Western Reads to Co-Host Showing of ‘Olympia’ at the Pickford on Jan. 28, Faculty Panels Feb. 5

[ Editor's note: This event is sold out. ]

BELLINGHAM – Western Washington University’s Western Reads program will host a pair of upcoming events in its continued programming regarding this year’s Western Reads selection, Daniel James Brown’s “The Boys in the Boat,” detailing the story of the University of Washington crew team that won gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games.

The events are free and open to the public.

At 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 28 at the Pickford Film Center in downtown Bellingham, Western Reads will co-host, along with the Pickford and Whatcom READS, a showing of Leni Riefenstahl’s groundbreaking documentary “Olympia,” which debuted in 1938 and broke new ground in the way sports were filmed and edited.

Riefenstahl’s films, complicated by her association with Nazism, will be explored during the evening’s discussion. The film will be shown in two parts, at 6:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m., with a facilitated discussionled by Western’s Kevin Leonard, professor of History, during the intermission. While the screening and discussion are free, tickets to reserve a seat must be picked up at the Pickford’s box office at 1318 Bay St.; for more information, go to http://www.pickfordfilmcenter.org/.

On Thursday, Feb. 5, a pair of faculty panel discussions will be held discussing the societal and historical impact of the 1936 Berlin Olympics, designed to be a showcase of Adolf Hitler’s master-race theory. But the success of other athletes, from the University of Washington’s crew team to African-American sprinter Jesse Owens, challenged Hitler’s ability to craft that narrative.

The Western faculty recounting these events and leading the community discussion on their lasting impact on the world are Kevin Leonard (History); Sheila Webb (Journalism) and Cornelius Partsch (Modern and Classical Languages). The panel discussions will be held from 4-5:30 p.m. in Academic Instructional Center West #204 on Western’s campus, and from 7-8:30 p.m. at Village Books in Fairhaven. The 4 p.m. panel on Western’s campus will be livestreamed at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/wwu-live-events1 for those who are unable to attend in person.

Western Reads is a campus-wide reading program designed to promote intellectual engagement, community and conversation among new students, bringing together teaching, scholarship and community service in a liberal arts, student-centered context.

For more information on either the showing of “Olympia” or the panel discussions, contact Dawn Dietrich, director of Western Reads and Western Washington University Professor of English, at Western.Reads@wwu.edu.