BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.2.3.1//EN TZID:America/New_York X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/New_York BEGIN:VEVENT UID:763@ssa.ccny.cuny.edu DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20260423T173000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20260423T190000 DTSTAMP:20260126T233033Z URL:https://ssa.ccny.cuny.edu/events/spring-2026-sciame-lecture-series-ben -goldfarb/ SUMMARY:Spring 2026 Sciame Lecture Series: Ben Goldfarb DESCRIPTION:Please RSVP\nThis in-person lecture is part of the Spring 2026 Sciame Lecture Series\, "The Elephant in the Room: Locating Animal Lives i n Buildings\, Cities\, and Landscapes."\n\nBen Goldfarb (he/him) is an env ironmental journalist whose work has appeared in National Geographic\, the Atlantic\, Smithsonian Magazine\, the New Yorker\, and many other publica tions. His most recent book\, Crossings: How Road Ecology Is Shaping the F uture of Our Planet\, was named one of the best books of 2023 by the New Y ork Times and received the Rachel Carson Award for Excellence in Environme ntal Writing and the Banff Book Competition’s Grand Prize. His previous book\, Eager: The Surprising\, Secret Life of Beavers and Why They Matter\ , won the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award. He lives in Colo rado with his wife\, his daughter\, and his dog\, Kit — which is\, of co urse\, what you call a baby beaver.\n\n"Paved Paradise: The Impacts of Roa ds and the Rise of Transportation Ecology": Some 40 million miles of roadw ays encircle the earth\, yet we tend to regard them only as infrastructure for human convenience. While roads are so ubiquitous they’re practicall y invisible to us\, wild animals experience them as alien forces of death and disruption. More than a million animals are killed by cars each day in the U.S. alone\; creatures from antelope to salmon are losing their abili ty to migrate in search of food and mates\; and the very noise of traffic chases songbirds from vast swaths of habitat. Today\, road ecologists are seeking to blunt that destruction through innovative solutions. Conservati onists are building bridges for California’s mountain lions and tunnels for English toads\, engineers are deconstructing the labyrinth of logging roads that web national forests\, and community organizers are working to undo the havoc highways have wreaked upon American cities. In his talk\, B en Goldfarb will discuss the ecological harms wrought by transportation an d the movement to redress them — and how we can create a better\, safer world for all living beings.\n\nSuggested Reading: How Roadkill Became an Environmental Disaster\, Ben Goldfarb\, The Atlantic\, 2019.\n\n"The Eleph ant in the Room: Locating Animal Lives in Buildings\, Cities\, and Landsca pes" takes its title from the expression “the elephant in the room\,” which originates in the Russian author Ivan Krylov’s 1814 fable “The I nquisitive Man.” In the story\, a visitor to a natural history museum be comes so enthralled with countless “birds and beasts” that he overlook s the largest of them all: a colossal elephant. As the expression gained c urrency\, any reference to real animals gave way to metaphorical ones. The spring 2026 Sciame lecture series takes the idiom literally by addressing the common failure to notice all animals in the built environment. In the lecture series\, scholars\, designers\, thinkers\, and activists cast lig ht on imagining\, designing\, and sharing buildings\, cities\, and landsca pes with other species.\n\nMaking space for animals in the built environme nt often requires diverting attention away from our human perspective and desires\, thus troubling our own anthropocentrism and claims about human e xceptionalism. More often than not\, the built environment creates antagon istic\, if not deadly\, conditions for animals. Ballooning construction ca mpaigns\, invasive resource extraction for building materials\, and hermet ically sealed structures have all decimated animal habitats and killed cou ntless animals. Given the planetary threats of diminishing biodiversity\, the climate crisis\, and health emergencies\, recentering animal lives and human-animal relationships in the built environment is critical to the su rvival of all animal life.\n\nAll lectures are free\, open to the public\, and held in the Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture Sciame Au ditorium. For live captioning\, ASL interpretation\, or access requests\, please contact ssadean@ccny.cuny.edu.\n\nThis lecture series is made possi ble by the Spitzer Architecture Fund and the generous support of Frank Sci ame ’74\, CEO of Sciame Construction. CATEGORIES:Events,Lectures,Sciame Lectures LOCATION:Sciame Auditorium (Room 107)\, 141 Convent Avenue\, New York\, NY\ , 10031\, United States GEO:40.8177595;-73.95047339999996 X-APPLE-STRUCTURED-LOCATION;VALUE=URI;X-ADDRESS=141 Convent Avenue\, New Yo rk\, NY\, 10031\, United States;X-APPLE-RADIUS=100;X-TITLE=Sciame Auditori um (Room 107):geo:40.8177595,-73.95047339999996 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York X-LIC-LOCATION:America/New_York BEGIN:DAYLIGHT DTSTART:20260308T030000 TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR