women’s and gender history and the era of the American Revolution. She earned her PhD from American University in Washington, D.C.
Her first book, The Home Front: Revolutionary Households, Military Occupation, and the Making of American Independence (2025) narrates the American Revolution and its aftermath from the vantage points of households in British-occupied cities (Boston, New York, Newport, Philadelphia, Charleston, and Savannah). During the Revolution, as war eroded social norms and fractured the institutions that structured daily life, households in occupied regions became war zones, with dissimilar consequences for their assorted residents. Integrating these varied, often contradictory experiences, The Home Front exposes the importance of the household as a site of wartime violence and as an additional front in the War for American Independence.
Duval has published an award-winning article, “Mastering Charleston: Property and Patriarchy in British-Occupied Charleston, 1780-82,” in the William and Mary Quarterly, as well as contributing chapters to three volumes about the American Revolution: Women Waging War in the American Revolution (UVA 2022), The Revolution at 250 (UVA 2026), and the forthcoming Cambridge History of the American Revolution. Her research has been supported by fellowships from the McNeil Center for Early American Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, the New York Public Library, the David Library of the American Revolution, and the Massachusetts Historical Society.
As a Gibson Fellow at the Karsh Institute, she will be researching a new book project about motherhood and reproduction during the American Revolution.
Jane Kamensky is president and CEO of Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. A leading historian of early America and the United States, she earned her BA (1985) and PhD (1993) in history from Yale University. For 30 years, she worked as a professor and higher education leader, most recently as Jonathan Trumbull Professor of American History at Harvard University and Pforzheimer Foundation Director of the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America at Harvard Radcliffe Institute.
Kamensky is the author or editor of numerous books, including A Revolution in Color: The World of John Singleton Copley (2016), which won four major prizes and was a finalist for several others; and the authoritative Oxford Handbook of the American Revolution, co-edited with the late Edward G. Gray. Her most recent book, Candida Royalle and the Sexual Revolution, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography. A former Commissioner of the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery and past Trustee of the Museum of the American Revolution, Kamensky serves as a member of the National Advisory Council of More Perfect, and as one of the principal investigators on the NEH/ Department of Education-funded initiative, Educating for American Democracy, among many other public history roles. Her work has been supported by fellowships from the NEH, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Guggenheim Foundation, among others, and she is an elected fellow of the American Antiquarian Society, the Massachusetts Historical Society, and the Society of American Historians.
Natasha Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, by Dave Malloy
Date & Time: Thur March 26, 8-10:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation.This award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. www.concordtheatricals.com
Artist Talk, Nakeya Brown: Refutations
Date & Time: Thur March 26, 6-7pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Campbell 158 (School of Architecture)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! But please register online
The Fralin Museum of Art is hosting an artist talk with photographer Nakeya Brown
Nakeya Brown presents a selection of photographs exploring beauty culture and bio-mythographic memory. Lecture concludes with a Q&A discussion.
Indigenous Democratic Traditions: Arts Workshop
Date & Time: Fri March 27, 10am-12pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Shannon Library room 330
Tickets or RSVP? Free! But registration is required.
Deborah Wilkinson, citizen of the Upper Mattaponi Indian Tribe, shows and teaches traditional craft ways to participants, presenting a hands-on workshop in the design and preparation of gourd shards for painting and crafting into necklaces.
This event is free, but registration is required to reserve a seat, including workshop materials and lunch. Box lunches will be provided on a first-come, first-served basis at the conclusion of the workshop.
This workshop is part of the “Indigenous Democratic Traditions: Before America’s 250th & Beyond” program, presented by UVA Karsh Institute of Democracy’s John L. Nau III History and Principles of Democracy Lab and is co-sponsored by VA250, UVA250, the Page Barbour Fund, and Virginia Humanities.
Presenter Details
Deborah Wilkinson is a citizen of the Upper Mattaponi Indian Tribe and owner of Adamstown Gourds & Such. She is a self-taught artist who discovered a passion for gourd art after attending a local inter-tribal cultural class in 2019. She uses a variety of techniques when crafting a gourd, including wood burning, carving, painting, and adding embellishments. All gourds are unique creations as Wilkinson works to capture the individual spirit of the objects that inspire her. Her tribal culture and love of nature are frequently incorporated into her work.
Politics in the Zone: China's Evolving Use of Economic Development Zones throughout the Reform Era
Date & Time: Fri March 27, 3:30-4:45pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Monroe 118
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The East Asia Center will be hosting UVA alumna April Herlevi, Senior Research Scientist for the Center for Naval Analyses, for a speaker series lecture "Politics in the Zone: China’s Evolving Use of Economic Development Zones throughout the Reform Era."
