Past Events
Past Events
This page features archival information from select Philosophy, Religion, and Humanities Forum talks in recent years. Click the links below for information about specific events.
Jim Jarmusch, Dead Man Film Screening with Discussion
Fall 2025: The PRH Forum hosted a film screening and discussion in partnership with Austin Film Society.
November 13th and 17th, 2025
7 pm
AFS Cinema
DEAD MAN
A film by Jim Jarmusch
USA, 1995, 2h 0min, DCP
“A hypnotic and beautiful black-and-white western … This masterpiece is simultaneously a mystical, highly poetic account of dying; a well-researched appreciation of Native American cultures; a frightening portrait of modern American violence and capitalist greed that refuses to traffic in the stylistic alibis of Hollywood; a warm, hilarious depiction of cross-cultural friendship; and a hallucinatory trip across the American wilderness.”
—The Chicago Reader
On November 13th, the screening featured a post-film discussion with Austin Community College Professors Antonio Ramirez and Matt Kliewer from the Department of Philosophy, Religion, and Humanities. The panel, moderated by Professor Jean Lauer, invited conversation about the film’s themes as they pertain to existentialism, epistemology, legacies of the Western and revisionist Western, and Indigenous representation.
****************************************************
Werner Herzog Film Screenings with Discussion
Fall 2024: The PRH Forum hosted a film screening and discussion in partnership with Austin Film Society.
November 3, 2024
3 pm
AFS Cinema
BURDEN OF DREAMS
A film by Les Blank
USA, 1982, 1h 35min, DCP
“One of the most remarkable documentaries ever made about the making of a movie.”
—Roger Ebert
“A fascinating portrait of a filmmaker pushed to the outer edge of sanity.”
—All Movie Guide
About the film: Here the great documentarian Les Blank profiles his good friend, filmmaker Werner Herzog, as the German director fights the elements (and his lead actor) to make the epic FITZCARRALDO. Featuring a post-film panel by Austin Community College. Newly restored.
Featuring a post-film panel by Austin Community College with Professors Jean Anne Lauer, Aran Gharibpour, and Zach Blaesi from the Department of Philosophy, Religion, and Humanities. The panel will explore the ethical aspects of Herzog’s uncompromising pursuit of his creative dream and how it could challenge our conceptions of human excellence and well-being.
Followed by a special presentation at 6pm
FITZCARRALDO
A film by Werner Herzog
West Germany/Peru, 1982, 2h 37min, DCP, In German/Spanish/Asháninka with English subtitles
“FITZCARRALDO is one of the great visions of the cinema and one of the great follies.”
—Roger Ebert
“Few motion pictures have captured the frenzied power of obsession with as much veracity.”
—Deep Focus Review
“The preeminent testament of Herzog’s labor as a filmmaker.”
—Slant
About the film: One of the screen’s great portraits of obsession. Klaus Kinski plays Fitzcarraldo whose dream of building an opera house in the middle of the Peruvian jungle to rival Europe’s best leads him to try and make one big score. One sequence in the film was so insanely difficult to achieve that the whole enterprise becomes charged with a madness akin to that of the story’s protagonist. Also screening: Les Blank’s BURDEN OF DREAMS featuring a post-film panel by Austin Community College.
PRH FORUM EVENTS: 2023
Ai Weiwei, Human Flow Film Screening
Spring 2023: The PRH Forum hosted a film screening and discussion in partnership with Austin Film Society.
HUMAN FLOW
A film by Ai Weiwei
Germany/China, 2017, 145 minutes, English
“As a human being, I believe any crisis or hardship that happens to another human being should be as if it is happening to us. If we don’t have that kind of trust in each other, we are deeply in trouble.” — Ai Wei Wei
March 5, 2023
6 pm
AFS Cinema
About the film: Artist, activist, and director Ai Weiwei captures the global refugee crisis — the greatest human displacement since World War II — in this breathtakingly epic film journey HUMAN FLOW.
More than 65 million people around the world have been forced from their homes to escape famine, climate change, and war. Ai Weiwei examines the staggering scale of the crisis and its profoundly personal human impact. Over the course of one year in 23 countries, Weiwei follows a chain of urgent human stories that stretch across the globe, including Afghanistan, France, Greece, Germany and Iraq.
Discussants: Dr. Jean Anne Lauer, professor of Humanities and Film studies at ACC, and Natalia Drelichman, attorney with American Gateways.
CCHA 2023: Post-Conference Symposium
- October 14, 2023 “Panel: Finding Your Career in Arts and Culture”
- October 18, 2023 Hip Hop Symposium: Celebrating Journalism and Cinema in Hip-Hop featuring Billy Johnson Jr. on the role of Journalism in Hip-Hop & Rakeda Ervin on the Cinematic Evolution of Hip-Hop.
- March 5, 2023 Human Flow Film Screening
PRH FORUM EVENTS: 2018 - 2019
- October 3, 2018 Ajit George, Daughters of Destiny Film Screening
- October 17, 2018 Panel, “What’s Wrong with Goat Yoga? A Discussion of Cultural Appropriation in Modern Western Yoga”
- November 13, 2018 Panel, “Liberal Arts Education in the 21st Century Community College”
- February 27, 2019 Ted Hadzi-Antich, “The Case for Liberal Arts Education in the Community College”
- March 12, 2019 Carolyn Bottler, “Buddhist Ethics: The Practice of Enlightenment, Tolerance, and Energy”
- April 9, 2019 Grant Potts, “Beauty, Truth, and Education”
PHILOSOPHY FORUM EVENTS: 2017 - 2018
- September 26, 2017 Jeet Kune Do: Bruce Lee’s Philosophy and Art
- October 10, 2017 Evie Litwok, “Witness to Mass Incarceration”
- October 24, 2017 Tommy J. Curry, “Black Male Studies: The Impact of Black Male Vulnerability and Phallicism on Gender-Masculinity Theory”
- November 8, 2017 Grant Potts, “The Philosophy of Rite: Ritual in Chinese Ethical Thought”
- February 28, 2018 Carolyn Bottler, “Buddhist Ethics: The Practice of Enlightenment”
- April 4, 2018 Panel, “Yoga, Spirituality, and Philosophy”
PHILOSOPHY FORUM EVENTS: 2016 - 2017
- September 28, 2016 Panel, “Are you Game? A Look at the History of Gaming Across Time and Cultures?”
- October 26, 2016 Panel, “Philosophy, Masques, and Horror”
- November 6, 2016 Panel, “Ethics and Women’s Incarceration”
- February 13, 2017 Panel, “Philosophy, Sex & Love“
- February 22, 2017 Matt Watkins, “Guns on Campus: Is an Armed Campus a Better Campus?”
- March 19, 2017 Grant Potts, “Has God Left the Building? Today’s Trends in American Religion and Spirituality”
- April 4, 2017 Panel, “Can’t Kill a Dream: Dr. King’s Lessons for Today”
PHILOSOPHY FORUM EVENTS: 2015 - 2016
- September 30, 2015 Don Becker, “What Do We Owe to Our Government?”
- November 4, 2015 Panel, “What Does Our Government Owe Us?”
- February 24, 2016 Panel, “High-Tech Humanities: Exploring the Impact of Technology on the Human Experience”
- March 30, 2016 Panel, “Why Non-Human Lives Matter”