View Full Site

(Co)Ignition Calendar of Events

Cognitive Speaker Series and (Co)Ignition Member Research Presentations

On Friday, March 30th, the Center for Cognitive Literary Studies is proud to present Purdue alumn Isabel Jaen-Portillo's return! Coming to us from Portland State University, Dr. Portillo will give a talk entitled "Cognition and Gender in Early Modern Spanish Narrative: Zaya's Amorous and Exemplary Novels." The talk will be at 3:30 in Stanley Coulter 102.

The Center for Cognitive Literary Studies will meet again on Wednesday, March 21st at 11:30 in Stanley Coulter 136.

The first meeting of Spring 2012 will be on January 25th, at 11:30 am to discuss several arcticles from the inaugural issue of The Scientific Study of Literature. On that same day, Steven Totosy will be speaking from 4:30 - 5:30 in STEW 311 giving a talk entitled "About the social relevance of the study of culture and literature."

Fall 2011 will see the School of Languages and Cultures Colloquia: Cognitive Science Series. Talks will be given by Professors Thomas Broden, Jen William, Paula Leverage, and Howard Mancing.On September 6th, Thomas Broden gave a lecture entitled "Introduction to Cognitive Studies in Language and Texts." Tuesday, November 1st, Paula Leverage spoke on "Moving Through Narrative." November 10th, Howard Mancing delivered his talk on "Embodied Cognition."

November 15th, Janet Alsup will be speaking on "Investigating Connections Between Empathy and Reading Comprehension of Middle School Students" in STEW 310.

April 25th will be the last meeting of the semester, and the (Co)Ignition group will be meeting to discuss an article by (Co)Ignition member, Professor Howard Mancing, entitled "Virtual Reality: Biological vs. Mechanical"


Spring 2011 will see the (Co)Ignition group gather on the following dates: Monday 01/31 3:30p SC G030, Monday 02/28 3:30p SC G030, Monday 03/28 3:30p SC G030, Monday 04/25 3:30p SC G030.

On October 26th, Amy Cook gave a well-attended public lecture entitled "Hamlet's Mirror: Shakespeare and the Conceptual Blending Mind."

September 28th saw a discussion of two recent articles by Antonio Damasio: "Neuroscience and Ethics: Intersections," and "We Feel, Therefore We Learn: The Relevance of Affective and Social Neuroscience to Education."

To mark the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, the program in Cognitive Literary Studies at Purdue brought Professor Merlin Donald to campus to speak about his research on the evolution of the human brain. The free talk he gave was entitled "What We Were, What We Are Becoming: Cognitive Evolution," and was attended by a capacity crowd at Krannert Auditorium. The Center for Cognitive Literary Studies graciously thanks all of the sponsors for this event, including Purdue University's School of Languages and Cultures, the Department of Psychological Sciences, the Deparment of Comparative Literature, and the Anthropology Department, as well as Wabash College.

March 30th saw a discussion of Donald's latest book, "A Mind so Rare"

On Tuesday, March 24th (Co)Ignition Director Professor Paula Leverage gave a talk for the Center for Undergraduate Instructional Excellence entitled, "Cognitive Approaches to Literature, Film and Pedagogy: An Evolutionary Perspective."

Professor of Psychological Sciences and (Co)Ignition member, Richard Schwiekert, gave a talk on Thursday March 12th, entitled "Experimental Factors that Selectively Influence Processes in Immediate Recall."

On March 3rd, (Co)Ignition member Professor Julien Simon gave a lecture at Indian University East titled "Cognitive Literary Studies: An Introduction."

March 2nd completed (Co)Ignition's examination of Merlin Donald's "Origins of the Mind."

February the 13th, (Co)Ignition member Professor Ryan Schneider presented a talk on "Cognitive Studies and the Color Line" for the American Studies Colloquium.

February 9th continued discussion of Merlin Donald's "Origins of the Modern Mind," and brought about a concrete date for his presentation here at Purdue.

January 26th was the first meeting of the semester for (Co)Ignition and the discussion covered visiting scholar Merlin Donald's book, "Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition."

On December 14th, 2008, Isabel Jaen-Portillo and Julien Simon presented their preliminary plans for an upcoming fMRI and pet scan based project.

On November 11th and 12th, 2008, Jonathan Gottschall, author of The Rape of Troy: Evolution, Violence, and the World of Homer, and Literature, Science, and a New Humanities, gave three addresses to the extended (Co)Ignition community. The first was a small, informal presentation shared with the members of (Co)Ignition, in which discussion centered around Literature, Science, and a New Humanities and the difficulties facing a paradigmatic revolution in the humanities, as well as the need for establishing consilience between the humanities and the sciences. The second was a public talk to the Purdue community at-large, this one a descriptive lecture introducing his evolutionary and historical examinations of Homer's works. His last talk was given to a select group of undergraduates at Wabash College.