Dr. April A. Herlevi is an expert on China’s foreign policy and economic statecraft. She currently serves as a Senior Research Scientist at the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA), a nonprofit research organization based in Arlington, Virginia, and as a Nonresident Fellow for the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR). Herlevi leads research on Chinese technology acquisition and innovation, global infrastructure development, Chinese foreign policy in the Pacific Islands, and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Dr. Herlevi earned a PhD in international relations and comparative politics from the University of Virginia in 2018.
Indigenous Democratic Traditions: Before America's 250th & Beyond
Date & Time: Fri March 27, 2:30-4:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Contemplative Commons Studio 1B
Tickets or RSVP? Free! But registration is required.
As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary, UVA’s Indigenous Political & Social Thought Committee invites reflection not only on the founding of the republic and the Constitution, but also on the Indigenous systems of governance that predated and influenced the United States’ democracy. The Founding Fathers recognized these systems, which impacted the nascent country’s institutions and were recognized in its new symbols.
Today, 574 federally recognized Native nations operate sovereign governments across the United States, managing internal affairs and engaging with local, state, federal, and international jurisdictions. These systems have evolved over centuries, rooted in traditions that long predate European arrival and continue to adapt to contemporary challenges and opportunities.
Native scholars, knowledge holders, students, and community members convene for this daylong symposium to explore the foundations and futures of tribal governance. This educational and promotional initiative seeks to broaden the conversations surrounding the U.S. Semiquincentennial to include Indigenous political thought and sovereignty, enriching our collective understanding of civic discourse and democratic practice.
Speakers Wayne Adkins, Kitcki Carroll, and Lori Quigley discuss the foundations and futures of tribal governance.
Presenter Details
Wayne Adkins is an enrolled citizen of the Chickahominy Indian Tribe and has been a member of the Chickahominy Tribal Council since 1996. A graduate of Charles City County High School, he obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Virginia in 1976. Adkins served as a member of The Virginia Indian Tribal Alliance for Life (VITAL), the organization that was instrumental in gaining federal government recognition of six Virginia Tribes through Congressional legislation in 2018. In addition to serving as First Assistant Chief, he is the Finance Officer for the Chickahominy Indian Tribe.
Kitcki A. Carroll is an enrolled citizen of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes and a descendant of Cheyenne Peace Chief, Chief Black Kettle. Since 2010, he has proudly served as the executive director for United South and Eastern Tribes, Inc. (USET) and the USET Sovereignty Protection Fund (USET SPF), a nonprofit and inter-tribal organization representing 33 federally recognized Tribal Nations from the Northeastern Woodlands, down the Atlantic coast to the Everglades, and across the Gulf of Turtle Island. Established in 1969, USET and USET SPF collectively advocate on behalf of its Tribal Nations at the regional and national level. In his capacity as executive director, Carroll works to protect and promote the sovereignty rights of USET/USET SPF members. He is a strong advocate for all Native people and actively works to ensure that the United States recognizes, honors, and fulfills its sacred trust and treaty responsibilities and obligations to Indian Country.
Dr. Lori V. Quigley is an enrolled member of the Seneca Nation, Wolf clan. She has enjoyed a career in education, attaining the rank of tenured full professor and holding positions as an academic dean, provost, and president. Currently, she serves as professor and department chair for the leadership and policy doctoral program at Niagara University and is an educational consultant and adviser to many school districts and colleges/universities, providing guidance on topics ranging from curriculum development to social justice. She earned her BA in journalism and mass communication from St. Bonaventure University and an MA in public communication and PhD in language, learning, and literacy from Fordham University. Committed to giving back to the community, Quigley received a U.S. presidential appointment to the National Advisory Council on Indian Education, and she completed a two-term gubernatorial appointment on the New York State Minority Health Council and three years as chairwoman of the board for the Seneca Gaming Corporation. Currently, she is the ombudsperson for the National Indian Education Association and a member of the WNY Alzheimer’s Association board of directors and the Trailblazing Women of WNY.
Natasha Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, by Dave Malloy
Date & Time: Fri March 27, 8-10:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation.This award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. www.concordtheatricals.com
Natasha Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, by Dave Malloy
Date & Time: Sat March 28, 8-10:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation.This award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. www.concordtheatricals.com
Natasha Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, by Dave Malloy
Date & Time: Wed April 1, 8-10:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation.This award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. www.concordtheatricals.com
Jessica Anthony Fiction Reading
Date & Time: Thur April 2, 5-6:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: UVA Bookstore
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Acclaimed writer Jessica Anthony will be on Grounds to work with undergraduate students in our Creative Writing Program and give a public reading on April 2 at the UVA Bookstore.
