The creation of new, walled, cemeteries in many European cities in the first decade of the nineteenth-century was the result of the confluence of specific social and economic processes brought by industrialization. The new cemeteries are both public and private spaces of the new bourgeois city. Urban, modern cemeteries are said to be a critical symbolic adjunct to the city.

The lecture looks at some aspects of Barcelona's modernization (1819-1919) from the privileged point of view of the cemeteries the city built during those same years.

This seminar is jointly sponsored by the Forum on Contemporary Europe and the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Stanford University.

Publicó su primer libro, la novela corta Ziutateaz, en 1976. Le siguió, en 1978, el libro de poemas Etiopia. A partir de entonces ha publicado con asiduidad, cultivando diversos géneros. Entre sus obras más importantes pueden citarse las siguientes: Obabakoak (1988); Gizona bere bakardadean (1993) -publicada en castellano con el título de El hombre solo (1994)-; Zeru horiek (1995), Esos cielos (1996)-; Poemas & Híbridos (1990); Groenlandiako lezioa (1998), Lista de locos (1998); Soinujolearen semea (2003), El hijo del acordeonista (2004).

En el ámbito de la literatura infantil y juvenil, cabe destacar los siguientes títulos: Behi euskaldun baten memoriak (1991), Memorias de una vaca (1992) Sara izeneko gizona (1996), Un espía llamado Sara (1996); Xola eta lehoiak, Shola y los leones(1995); Bambulo (1998).

Ha publicado artículos y textos literarios en diversas publicaciones de todo el mundo: El País, El Mundo, El Correo, The New York Times, The Guardian, Corriere della Sera, El Paseante, Matador, Vuelta, Die Horen, Lichtungen, Lyrikkklubbss Bibliotek, Linea d ómbra, La Main du Singe, Le Serpent à Plumes, La Femelle du Requin, Tabacaria, Modern Poetry in Translation, Poetry London, Revue Labyrint, Threepenny Review etc.

Premio de la Crítica en diversas ocasiones; Premio Euskadi, Premio Nacional de Literatura, Prix Millepages, finalista en dos ocasiones en European Literary Award, Premio Cesare Pavese etc.

Su obra ha sido traducida y publicada en 30 lenguas.

__________________________________________________________________________

Bernardo Atxaga belongs to a group of writers who began to publish in the Basque language at the beginning of the 1970's. He graduated with a degree in Economics from the Facultad de Bilbao in 1973. Later, he completed his studies in Philosophy at the University of Barcelona (1980 - 1983). He published his first book, the short novel Ziutateaz, in 1976, followed by Etiopia, a book of poems, in 1978. Since then, he has published prolifically and developed a varity of styles. Among his most important works are: Obabakoak (1988); Gizona bere bakardadean (1993) -published in Castilian and titled El hombre solo (1994)-; Zeru horiek (1995), Esos cielos (1996)-; Poemas & Híbridos (1990); Groenlandiako lezioa (1998), Lista de locos (1998); Soinujolearen semea (2003), and El hijo del acordeonista (2004).

In the world of emerging young literature, the following titles of Mr. Atxaga are worth noting: Behi euskaldun baten memoriak (1991), Memorias de una vaca (1992) Sara izeneko gizona (1996), Un espía llamado Sara (1996); Xola eta lehoiak, Shola y los leones (1995); Bambulo (1998).

He has published articles and literary texts in many publications around the world, including: El País, El Mundo, El Correo, The New York Times, The Guardian, Corriere della Sera, El Paseante, Matador, Vuelta, Die Horen, Lichtungen, Lyrikkklubbss Bibliotek, Linea d ómbra, La Main du Singe, Le Serpent à Plumes, La Femelle du Requin, Tabacaria, Modern Poetry in Translation, Poetry London, Revue Labyrint, Threepenny Review etc.

Atxaga has won many awards including the Premio de la Critica on many occasions, the Premio Euskadi, Premio Nacional de Literatura, Prix Millpages, and he was a finalist on two occasions for the European Literary Award.

His works have been translated and published in 30 languages.

