MCLLC Spring UK Core Courses

Looking for a good UK Core Course? Check out the upcoming list for Spring 14. And if you want something taught in one of the 10 languages we offer, check out the course catalogue on MyUK.

MCL UK CORE COURSES - SPRING 2014



All MCL UK Core Courses Taught in English



GER 105 GERMAN FILM TODAY

Instructor: Jeff Rogers MW 9:00-9:50 + 1 hr.online lab UK Core Inquiry Humanities

What is a German film? And what makes it German? From Run Lola, Run to Inglorious Basterds, we'll watch and discuss some of

the most exciting international films of the past 15 years.



CLA 135 GREEK & ROMAN MYTHOLOGY

Instructor: Caldesi-Valeri MW 11:00-11:50 + 1 on-line hour a week UK Core Inquiry Humanities

The Greek myths studied both from the standpoint of their meaning to the Greeks and Romans and from the standpoint of their use

in later literature and in everyday life.

Analysis and PDE Seminar

Title:  Universal wave patterns

Abstract:  A feature of solutions of a (generally nonlinear) field

theory can be called "universal" if it is independent of side conditions like initial data. I will explain this phenomenon in some detail and then illustrate it in the context of the sine-Gordon equation, a fundamental relativistic nonlinear wave equation. In particular I will describe some recent results (joint work with R. Buckingham) concerning a universal wave pattern that appears for all initial data that crosses the separatrix in the phase portrait of the simple pendulum.  The pattern is fantastically complex and beautiful to look at but not hard to describe in terms of elementary solutions of the sine-Gordon equation and the collection of rational solutions of the famous inhomogeneous Painlev\'e-II equation.

Date:
-
Location:
745 Patterson Office Tower

Analysis and PDE Seminar

Title:  Automating and Stabilizing the Discrete Empirical Interpolation Method for Nonlinear Model Reduction

Abstract:  The Discrete Empirical Interpolation Method (DEIM) is a technique for model reduction of nonlinear dynamical systems.  It is based upon a modification to proper orthogonal decomposition which is designed to reduce the computational complexity for evaluating reduced order nonlinear terms.  The DEIM approach is based upon an interpolatory projection and only requires evaluation of a few selected components of the original nonlinear term.  Thus, implementation of the reduced order nonlinear term requires a new code to be derived from the original code for evaluating the nonlinearity.  I will describe a methodology for automatically deriving a code for the reduced order nonlinearity directly from the original nonlinear code.  Although DEIM has been effective on some very difficult problems, it can under certain conditions introduce instabilities in the reduced model.  I will present a problem that has proved helpful in developing a method for stabilizing DEIM reduced models.

Date:
-
Location:
745 Patterson Office Tower

synaesthesia

Any of you who might be interested in exploring the idea of synaesthesia in Sophocles might want to look at the following:

Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain on Synesthesia by Richard E. Cytowic and David Eagleman. I recommend it only because David Eagleman is one of the authors. His book Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain is a fabulous read. I've been recommending it to all of my friends. He is informative on the subject of neuroscience and has a wonderful writing style The book on synaesthesia is so described on Amazon:

Analysis and PDE Seminar

Title:  Lp norms of eigenfunctions and Kakeya-Nikodym averages

Abstract:  We consider the problem of determining upper bounds on the growth of L^p norms of eigenfunctions of the Laplacian on a compact Riemannian manifold. After an introduction to the problem, we will discuss recent works of C. Sogge and the speaker with C. Sogge relating such growth to mass concentration in frequency dependent tubes about geodesic segments. We then show that this yields improved L^p bounds for manifolds with nonpositive sectional curvatures, extending a result of Sogge-Zelditch to higher dimensions.





 

Date:
-
Location:
745 Patterson Office Tower

Aristotle on the Corinthian messenger in Oedipus

                                             

 

On Monday we will discuss Aristotle's great contribution to an understanding of Sophocles' Oedipus.

First and most importanr is Aristotle's distinction between simple and complex plots:

"Some plots are simple, others are complex. By "simple" plot, I mean one in which as it develops in a consecutive and unified manner... the shift in fortune (metabasis) comes about without peripety (peripeteia) or recognition; by "complex" one in which the shift (metabasis) is accomplished consecutively but with peripety or recognition or both." (Poetics1452a12ff.)

Next, Aristotle defines peripety:

Peripety is the shift of the action toward the opposite pole..., as, for example, in the Oedipus, the messenger who has arrived, when it seems that he will make Oedipus happy and relieve him of his fears towards his mother by revealing who he is, brings about the oposite." (Poetics, 1452a23ff.)

Crossroads

While going through Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" I noticed in Act 3, Scene2  this little speech from Robin Goodfellow:

My fairy lord, this must be done with haste,

For night's swift dragons cut the clouds full fast,

And yonder shine's Aurora's harbinger,

At whose approach, ghosts wand'ring here and there

Troop home to churchyards. Damned spirits all,

That in crossways and floods have burial.

The play is supposed to be set in ancient Athens, but, of course, it's not. It's interesting that Shakespeare has knowledge of the practice of burying suicides in crossroads. Crossroads as liminal areas, places betwixt and between, places of filth and dirt, have a long, long history.

Images courtesy of Martin Liebermann: 

www.martin-liebermann.de".

 

 

 

Subscribe to