Presenter Details
Jessica Anthony was born in 1974 and raised in upstate New York. After graduating from Bates College, she taught English in Poland and the Czech Republic, and received an MFA in fiction from George Mason University. She is the recipient of McSweeney's inaugural "Amanda Davis Highwire Fiction Award." Her first novel, The Convalescent, reimagines a lost tribe of Hungarians in the 12th century, and the last of their kind, who is selling meat out of a school bus in modern day Virginia. The novel has become a cult classic. After The Convalescent, Anthony collaborated with the graphic designer and conceptual artist Rodrigo Corral to create the transmedia novel Chopsticks, which was profiled in the Wall Street Journal, won App of the Year by Apps Magazine. Her third novel, Enter the Aardvark, is about a Republican congressman in DC who, one hot August morning, receives a delivery on his front stoop from FedEx: a gigantic taxidermic aardvark that proceeds to bring down his re-election campaign. The novel was a finalist for the New England Book Award in Fiction, a New York Times Editors' Choice, and was profiled in Time Magazine. Her fourth novel, The Most, follows a Delaware housewife over the course of a single day, when she goes for a swim in her community swimming pool, then realizes that she cannot come out. The Most was longlisted for the National Book Award in Fiction.
Anthony has received residency fellowships from the Millay Colony, Ucross, MacDowell, the Hermitage, Bogliasco (Italy), the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Anderson Center. For three months she served as the 41st Bridge Guard, guarding the Mária Valéria Bridge connecting Štúrovo, Slovakia and Esztergom, Hungary. She is a recipient of the Creative Capital Award for Literature.
Natasha Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, by Dave Malloy
Date & Time: Thur April 2, 8-10:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation.This award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. www.concordtheatricals.com
The Drivers of China's Reverse Migration: Shortage, Environment and Rewards
Date & Time: Fri April 3, 3:15-4:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Monroe 118
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The East Asia Center will be welcoming David Zweig, Professor Emeritus of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology's Division of Social Science, for a speaker series lecture "The Drivers of China’s Reverse Migration: Shortage, Environment and Rewards."
Professor Zweig is the Director of Transnational China Consulting Limited, as well as author of ten books, including most recently The War for Chinese Talent in America: The Politics of Technology and Knowledge in Sino-U.S. Relations. For 15 years, he directed the Center on China’s Transnational Relations at HKUST, and in 2013-2015 was awarded the Humanities and Social Sciences Prestigious Fellowship, from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong.
Natasha Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, by Dave Malloy
Date & Time: Fri April 3, 8-10:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
From the celebrated and award-winning composer Dave Malloy comes Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, an electropop opera based on a scandalous slice of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation.This award-winning musical expands the possibilities for the genre with its daring score and bold storytelling.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals. www.concordtheatricals.com
Students at the Table: Building a Student Technology Council at UVA: The Ethical Dimension of AI Literacy Series
Date & Time: Wed April 8, 1-2pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Scholars' Lab Common Room, Shannon Library (room 330)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online
Join us for the fourth talk in The Ethical Dimension of AI Literacy series. In this session, Mona Sloane, Assistant Professor of Data Science and Media Studies and founder of Sloane Lab, will be joined by Sloane Lab researchers Owen Kitzmann and Celia Calhoun for the following talk:
Event Details
Digital tools and AI increasingly shape how students learn, yet students are rarely included in decisions about the technologies that affect them most. This talk introduces the Student Technology Council (STC) as a practical model for bringing student voices into campus technology and AI governance. Drawing on the research and design of UVA's STC, the presentation shows how structured student participation can inform decisions about educational technologies, data practices, and classroom AI use. The talk highlights how STCs can strengthen trust, improve instructional innovation, and support more transparent and ethical approaches to campus technology.
All are invited to register and attend. For questions, please contact Meridith Wolnick (maw2tj@virginia.edu) or Bethany Mickel (bethanym@virginia.edu).
Samuel C. Huneke: "I Will Not Abandon You: Queer Women in Nazi Germany"
Date & Time: Wed April 8, 5-6:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: New Cabell Hall 236 (German Conference Room)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Join us on April 8, 2026 at 5:00pm in the German Conference Room (New Cabell 236) for a talk from Samuel C. Huneke, Associate Professor of History at George Mason University. Presenting his new book titled "I Will Not Abandon You: Queer Women in Nazi Germany," the talk will explore queer resistance and defiance in facist Germany.
Cold War Culture and Thai Intellectuals in the American Era
Date & Time: Thur April 9, 12-1:15pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Gibson 341
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The UVA East Asia Center will be hosting Tamara Loos, Professor and Chair of the History Department at Cornell University, for a Nelson Lecture on Southeast Asia "Cold War Culture and Thai Intellectuals in the American Era."
Tamara Loos is Professor and Chair of the History Department at Cornell University and has served as Director of the prestigious Southeast Asia program there. Her first book, Subject Siam: Family, Law, and Colonial Modernity in Thailand, explores the implications of Siam’s position as both a colonized and colonizing power in Southeast Asia. It is the first study that integrates the Malay Muslim south and the gendered core of law into Thai history. Her second book, Bones Around My Neck, offers a critical history of Siam during the era of high colonialism through the dramatic and tragic life of a pariah prince, Prisdang Chumsai (1852–1935). Her teaching and articles focus on an array of topics including sex and politics, subversion and foreign policy, sexology, transnational sexualities, comparative law, sodomy, and gender in Asia. She has been interviewed by the BBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Financial Times, and other global media outlets about political protests in Thailand. She is currently writing How to be an Anti-Communist: Cold War Intimacies in Thailand.