This annual award, which carries a cash prize of $10,000, honors a journalist not only for a distinguished body of work, but also for the particular way that work has helped American readers to understand the complexities of Asia. It is awarded jointly by the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Center in the Freeman Spogli Institute at Stanford University, and the Shorenstein Center on Press, Politics, and Public Policy in the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. This year’s recipient is Ian Buruma.

Ian Buruma was born in the Netherlands, and educated at Leyden University and Nihon University, Tokyo. He is a journalist, author, and Luce Professor at Bard College, New York. He is a frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books and many publications in Europe and the US. His latest books are Occidentalism (with Avishai Margalit) and Murder in Amsterdam.

Buruma’s talk will explore how for many centuries Westerners have looked East for answers to the problems in their own societies. How valid were these answers? What are people looking for today, when China and Japan look like attractive models? Is there anything we can learn?

Related panel discussion:
Death of the Foreign Correspondent: An Exaggerated Demise?

For the past sixty years, most analysts have assumed that Japan's security policies would reinforce American interests in Asia. The political and military profile of Asia is changing rapidly, however. Korea's nuclear program, China's rise, and the relative decline of US power have commanded strategic review in Tokyo just as they have in Washington. What is the next step for Japan's security policy? Will confluence with U.S. interests--and the alliance--survive intact? Will it be transformed? Will Japan become more autonomous?

Richard J. Samuels is Ford International Professor of Political Science and director of the Center for International Studies. He is also the founding director of the MIT Japan Program. In 2001 he became chairman of the Japan-US Friendship Commission, an independent federal grant-making agency that supports Japanese studies and policy-oriented research in the United States. In 2005 he was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Professor Samuels served as head of the MIT Department of Political Science between 1992-1997 and as vice-chairman of the Committee on Japan of the National Research Council until 1996. Grants from the Fulbright Commission, the Abe Fellowship Fund, the National Science Foundation, and the Smith Richardson Foundation have supported nine years of field research in Japan.

Dr. Samuels' recent book, Securing Japan, was published in 2007 by Cornell University Press.

His previous books include Machiavelli's Children: Leaders and Their Legacies in Italy and Japan, a comparative political and economic history of political leadership in Italy and Japan, "Rich Nation, Strong Army": National Security and the Technological Transformation of Japan, The Business of the Japanese State: Energy Markets in Comparative and Historical Perspective, and Politics of Regional Policy in Japan.

His articles have appeared in International Organization, Foreign Affairs, International Security, The Journal of Modern Italian Studies, The Journal of Japanese Studies, Daedalus, The Washington Quarterly, and other scholarly journals.

Dr. Samuels received his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1980.

As a result of the events which started in Poland with the birth of the Solidarity Movement in 1980 and the events that followed in the next decade, the political map of Europe has changed drastically. New spirit and new countries have emerged, changing the continent as radically as it was changed by the two World Wars. This time, however, change was achieved without (or nearly without) bloodshed . The process of unification of the continent which continued with the admission of Poland (and five other countries) first to NATO and then to European Union, changed those two institutions which are still re-defining themselves. This lecture will present and evaluate this new shape of Europe and of European institutions in light of these changes.

About the Speaker
Dr. Kozlowski earned an M.A. from the Department of Philosophy and History from Jagiellonian University in Krakow, after which he studied Political Science at the Sorbonne and English language at the London School of English. He earned his Ph. D. in History from Jagiellonian University in 1988. Dr. Kozlowski studied at Northwestern University (1986-87) and at Stanford University (1987-88) on a Fulbright Research Grant.

Dr. Kozlowski worked as a journalist and editor for a number of Polish publications including "Wiesci," "Wiadomosci Krakowskie," and "Tygodnik Powszechny", before joining the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Since 1990, Dr. Kozlowski has served as Minister-Counselor and Charge d'Affairs at the Polish Embassy in Washington D.C., as Director of the American Department and Undersecretary of State for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as Ambassador of Poland to Israel, and as Ambassador for Polish-Jewish Relations. He is currently the Deputy Director of the Department of Africa and Middle East, Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.