Categorically Not! – Vulgarization

The next Categorically Not! is Sunday 25th March. The Categorically Not! series of events that are held at the Santa Monica Art Studios, (with occasional exceptions). It’s a series – started and run by science writer K. C. Cole – of fun and informative conversations deliberately ignoring the traditional boundaries between art, science, humanities, and other subjects. I strongly encourage you to come to them if you’re in the area. There’s a new website showing past and upcoming events here. You can also have a look at some of the descriptions I did of some events in some earlier posts (such as here and here), and the description of some of the recent special ones on Point of View and Uncertainty that I organized with K. C. as USC campus events (here, here (with video) and here).

Here is a description from the poster for the upcoming programme:

In French, the word for “popularize” translates as “vulgarize.” Vulgarization is what Categorically Not! does best, so for this month’s program, we’ll hear about how and why otherwise respectable people bring literature, music, and science to the hoi poloi.

For literature, we have John Romano—a man who’s led a double-life: Before writing for movies and TV, he taught English at Columbia, where he published a book on Dickens, dozens of essays and reviews, and lectured on the connection between the humanities and entertainment on college campuses as well as for the NEH. His favorite assignment was teaching the Humanities-Great Books course to Freshmen, and in recent years he has re-created the course for adults, taking the tired-of-Book-Clubs crowd on a tour from the Iliad to the Twentieth Century. He’ll share reflections on the Western canon, its surprising accessibility, and its enduring power to entertain and to disturb.

Arthur B. Rubinstein was musical director for Broadway and Los Angeles productions of Jesus Christ Superstar, Chorus Line and A Little Night Music, and has composed original music for more than 200 movies and TV productions including War Games, Stakeout, Lost in America, and the CBS series Scarecrow & Mrs. King, for which he won an Emmy. He proudly displays his vulgarity as Music Director of Symphony in Glen—a program of free musical concerts in Griffith Park created to make the delights of classical music available to everyone regardless of background or income. Maestro Rubinstein will talk about LA’s hoi polloi, vulgarizing Mozart and declassifying Delibes.

A writer for newspapers including the NY Times and LA Times, and magazines ranging from The New Yorker to People, K.C. Cole fell in love with physics while writing about Frank Oppenheimer’s San Francisco Exploratorium—“a community museum dedicated to human awareness” designed to bring the insights of art and science to the general public in order to promote understanding. Since then, she’s shamelessly pushed science on the general public through radio, TV, magazines, newspapers, and seven nonfiction books including Mind Over Matter: Conversations with the Cosmos. Her most recent foray into vulgarization is Categorically Not! She’ll talk about why she bothers.

As usual, it is held at the Santa Monica Art Studios, come at 6:00pm for drinks, cookies and a look around the space, and there’s a 6:30 start, and they’ll ask for a small donation. Please contact Sherry Frumkin to tell us if you’re coming. Call 310-397-7449 or email sherry [at] santamonicaartstudios.com. If you don’t get around to letting her know, do come anyway!

Check out KC’s brand new website where all the events can be found, and directions.

-cvj