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Freshly Tapped: Death Becomes Devils Backbone’s Sparkling Ale

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Filter Events

12nov10:00 am10:00 pmImmersive Multimedia Exhibition: Lucid Motion by Rhizomatiksat ARTECHOUSE10:00 am - 10:00 pm ARTECHOUSE

12nov6:00 pm8:30 pmProfs & Pints: CSI—Then and Now6:00 pm - 8:30 pm Church Hall

Event Details

Profs and Pints presents: “CSI—Then and Now,” with Dr. Victor Weedn, forensic pathologist, attorney, and professor in the George Washington University Department of Forensic Sciences.

Murder has been a crime throughout history and in all civilizations, and where there’s a crime, there’s a need to investigate the scene. Come let Victor Weedn, a leading expert on forensic science, walk you through the fascinating history of that field and teach you about its basic methods, current controversies, and future.

You’ll learn about the development of forensic medicine, of forensic toxicology, and the first crime labs. You’ll come to know the key figures who helped professionalize the field, and how the field has been changed by fingerprint examination, chemistry instrumentation, DNA instrumentation, computerized databases, and the attention drawn to it by the wildly popular CSI crime-show franchise.

Then you’ll get brought up to speed on the key controversies and debates in the field today, dealing with forensic fraud, hair analysis errors, bite-mark analysis, and misleading statements by forensic expert witnesses. Although there is much that the field is doing right, it continues to evolve, improve, and become more powerful, giving plenty of cause to end the talk on a hopeful note.

Dr. Weedn has a fascinating background that leaves him distinctly suited to deliver such a talk. He has worked as a medical examiner, crime laboratory director, and academic. He founded the military’s DNA identification program and oversaw the Armed Forces Identification Laboratory which identified Czar Nicholas II of Russia, the Branch Davidian victims, and later Michael Blassie, the Vietnam unknown in the National Cemetery in Arlington. He also has worked on mass graves in Iraq to develop evidence against Saddam Hussein, has been a leading advocate of the need for forensic science reform, and is deeply involved in the federal response to the current opioid crisis. Whether you’re a crime-show buff or just interested in the sciences or our own mortality, you’ll be glad to be alive to hear his presentation. (Advance tickets: $12. Doors: $15, save $2 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. Talk starts 30 minutes later. Please allow yourself time to place any orders and get seated and settled in.)

Time

(Tuesday) 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm

Location

Church Hall

1070 Wisconsin Ave NW, Washington, DC 20007

Cost

Advance ticket: $12. Door: $15, save $2 with student ID.

Learn More

Calendar GoogleCal

12nov7:00 pmClairow/ beabadoobee • Hello Yello7:00 pm 9:30 Club

12nov7:30 pm10:00 pmAMADEUS7:30 pm - 10:00 pm Folger Theatre

13nov10:00 am10:00 pmImmersive Multimedia Exhibition: Lucid Motion by Rhizomatiksat ARTECHOUSE10:00 am - 10:00 pm ARTECHOUSE

13nov6:00 pm8:30 pmProfs & Pints: Was Fighting World War I a Grave Mistake?6:00 pm - 8:30 pm Bier Baron Tavern

Event Details

Profs and Pints presents: “Was Fighting World War I a Grave Mistake?” with Michael Kazin, professor of history at Georgetown University, co-editor of Dissent magazine, and author of War Against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918.

Veterans Day originally marked the anniversary of the armistice that ended World War I. Historians continue to debate whether that conflict could have been prevented, but for the United States it was indisputably a war of choice. Germany neither threatened a trans-Atlantic attack nor had the ability to mount one. And while Woodrow Wilson and the government’s propaganda agency portrayed the Kaiser’s regime as a cruel autocracy, that regime could not raise an army without the approval of the Reichstag, an elected legislature. It was unclear that Imperial Germany was significantly morally inferior to the three empires it was fighting—the British, the French, and, until March of 1917, the realm of the Tsar.

We cannot know what impact continued U.S. neutrality would have had; by its nature, counter-factual history is a speculative enterprise. But we do know the consequences of the U.S. decision to join the Allied powers in the spring of 1917. At home, the decision to go to war also led inexorably to a campaign of repression of individual rights far greater than any that had occurred before. Newspapers were banned for making the slightest criticisms of government policy. Critics of the war were jailed for speaking out against it. Vigilantes freely assaulted people who failed to echo the hyper-patriotic gospel. The fear of “seditious” radicals and aliens would lead, in the 1920s, to the post-war Red Scare and the racist immigration laws.

Over in Europe, the American Expeditionary Force played a highly significant part in compelling the Germans to sue for peace in the fall of 1918. But the victory won by the U.S. and its allies led to an even greater tragedy, with a deeply flawed peace treaty helping to spur bloody revolutions and sow the seeds of the Second World War, a far deadlier global conflict.

Professor Kazin will analyze arguments made for and against U.S. entry into World War I at the time and in the century since. You’ll gain a much greater understanding of the conflict and its impact. (Advance tickets: $12. Doors: $15, save $2 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. Talk starts 30 minutes later. Please allow yourself time to place any orders and get seated and settled in.)