UA In the News — Oct. 28

App being developed at UA could help prevent fire fatalities
Fox 6 (Birmingham) – Oct. 27
Alabama fire chiefs say a new app will help them, help you stay safe. Tuscaloosa Fire Chief Alan Martin is hoping a new smartphone fire safety app will help. The Alabama Fire Chiefs Association has been selected as one of 200 candidates across the country to possibly received $25,000 to fund the mobile app. Martin says the app would allow firefighters to enter critical information in it at a moment’s notice. Martin says that information could possibly save lives. The fire safety app is being developed at The University of Alabama.

A history of Halloween
Montgomery Advertiser – Oct. 27
Warty-nosed witches, ghouls, goblins, Transformers, princesses and clowns stalking neighborhood streets upon nightfall for the sweet taste of candy wasn’t always what Halloween was about. Michael J. Altman, an assistant professor of religious studies at the University of Alabama who specializes in American religious cultures, said thousands of years ago, Halloween started as European harvest festival celebrations, such as the Wicca holiday of Samhain. “So the pre-Christian tradition of Halloween was an end of the season festival going from the period of the year where we go from life, which is agriculturally having grown all of our crops and harvested them, to transitioning to winter where crops die and the days became shorter and nights become longer,” Altman said. “And, along with those long nights of no crops came people thinking about the dead. The agricultural metaphors were a big part of it. Even though all of us don’t farm nowadays, we still feel that transition from the heat of summer and its brightness, to the cold, longer nights and dead leaves of winter. So, that idea has stayed with us.”
 
Cuba Week at the University of Alabama
APR – Oct. 27
This week, the University of Alabama celebrates its third annual Cuba Week … UA’s Cuba Week offers an array of opportunities for the public to immerse themselves in Cuban history and culture. There will be presentations of artwork and performances with 25 Cubans from Havana, UA professors and student counterparts taking part.

UA Adapted Athletics program has red carpet event for “This is How We Roll”
NBC 48 (Huntsville) – Oct. 27
Champion wheelchair athletes at The University of Alabama got the red carpet treatment last night. The Mama Theatre welcomed UA adapted athletes for a showing of the new documentary “This is How We Roll.” It follows the program’s men’s and women’s basketball teams.
NBC 12 (Montgomery) – Oct. 27

Adolph Reed: There is no American Left, but after Bernie, there is potential
Columbia Missourian – Oct. 27
Adolph Reed, a professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania, opened his lecture Thursday evening with a bleak outlook on the future of left-wing politics. He shared what he believes is a brutal fact: “There is no Left to speak of in the United States.” Reed, who has researched American political development with an emphasis on urban politics, spoke at MU’s Mumford Hall as part of a National Endowment for the Humanities initiative to bring influential speakers to campuses and communities. The purpose of Reed’s lecture was to discuss what the future could hold for left-leaning politics after the Nov. 8 election. (The Kinder Institute will host George Hawley, associate professor at the University of Alabama, as a companion lecturer on the future of the American Right on Nov. 8.)

Diversity chief search proceeds at University of Alabama
Tuscaloosa News – Oct. 27
The University of Alabama plans to post a job listing for a new chief diversity and inclusion officer in the next couple of weeks. The job will be advertised for 30 days, and, once that period has ended, a 15-member search committee of UA faculty, staff and students will begin to screen and review candidates, according to Monica Grepin Watts, vice president for communications. The new position, announced by UA President Stuart Bell last year, is expected to be a senior administrator able to work with faculty staff and students, though where the office would be in the university’s organizational chart has yet to be announced.