Cultures & Languages | Collaboration Hub 120
Join other language learners in our multi-language reading club! Spend an hour relaxing, reading for fun in the company of others. Bring a foreign language book, magazine, or newspaper or read one from the library collection.

Cultures & Languages | 117 Decio Hall
Practice your German, enjoy the company of students and faculty, and have some delicious snacks. We would love to see you all there. Originally published at germanandslavic.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | 128 Decio Hall
In this talk and reading, prize-winning translator, scholar, and poet Alyssa Gillespie returns to Notre Dame to reflect on a body of work reshaped since 2022. Gillespie will read from Vega’s Fugitive: Poems by Marina Tsvetaeva (2026), her new collection of Tsvetaeva translations. She will then trace her turn toward Ukrainian literature, a path that runs through Taras Shevchenko. Her translation of Shevchenko’s “Kavkaz” (“The Caucasus”) was singled out by Vitaly Chernetsky in his 2025 ASEEES Presidential Address on ethics and epistemic justice in the field. Drawing on that work, she will consider what translators and students of Slavic literatures owe to the voices and traditions long marginalized within it: which texts get translated, whose knowledge counts, and how. The talk concludes with readings from her current large-scale project, a translation of Anatoliy Dimarov’s novel And There Will Be People (1964-68) for the Harvard Library of Ukrainian Literature book series. A conversation with the audience will follow. Alyssa Gillespie is the author of many scholarly books and articles on Russian literature, including A Russian Psyche: The Poetic Mind of Marina Tsvetaeva (2001), Taboo Pushkin: Topics, Texts, Interpretations (2012), Pushkin's Poetic Imagination (in Russian, 2021), and the forthcoming creative biography Alexander Pushkin: Between Passion and Measure (2027). She has won several international awards for her poetic translations and held a translation fellowship from the NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) in 2022. Vega's Fugitive (2026), her collected translations of the verse of Marina Tsvetaeva, is her first book-length translated work. Since 2022, she has been engaged in translating and writing about Ukrainian literature, and in the summer of 2025, she participated in the two-week-long "Translating Ukraine" Summer Institute in Wrocław, Poland. Her translation from the Ukrainian of Anatoliy Dimarov's novel And There Will Be People (1964-48) will be published serially in the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute's Library of Ukrainian Literature book series beginning in late 2027. Gillespie previously worked as a professor of Russian language and literature at the University of Notre Dame, 1999-2016, and as a professor and chair of the Russian department at Bowdoin College, 2016-2021.   Organized by the Department of German, Slavic, and Eurasian Studies with support from the Nanovic Institute for European Studies.Originally published at germanandslavic.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | 117 Decio Hall
Join us for a Slavic Tea Party, with a study abroad presentation on experiences in Kazakhstan (Sophia Nicholson)! Exploring Kazakh culture. Food, fun activities, songs. Originally published at germanandslavic.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | 102 Hesburgh Library (Rare Books & Special Collections)
This talk by Daniela Gutiérrez Flores, assistant professor of Spanish, University of California, Davis, traces the transformation in the cultural perception of cooking between the late fifteenth and seventeenth centuries across the early modern Mediterranean. Within the frame of the Humanistic reappraisal of practical knowledge, cookery—a historically shunned activity associated with servility, women, and unskilled labor—was recast as a practice that engaged not only the body and the senses, but the mind. This allowed cooks to articulate and claim the dignity and cultural value of their work, elevating it to an occupation of intellectual stature akin to art. Yet, such ideas also generated a gender division of culinary value: the work of male cooks was seen as an intellectual practice that contributed to civic life, while the work of women was perceived as superficial, and ultimately inferior. I suggest that this ideological division lies behind the contemporary figure of the culinary genius, with important consequences. Presenter Daniela Gutiérrez Flores specializes in early modern Spanish and colonial Latin American studies, with an emphasis on food and the culture of labor. Her current book project, A Century of Cooks: The Birth of Modern Cooking and the Making of the Spanish Empire, argues that early modernity marked the emergence of the modern notion of cooking as a socially respectable and culturally valuable occupation, akin to an art and form of knowledge. It demonstrates that, while this view of cooking challenged preceding epistemological frameworks that relegated it to an insignificant activity, such a dignification was only possible through a politics of exclusion rooted in gender, race, and social class. In addition to her book manuscript, she is currently developing two new research projects. At the intersection of food and animal studies, the first examines the presence of cats in early modern Spanish cultural imagination. It poses the kitchen as a porous space of interspecies and interclass relations through an understanding of the cat as an animal worker intimately tied to the underclasses. She is also developing a microcultural history of mondongo, a popular tripe stew with origins dating back to the sixteenth century, situating it within the broader context of Afro-Hispanic foodways. She is also interested in using food and sensorial engagement as pedagogical tools in teaching early modern culture and history. She was the lead Principal Investigator of the Mellon-funded Sawyer Seminar “Thinking Food at the Intersections: Justice and Critical Food Studies,” an interdisciplinary research initiative that sought to examine the systemic roots of food inequity through humanities-based programs. Learn more in the Library Guide, From Texts to Table: Getting Started. Contact For more information, contact Diego Felipe Lopez Aguirre, postdoctoral research associate, at dlopezag@nd.edu.Open to Undergraduates, Graduate Students, Faculty, Staff, Postdocs, Public, Alumni, & Friends

Cultures & Languages | Zoom
Learn how to design research posters that command attention in a crowded hall and deliver mini-presentations that resonate with your audience. You will leave with practical templates, layout best practices, and effective Q&A techniques. Join on Zoom. Register here

Cultures & Languages | Bond Hall 308
Join us for a guest lecture by Prof. Won-Ki Jeong (Ph.D.) from Korea University’s HVCL Lab as part of the Korea and AI Technology Talk. Learn about Korea’s cutting-edge AI technology development through the lens of medical image analysis. All are welcome.