Rubén Mosquera presents “El Teatro como crítica social en Argentina”
Date & Time: Thur April 9, 5-6:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Clark Hall, 108
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
Lecture (in Spanish) with Q&A to follow
Event Details
Join us for a multi-day residency with acclaimed Argentine playwright and theatre director Rubén Mosquera, hosted by the Department of Spanish, Italian & Portuguese at the University of Virginia.
A leading figure in Argentina’s independent theatre scene, Mosquera is known for socially engaged works that explore historical memory, civic responsibility, and the role of performance in times of political and cultural change. His theatre blends sharp social critique with innovative dramaturgy, positioning the stage as a space for dialogue, reflection, and collective meaning-making.
Entre voces y escenas - Rubén Mosquera
Date & Time: Fri April 10, 7-9pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
A new Spanish-language play by acclaimed Argentine playwright Rubén Mosquera. A bare stage becomes a space of questioning, where an author confronts enduring doubts about theater: its purpose, its ties to reality, and the boundary between fiction and life. Two actresses enter, transforming ritual preparation into performance and opening the stage to voices from history. Women from different eras—Guadalupe Cuenca, Felicitas Guerrero, Julieta Lanteri, Alfonsina Storni, the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, and countless anonymous women—emerge as symbols of resistance, care, and collective struggle. The author’s intrusive presence weaves obsession and memory into a choral fabric where theater fuses history, politics, and lived experience.
Event Details
Join us for a multi-day residency with acclaimed Argentine playwright and theatre director Rubén Mosquera, hosted by the Department of Spanish, Italian & Portuguese at the University of Virginia.
A leading figure in Argentina’s independent theatre scene, Mosquera is known for socially engaged works that explore historical memory, civic responsibility, and the role of performance in times of political and cultural change. His theatre blends sharp social critique with innovative dramaturgy, positioning the stage as a space for dialogue, reflection, and collective meaning-making.
The residency will culminate in free public performances of Entre Voces y Escenas, a new play written specifically for this residency, with UVA students working on its English translation. Performances will take place in the Caplin Theater, followed by a bilingual, student-moderated dialogue with the artists. Mosquera’s visit offers a rare opportunity to experience contemporary Argentine theatre in its full creative process—from page to stage—while fostering meaningful connections between language learning, performance, and global cultural engagement.
University Singers Spring 2026 Concert
Date & Time: Fri April 10, 8-9:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
The University of Virginia Department of Music presents The University Singers directed by Michael Slon on Friday, April 10th at 8pm in Old Cabell Hall on the historic Lawn.
Join the UVA University Singers for a special concert celebrating America’s 250th, with works including settings of Jefferson’s words from the Declaration of Independence by Judith Shatin and Todd Frazier, and music of Randall Thompson and George Bristow, as well as patriotic favorites. The program traces key moments in America’s history through musical narrative. The weekend will also include a celebration of Prof. Michael Slon’s 25th anniversary as UVA’s director of choral music
About
The University Singers is the University of Virginia’s flagship choral ensemble, heard by thousands each season in performances of a cappella and accompanied choral repertoire, including major works with orchestra.
Students in the University Singers come from UVA's eight undergraduate schools, including Arts and Sciences, Education, Batten, Commerce, Nursing, and Engineering, as well as several of the graduate and professional schools. While approximately 25-30% are music majors, the ensemble is open to any student by audition, and is a for-credit curricular class. Together, members enjoy an esprit de corps that arises from the pursuit of musical excellence, and the camaraderie the singers develop offstage. The University Singers is led by faculty conductor Michael Slon.
Entre voces y escenas - Rubén Mosquera
Date & Time: Sat April 11, 2-4pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Ruth Caplin Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
A new Spanish-language play by acclaimed Argentine playwright Rubén Mosquera. A bare stage becomes a space of questioning, where an author confronts enduring doubts about theater: its purpose, its ties to reality, and the boundary between fiction and life. Two actresses enter, transforming ritual preparation into performance and opening the stage to voices from history. Women from different eras—Guadalupe Cuenca, Felicitas Guerrero, Julieta Lanteri, Alfonsina Storni, the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, and countless anonymous women—emerge as symbols of resistance, care, and collective struggle. The author’s intrusive presence weaves obsession and memory into a choral fabric where theater fuses history, politics, and lived experience.
Event Details
Join us for a multi-day residency with acclaimed Argentine playwright and theatre director Rubén Mosquera, hosted by the Department of Spanish, Italian & Portuguese at the University of Virginia.
