Tuesday, October 27
12 pm
Shapiro Campus Center @ Brandeis University
This past summer in Iran, a movement for more democracy was met with chaos and bloodshed. Come hear about a people power movement that in the end marked the finish of the Cold War without violence or bloodshed!
Did you know that the events leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall were the result of a bureaucratic mistake?
Did you know that for years, East German officials played their national anthem without texts because it discussed a unified Germany?
Come here what life in Communist East Germany was really from 2 historic figures who were there!
The Center for German and European Studies presents
Concert and Conversation with
Wolf Biermann
(singer and song writer, who became the most radical critic of the party dictatorship in East Germany)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_Biermann
and
Marianne Birthler
(heads the government office that manages the archives of the former East German secret police (Stasi))
http://www.bstu.bund.de/nn_1137410/EN/Office/The__Federal__Commissioner/the__federal__commissioner__node.html__nnn=true
Here’s a Thomas Friedman column on the significance of Nov 9, the day the wall fell:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/18/opinion/18friedman.html
“The most important difference between 11/9 and 9/11 is “people power.” Germans showed the world how good ideas about expanding human freedom — amplified by people power — can bring down a wall and an entire autocratic power structure, without a shot. There is now a Dunkin’ Donuts on Paris Square adjacent to the Brandenburg Gate, where all that people power was concentrated. Normally, I am horrified by American fast-food brands near iconic sites, but in the case of this once open sore between East and West, I find it something of a balm. The war over Europe is indeed over. People power won. We can stand down — pass the donuts.”
http://www.brandeis.edu/cges/news/upcomingevents/index.html
Also more info at the Facebook Event:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=161144713010