Cultures & Languages | 128 Decio Hall
Join us for a gathering to explore Kyrgyz culture and create tote bags decorated with traditional Kyrgyz ornaments! Originally published at germanandslavic.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | 2148 Jenkins Nanovic Halls
The Acta Pekinensia (1705–1712), compiled by the Jesuit Kilian Stumpf, is among the richest documentary sources for the Chinese Rites Controversy. While scholarship has focused primarily on European missionaries, the papal legate, and the Kangxi emperor, this paper shifts attention to the collective petitions submitted by Chinese Catholics concerning the Chinese rites and the names of God. I argue that these petitions are more than evidence of a theological dispute. They reveal the emergence of a Chinese Catholic community that understood itself not simply as the recipient of missionary instruction but as a moral and theological agent within the life of the Church. Often drafted by Christian literati while speaking in the name of a broader body of believers, the petitions combined sophisticated theological reasoning with the deferential language of Qing official culture. Women also appear among the petitioners, offering a rare glimpse of female participation in public religious advocacy despite the gendered constraints of late imperial China. Rather than reading these documents solely as ecclesiastical records, I situate them within the broader moral and political culture of the Qing. Their collective appeals echo the practice of mingyuan (鳴冤), public cries against injustice through which ordinary subjects sought redress from higher authorities. Yet these petitions did more than protest. They insisted on making visible the qing (情)—the lived circumstances, moral experience, and cultural realities—of Chinese Christians as indispensable to the Church’s discernment of the rites. Read through the lens of historical theology, these petitions reveal how Chinese Catholics appropriated familiar forms of political communication to articulate a distinctly Chinese mode of ecclesial participation. The Acta Pekinensia thus preserves not only the history of a controversy but also one of the earliest collective expressions of what it meant to reason—and to speak—as Chinese Catholics. Xueying Wang’s research focuses on Catholicism in China, especially the late imperial period. She pays special attention to the writings of Chinese Catholics, whose voices have traditionally been neglected. She has published articles on the work of Chinese Catholic intellectuals including Yan Mo, Zhang Xingyao and Xia Dachang, who offered divergent perspectives on how their Confucian heritage could be harmonized with their newfound Catholic faith. Through careful examination of their writings, Wang explores theological topics such as human nature, sacrifices, and Jesus Christ in the cultural context of late imperial China. She is also interested in the translation of Catholic concepts into Chinese. She is currently writing a monograph tentatively titled: Chinese Literati on the Rites Controversy: A Comparative Theological Perspective.The seminar is sponsored by the Liu Institute's East Asia Working Group. Originally published at asia.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | Decio 131
Come and practice your Japanese in a fun and relaxing environment! All levels welcome! For questions, please contact Prof. Naoki Fuse (nfuse@nd.edu).

Cultures & Languages | Duncan Student Center W210
Come and practice your English in a comfortable and relaxed environment!

Cultures & Languages | 3130 Jenkins Nanovic Hall
Come and practice your Irish at Tae's Plé! All levels are welcome!

Cultures & Languages
Happy Thanksgiving! Originally published at architecture.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | Decio 3rd Floor
Italian Cultural Hour, a fun and informal opportunity to meet and practice your Italian with members of the Italian Program, Italophones, Italophiles, and anyone with an appreciation for all things Italian. Join us to celebrate le feste in Italia (holidays in Italy), learn about Italian holiday traditions, and enjoy some typical seasonal treats and activities! All are welcome! Originally published at italianstudies.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | Bond Hall 308
Join Fulbright FLTAs Ester, Sharon, and Nazgul for a presentation on year-end holiday celebrations in their homelands! Enjoy festive holiday treats with familiar and new faces alike!

Cultures & Languages | Decio 131
Come and practice your Japanese in a fun and relaxing environment! All levels welcome! For questions, please contact Prof. Naoki Fuse (nfuse@nd.edu).

Cultures & Languages | 128 Decio Hall
Join us every Thursday for a relaxed and friendly conversation club! We will talk about a variety of topics, listen to music, share ideas, and practice Russian together. We hope to see you there! Originally published at germanandslavic.nd.edu.

Cultures & Languages | Duncan Student Center W210
Come and practice your English in a comfortable and relaxed environment!

Cultures & Languages | Log Chapel
Join us for Holy Mass in French in the Log Chapel on campus! Mass will be followed by reception with free French food, courtesy of the French Club.

Cultures & Languages | 3130 Jenkins Nanovic Hall
Come and practice your Irish at Tae's Plé! All levels are welcome!