A leading figure in Argentina’s independent theatre scene, Mosquera is known for socially engaged works that explore historical memory, civic responsibility, and the role of performance in times of political and cultural change. His theatre blends sharp social critique with innovative dramaturgy, positioning the stage as a space for dialogue, reflection, and collective meaning-making.
The residency will culminate in free public performances of Entre Voces y Escenas, a new play written specifically for this residency, with UVA students working on its English translation. Performances will take place in the Caplin Theater, followed by a bilingual, student-moderated dialogue with the artists. Mosquera’s visit offers a rare opportunity to experience contemporary Argentine theatre in its full creative process—from page to stage—while fostering meaningful connections between language learning, performance, and global cultural engagement.
UVA Percussion Ensemble
Date & Time: Sat April 11, 8-9:30pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
The UVA Music Department presents "A Night of Percussion" on Saturday, April 11 in Old Cabell Hall. This event is supported by the Eleanor Shea Music Trust.
About
The UVA Percussion Ensemble is directed by I-Jen Fang, the principal timpanist and percussionist with the Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia. Re-established in spring 2005, the Percussion Ensemble is a chamber group that performs literature ranging from classical transcriptions to contemporary music.
The ensemble draws upon a large family of pitched and non-pitched percussion instruments. The number of players and the amount of equipment vary greatly from piece to piece. Music is chosen to match the abilities and interests of the ensemble members. Music reading skills and basic percussion technique on all percussion instruments is required. Previous percussion ensemble experience is highly recommended. The course is offered both semesters with a small group in the fall and a large group in the spring, culminating in an annual Night of Percussion Concert. Membership is open to all university students.
Chamber Music Series #6: Mixed Chamber Ensembles
Date & Time: Sun April 12, 3:30-5pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
The University of Virginia Department of Music closes out the 2025-26 season featuring mixed chamber ensembles on Sunday, April 12th, at 3:30pm in Old Cabell Hall.
The UVA Chamber Music Series presents innovative performances by the University of Virginia's world-class performance faculty and celebrated guest artists, is comprised of six professional performances for the University and the central Virginia community. These intimate concerts are programmed to offer both new and traditional works that will delight the novice as well as the well-tempered critic. The UVA Chamber Music Series is directed by Jiyeon Choi.
Digitalis: Electronic Music Festival 2026
Date & Time: Tue April 14, 7:30-9pm (drop-in event)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
The University of Virginia Department of Music presents Digitalis on Tuesday, April 14th at 7:30 pm in Old Cabell Hall. The event is free and open to all.
Digitalis is an annual concert of experimental work for sound and visual media featuring premiers by undergraduate and graduate students in Composition and Computer Technologies. These adventurous concerts invite audiences to explore new dimensions of musical experimentation. Past performances include compositions for multi-channel electronic sound, video, interactive light, homemade electronic music instruments, and more. Come experience a musical event like no other!
Land: Memory, a conversation with Esme Murdock and Meredith Palmer
Date & Time: Thur April 16, 4-5:30pm (you must stay until discussion ends)
Location: Minor Hall 125
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Join us on Thursday, April 16 from 4-5:30pm in Minor Hall 125 for a public conversation between BIFFI Fellows-in-Residence Esme Murdock and Meredith Palmer.
Speaker Details
Dr. Meredith Alberta Palmer (Tuscarora, Six Nations) is an Indigenous Geographer who explores how US imperial notions and practices of consent and refusal in research data collected about Indigenous peoples engages in a territorial politic and practice. She is currently Assistant Professor of Geography and Indigenous Studies at the University of Buffalo. Her work builds on growing fields of research on the role of science and technology in histories of dispossession and in the ongoing colonization of Indigenous people, and particularly of Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) people. She combines rigorous archival work, careful community commitments, and Indigenous methodologies of oral history and critical analysis to narrate genealogies of the spatial politics of colonialism and occupation among the Haudenosaunee.
Her book manuscript, in progress, explores how evidentiary regimes in law, science, and technology are produced through the racial and spatial dynamics of US colonialism. Each of three sections focuses on techniques and technologies–land survey, case files, and population genetics–which, while seemingly objective and perhaps banal, have emerged in particular historical moments to reconfigure the terms of US colonial occupation of Indigenous and specifically Haudenosaunee lands and Peoples. Combining archival research, interviews, participatory ethnography, and critical analyses of Indigenous literary and visual productions, she shows how Haudenosaunee and other Indigenous peoples have continually reckoned and refused US colonialism’s terms of engagement.
