If you're thirsty and have always wanted to know about looking for space microbes on Europa, what medieval people really thought about dragons, how to make energy from alternative sources, or what a philosopher has to say about what the heck is actually going on, come to Public Works! It's a free event in the style of Nerd Night but designed just for Ithaca. We're bringing a variety of intellectually-stimulating presentations right to you for your entertainment and educational pleasure at Liquid State Brewery, in partnership with Story House Ithaca. Come hear talks given by Cornell and IC graduate students, professors, community experts, and everything in between! Each session will feature one to three accessible talks, followed by a Q&A session where audience participation is highly encouraged but not required!
Bring a friend, make a friend, ask an expert, and drink a beer!
The April 21st Public Works event will feature 2 talks:
a cultural analytics talk:
"Dark & Stormy: Bad Humor in the Worst Sentences Ever Written"
by Venkata S Govindarajan
Assistant Professor in CS at Ithaca College
Humor is a fundamental part of being human, but what about *intentionally bad* humor? I'll be talking about my recent research paper (with Dr. Laura Biester at Middlebury College) on sentences from the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, where writers compete to craft ‘atrocious opening sentences to the worst novel never written’. What’s unique about these sentences? Why are they so bad that they’re funny? And finally, how does AI like ChatGPT fare at writing sentences so bad that it makes us groan (and maybe chuckle)? I’ll try to answer these questions and more in my talk.
and TBD talk:
"TBD"
by TBD
TBD
Coming soon!
Time and Location
We're figuring out a new schedule in collaboration with Story House Ithaca!
TBD.
Liquid State Brewery
620 W. Green Street
Ithaca, NY
Want to sign up for email updates?
Send an email to publicworks-L-request@cornell.edu with the subject line 'join' (without quotes!)
Want to get instagram updates?
Follow our account!
We want to hear from you! Come talk to us at a Public Works event or send us a message at ithacapublicworks@gmail.com. Are you an academic? Feel free to list your Public Works talk as an outreach event on your CV! Are you not an academic? We still want to hear from you!
