What’s the “Spring Festival” in Western countries? What causes the funny Chinglish? What can you do to make this world a greener place? How long does it make a foreign country near and dear to your heart? For those who are interested in these topics, the upcoming ELC Spring Faculty Lecture Series 2008 will answer many of your questions.

“International cultural issues are very popular subject matter for the Faculty Lecture Series,” noted Philippe Bierny, the organizer of this year’s Faculty Lecture Series. The annual Spring Faculty Lecture Series, given every April, aim to help STU students explore diverse cultures and gain global perspectives. ELC faculty members Ora Karee and Beth Rathe will kick off this year’s Lecture Series on the evening of April 1, addressing Passover and Easter, two traditional spring holidays in the West. By then, interesting stories hidden behind these holidays and varying foods and customs connected with these special occasions will be unveiled at length.

The subsequent weeks will witness another three concerted lectures. Gabriel Fang and Mingming Yuan will give insight to the background of the English language and the most common mistakes made by Chinese learners of English on April 9. Kristin Helland, Claudia Kunschak, and Rita Zheng will bring to light Environmentalism, an increasing hot topic in the U.S., Europe, and China on April 22, and show what change you can make for environmental protection. The last presentation titled “Home away From Home: Living in Costa Rica, Australia and Indonesia” will be given on April 27 by Robyn Wall, Ada Wang, and Alan Fenwick.

According to Philippe, all the lectures will be held in the Science Lecture Hall. As usual, students are more than welcome to join the lectures and workshops. Philippe is confident that everyone should be able to learn something new as long as they participate. “The Lectures are specifically for students. The more who come, the better!”