Dr. Esme G. Murdock is a philosopher and Associate Professor of American Indian Studies at San Diego State University. Her research interests include environmental justice, Indigenous and Afro-descended environmental ethics, settler colonial theory, and decolonization as land/resource rematriation. Murdock comes to this work as a descendant of enslaved Africans and European settlers in North America. Her current work explores the devastating impacts of colonization and slavery on both Indigenous and Afro-descended peoples and environments on Turtle Island. She anchors her understanding of settler colonialism, in particular, in the experiences and theorization of Native and Black communities especially toward securing decolonial futures. She often writes back to mainstream environmental discourse that attempts to “read out” colonization as the context of environmental degradation and destruction, particularly in the settler colonies of the United States and Canada. Her work centers conceptions of land and relating to land found within both Indigenous and African American/Afro-descended environmental philosophies. In 2024, she was an invited visiting scholar in the School of Humanities, Te Whare Wānanga o Tāmaki Makaurau (The University of Auckland) in Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland), Aotearoa New Zealand, where she taught a graduate course titled “Indigenous Political Philosophies.” Murdock has work published in Environmental Values, Global Ethics, Hypatia, Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, Ethics, Policy & Environment, World Philosophies, Critical Philosophy of Race, Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, and Social Ontology.
Dr. Murdock is currently completing a book length manuscript tentatively titled “Blood, Bone, and Land: Land Memory Across Enslavements,” which is a project on ecological (re)memory of the South Carolina Sea Coast that engages in the diverse and often erased ecological histories, ecological heritages, ethnobotanical knowledges, and complex relations of Indigenous and Afro-descended peoples within the colonial complex of multiple European powers. At this time, she is focused on the cosmological significance of trees within memory work around enslavement and plantation spaces across Native American and African American traditions.
Spring Dance Concert, Produced and Directed by Kim Brooks Mata
Date & Time: Thur April 16, 8-9:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Culbreth Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
Our dance concerts invite audiences to step into a multitude of worlds and narratives crafted through the moving body. Each performance showcases new works where students, faculty, and guest artists delve deeply into the creative process of choreography, building diverse worlds that reflect their unique perspectives and artistic journeys. Through both live and screendance works, these concerts present a rich tapestry of styles and viewpoints, creating evenings of engaging, evocative, and eclectic performances that invite everyone—whether you're new to dance or a longtime fan—to discover something unexpected.
Zines Now: Zines All Day
Date & Time: Fri April 17, 10am-5pm (drop-in event)
Location: Scholars' Lab Common Room, Shannon Library (room 308)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Just show up!
Zines All Day will celebrate zines and zine-making at UVA through a day of back-to-back zine-making tutorials from the Scholars' Lab Makerspace student staff! Every hour, on the hour. No need to register--just show up in the Makerspace at the top of the hour, anytime between 10am and 4pm.
Event Details
Kick-off Discussion:
10:00-10:30am: Join Scholars' Lab Director Amanda Wyatt Visconti for an informal conversation about deciding what zine you want to make next. Visconti will share some of the variety of zines they've created, and chat about why the zines happened and what the writing process for each was like. Attendees are welcome to bring their own zines and share about how they get ideas, what tools and supplies they use to make zines, and similar practical and design topics."
Back-to-back, one-hour workshops on how to make a mini-zine will follow this kick-off conversation, all day long! Snacks and refreshments provided.
Zines Now! is a year-long initiative showcasing the history of zines as an art form, highlighting future possibilities for the making and distribution of zines, and facilitating the expression of students’ and community members' passions and priorities now. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the UVA Arts Council, which has made this programming possible.
Spring Dance Concert, Produced and Directed by Kim Brooks Mata
Date & Time: Fri April 17, 8-9:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Culbreth Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
Our dance concerts invite audiences to step into a multitude of worlds and narratives crafted through the moving body. Each performance showcases new works where students, faculty, and guest artists delve deeply into the creative process of choreography, building diverse worlds that reflect their unique perspectives and artistic journeys. Through both live and screendance works, these concerts present a rich tapestry of styles and viewpoints, creating evenings of engaging, evocative, and eclectic performances that invite everyone—whether you're new to dance or a longtime fan—to discover something unexpected.
Spring Dance Concert, Produced and Directed by Kim Brooks Mata
Date & Time: Sat April 18, 8-9:30pm (you must stay until event ends) Late arrivals may not be admitted
Location: Culbreth Theatre, UVA Drama Building (UVA Arts Grounds)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
Our dance concerts invite audiences to step into a multitude of worlds and narratives crafted through the moving body. Each performance showcases new works where students, faculty, and guest artists delve deeply into the creative process of choreography, building diverse worlds that reflect their unique perspectives and artistic journeys. Through both live and screendance works, these concerts present a rich tapestry of styles and viewpoints, creating evenings of engaging, evocative, and eclectic performances that invite everyone—whether you're new to dance or a longtime fan—to discover something unexpected.
