The E.N. Thompson Forum on World Issues is a cooperative project of the Cooper Foundation, Lied Center for Performing Arts, and University of Nebraska-Lincoln. It was established in 1988 with the purpose of bringing a diversity of viewpoints on international and public policy issues to the university and people of Nebraska to promote understanding and encourage debate.
Leilani Farha is the former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing and Global Director of The Shift. Farha has helped develop global human rights standards on the right to housing, including through her topical reports on homelessness, the financialization of housing, informal settlements, rights-based housing strategies, and the first UN Guidelines for the implementation of the right to…
This interactive event will feature local students and young professionals sharing their lived experiences as immigrants and refugees. Each panelist will tell their story, presenting a multi-dimensional picture beyond what’s portrayed in the news. Panelists will then respond to questions on a range of relevant topics, moderated by Karla Hernandez Torrijos, the inaugural Student Storyteller in…
Martha Schwartz is a landscape architect, urbanist, and climate activist. Her work and teaching focuses on the urban public realm landscape and its importance in making cities “climate ready”. For more than 40 years, Martha Schwartz Partners has completed projects around the globe, from site-specific art installations to public spaces, parks, master-planning and reclamation. Schwartz is also a…
Tyler Riewer is Creative Director at charity: water, a $100M nonprofit organization that uses data and storytelling to connect donors to their impact and dream up new ways to think about sustainability in the water sector. As of today, charity: water has funded 91,414 projects to bring clean and safe water to 14,762,215 people. Riewer leads a team of designers and storytellers, and travels the…
Dr. Ali S. Khan is Dean and Tenured Professor of Epidemiology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Public Health, and a Retired Assistant Surgeon General. He served at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for 23 years before retiring as the director of the Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response. At the CDC, Dr. Khan led and responded to numerous…
Echo-Hawk is President of the Pawnee Nation Business Council. He is an author, attorney, and and well-renowned legal scholar. A Pawnee Indian with a BA, Political Science, Oklahoma St. Univ. (1970) and JD, UNM (1973), he practices law in Oklahoma.
At this Cooper Conversation, young activists from UNL and Lincoln come together to discuss their activism, what motivates them, and how to move forward. Panelists will address the intersection of their own communities’ fight for racial justice, focusing on a rise in performative activism, allyship, burden of representation, and microaggressions. Moderated by Meyri Ibrahim, UNL political science…
Anna Deavere Smith is an actress, playwright, teacher, and author, credited with creating a new form of theater. Smith received the National Endowment for the Humanities Medal and the prestigious MacArthur Fellowship. Her acting credits in television include Shonda Rhimes’s new “untitled project,” For the People, Blackish, Nurse Jackie, and The West Wing, and her film credits include The American…
Wadhia is Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, Samuel Weiss Faculty Scholar and Clinical Professor of Law at Penn State Law in University Park. Her research focuses on the role of prosecutorial discretion in immigration law and the intersections of race, national security and immigration. Wadhia will talk about immigration reform, and the need to adopt a legal and policy framework…