"Pacific Asia Beyond the American Century" Social Sciences Panel as part of UVA's East Asia Center's 50th Anniversary
Date & Time: Sat April 18, 10am-11:30am (you must stay until the end of the discussion)
Location: Colonnade Club (Pavilion VII)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online
Join the East Asia Center as we celebrate 50 years of East Asian Studies at the University of Virginia, April 17-19. Our flagship conference features UVA graduates who are experts in their fields,
Speaker Details
Brantly Womack (chair) is Professor Emeritus of Foreign Affairs at the University of Virginia. His research focuses on Chinese politics, asymmetry in international relations, and East Asian regional dynamics.
Len Schoppa (discussant) is Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia. His research centers on Japanese politics, political institutions, and comparative political economy.
Alumni Panelists:
Alice Ba is Emma Smith Morris Professor of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Delaware. Her research examines East Asian regionalism, international institutions, and U.S.–Asia relations, with a particular focus on Southeast Asia and ASEAN. She received her PhD from UVA in 2000.
H. Steven Green is Associate Professor of International Relations and Japanese Politics in the Faculty of Law at Toyo University in Japan, as well as Deputy Director of Toyo University's Center for Global Education and Exchange, and Director of the Toyo University Sumo Team. His research interests include Japan’s defense policies and the role of the modern Japanese bureaucracy.
Inhan Kim received his PhD from UVA in 2002 and is now Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science & International Relations at Ewha Womans University. His research focuses on U.S. foreign policy and security issues over the Korean Peninsula and East Asia.
Guan-Yi Leu is Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at the University of Mary Washington. Her research. Her research explores East Asian political economy and industrial policy, with a regional focus on Taiwan. She completed her doctorate at UVA in 2012.
Ka Zeng received her PhD from UVA in 2000 and is now Professor of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her research investigates Chinese trade policy and behavior in global economic governance.
"Buddhist Studies and Asian Humanities" Panel as part of UVA's East Asia Center's 50th Anniversary
Date & Time: Sat April 18, 2-3:30pm (you must stay until the end of the discussion)
Location: Colonnade Club (Pavilion VII)
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online
Join the East Asia Center as we celebrate 50 years of East Asian Studies at the University of Virginia, April 17-19. Our flagship conference features UVA graduates who are experts in their fields,
Speaker Details
Natasha Heller (chair) is a cultural historian of Chinese Buddhism with research interests spanning the premodern period (primarily 10th through 14th c.) and the contemporary era. She is currently working on two new books: a cultural and religious history of Alishan, Taiwan, and a history of trees in Chinese Buddhism.
Alumni Panelists:
Jessica Starling received her PhD from UVA in 2012 and is now Department Chair and Professor of Religious Studies at Lewis & Clark College. Her research examines lived Buddhism in contemporary Japan, particularly within the Jōdo Shinshū, with special attention to themes such as gender, family, ethics, emotion and illness.
Gareth Fisher is Department Chair and Associate Professor of Religion at Syracuse University. His research looks at the revival of Buddhism in contemporary mainland China, as well as the cultural politics surrounding the restoration of Buddhist temples in the post-Mao period. He received his PhD from UVA in 2006.
Elena Pakhoutova is Senior Curator of Himalayan Art at the Rubin Museum of Art. Her background in Tibetan Buddhist studies informs her interdisciplinary interests, including Buddhist art and ritual, art production and patronage, material culture, narrative in Tibetan visual culture, and contemporary Himalayan art. She completed her PhD at UVA in 2009.
Yi-hsun Huang is Professor for the Center for Chan Buddhism at Shanghai University. She received her PhD from UVA in 2001 and specializes in Chan and Pure Land Buddhism.
Charlottesville Symphony at UVA: Masterworks 5- Rimsky-Korsakov Sherherazade
Date & Time: Sat April 18, 7:30-9pm (you must stay until the end of the discussion)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
The Charlottesville Symphony at the University of Virginia presents the final concerts of the season on Saturday, April 18, 7:30 p.m. at Old Cabell Hall.
Benjamin Rous, conductor
Daniel Sender, violin
Program
GUBAIDULINA Fairytale Poem (1971) 12ʹ
BARBER Medea’s Dance of Vengeance, Op. 23a (1953) 13ʹ
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV Scheherazade, Op. 35 (1888) 43ʹ
In-depth program notes by Program Annotator Laurie Shulman are posted on the orchestra’s website, www.cvillesymphony.org, two weeks prior to each Masterworks concert.
Touchstones of Democracy Series: Taxes
Date & Time: Thur April 23, 12-1:15pm (you must stay until event ends)
Location: Bond House
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Please register online. Lunches served on a first-come, first-served basis beginning at 11:30am
How have debates over taxation shaped American history and its democracy? The Brookings Institution's Vanessa Williamson explores in her book, The Price of Democracy: The Revolutionary Power of Taxation in American History, how tax politics and fights over taxes are not simply about money, but about broader questions central to democracy and its ideals. Justene Hill Edwards, associate professor of history at UVA and author of the award-winning Savings and Trust: The Rise and Betrayal of the Freedman's Bank (2024), is moderating the conversation.
The Nau Lab's “Touchstones of Democracy” series explores key events, places, thinkers, and texts that inform the history and principles of democracy. Leading up to the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Declaration of Independence in July 2026, this event series is showcasing recent books that expand and deepen our understanding of the era of the American Revolution—and illuminate the connections of that period to the present.
Speakers
Vanessa Williamson is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at Brookings, and a senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. She studies taxation and democracy in America.
Her forthcoming book, “The Price of Democracy,” reveals the revolutionary power of taxation in American history (Basic Books, September 2025). She is also the author of “Read My Lips: Why Americans Are Proud to Pay Taxes,” and, with Harvard professor Theda Skocpol, “The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism.”
She has written on school segregation, tax opinion, and tax politics in the Washington Post; about the Tea Party, anti-union legislation and voter registration at income tax filing in the New York Times; about taxpayer citizenship in the Atlantic; about philanthropy and austerity and white supremacy in Dissent; and about democracy and organizing for Teen Vogue. She has discussed her research on NPR’s “Marketplace”, C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal”, CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS”, CNBC’s “Squawk Box”, and MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show.” She received her Ph.D. in social policy from Harvard University.
Justene Hill Edwards is an associate professor of history at the University of Virginia. She is a specialist in African American history and her research examines Black economic life in America. She is the author of Savings and Trust: The Rise and Betrayal of the Freedman’s Bank (2024, W.W. Norton) and Unfree Markets: The Slaves’ Economy and the Rise of Capitalism in South Carolina (2021, Columbia University Press). She has won numerous fellowships and awards, most recently an Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, a Mellon New Directions Fellowship, and the Harold F. Williamson Prize from the Business History Conference. In 2024, she was awarded an inaugural Dean’s Research Fellowship by the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Virginia. Hill Edwards is on the editorial boards of The Journal of the Civil War Era, Enterprise & Society, and the University of Virginia Press. She also serves as a trustee of the Midland School, the Shockoe Institute, and the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library.
UVA Chamber Singers Spring 2026
Date & Time: Fri April 24, 2-3:30pm (you must stay until the event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
The UVA Department of Music presents the UVA Chamber Singers spring concert on Friday, April 24th at 8 pm in Old Cabell Hall.
Performer Details
The UVA Chamber Singers, directed by Michael Slon, is a select ensemble drawn from the University Singers (UVA’s flagship chorus), and committed to broad programming perspectives, performing a wide variety of repertoire ranging from early music to contemporary compositions. In addition to a performance for the Governor and other distinguished guests at UVA’s 2017 Bicentennial Celebration, performances have included Britten’s Hymn to St. Cecilia, Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas (with Three Notch’d Road Baroque ensemble), programs of Latin American choral music, choral music from film and Broadway, and new music by Meredith Monk (performed with the Meredith Monk Vocal Ensemble.) Other collaborations include concerts with the Staunton Music Festival, Victory Hall Opera (in pioneering presentations of Poulenc and Gluck operas with deaf actors), the Charlottesville Chamber Music Festival, and a 2022 presentation of Defiant Requiem (honoring the prisoners at Terezin who performed the Verdi Requiem) at the Strathmore Music Center with five other universities. They’ve sung in workshops with Peter Phillips and members of the Tallis Scholars, and in 2014, were honored to perform for composer Philip Glass. They’ve also been heard in major works, at VMEA, and on tour in the U.S. and Europe with the University Singers.
UVA Jazz Ensemble Spring 2026
Date & Time: Sat April 25, 8-9:30pm (you must stay until the event ends)
Location: Old Cabell Hall
Tickets or RSVP? Free! Claim your UVA Arts$ tickets at least 24 hours in advance
The UVA Jazz Ensemble has become one of the more creative college big bands in the country. The group’s performances feature classic repertoire from across the spectrum of jazz history, jazz arrangements of music from diverse genres, and original compositions and arrangements by the students and the director.
Performer Details
Giving two major concerts a year in Old Cabell Hall, and various extra performances, the Jazz Ensemble is an extended big band that includes flutes, vocalists, and, sometimes, other instruments not normally associated with big band music.
The UVA Jazz Program focuses on developing the individual voices of our jazz students. We follow the Duke Ellington model of how to build a jazz orchestra: allow and encourage the distinct musical personalities of the musicians to create the overall sound and direction of the music.
The Jazz Ensemble encourages its members to immerse themselves in the art form called jazz, to understand its history, and to listen, repeatedly, to the music. Jazz, and the blues from which it sprang, are both gifts from Black America to the rest of the world. Jazz gives music back to the musicians by teaching two things: 1. master musical language on your instrument, and 2. Tell your own story; “Be yourself, everyone else is already taken,” as Oscar Wilde exhorted. The UVA Jazz Ensemble avidly pursues these twin goals of expertise and creative expression.