Profs and Pints Meetup-Metro DC

Profs and Pints Northern Virginia presents: “Mental Health in an Unhinged World,” a guide to managing stress in turbulent times that evoke big existential questions, with Jillian Tucker, licensed clinical social worker in private practice and an adjunct professor of clinical social work at Columbia University and New York University.

[Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/nv-unhinged-world .]

It’s tough to stay grounded when the world seems upside-down.

So much of what’s going on around us can feel overwhelming, especially at a time when globalization and the omnipresence of social media increase our exposure to conflict and to troubling international and national news. Adding to the stress: Many of these crises bring up core questions about morality, mortality, the unknown, and life’s meaning.

There’s good news, however: People have figured out how to get through turbulent times before, and the fields of psychology and neuroscience have affirmed the wisdom of many of their coping strategies while helping equip us with new ones.

Learn how to better cope with chaos with Jillian Tucker, an award-winning clinical practice instructor who previously has given excellent Profs and Pints talks.

She’ll provide valuable context by discussing how humans have always dealt with existential stressors—in fact, many of the earliest human objects, traditions and stories reflect effort to make sense of life. You’ll learn how people have coped with turbulent times throughout history by drawing from cultural and ancestral experience and wisdom as well as other sources of resilience. We’ll examine a full range of coping skills from history, philosophy, spirituality, art, literature, music, and dance.

Dr. Tucker also will discuss coping skills rooted in modern psychology and neuroscience. She’ll talk about neuroscientific research finding that spirituality, in a broad sense, can help protect us from distress. You’ll learn about biological, psychological, social, environmental, and movement-based strategies for managing short- and long-term stressors. You’ll also get tips on how to assess your current individual and group coping skills and make sure you have the right skills when you need them. You’ll gain a newfound appreciation of the value of seeking joy, connection, and mirth as an antidote to the stress in our lives.

You’ll gain insight into how the global situation can distress us on an individual level. We’ll look at the role that our digital lives play in exacerbating stressors and how to curate digital overuse while still using technology to maintain social connections and bring meaningful change. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.)

Image by Canva.

Profs and Pints DC presents: “Whistler and the Peacock Room,” on the strange history and artistic significance of one of the city’s most beautiful spaces, with Rebecca Jeffrey Easby, associate professor of art history at Trinity Washington University and scholar of Victorian Art.

[Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/profsandpints/whistler-peacock-room .]

The Peacock Room of the Smithsonian’s Freer Gallery is a hidden gem, an amazing work of interior decorative art, and a space originally meant to look otherwise and exist elsewhere. Initially built in the 19th century as the dining room of a luxurious London townhouse, it became the site of one of the most public and celebrated battles ever pitting an artist against a patron.

The story of how the Peacock Room came to be and to exist within the Smithsonian offers a fascinating lens for examining the workings of the art world and the mind and career of an important and irrepressible American artist, James McNeill Whistler.

Explore the fascinating story of the Peacock Room and the controversy surrounding it with Rebecca Easby, a scholar of 19th century art and Victorian exhibition practices who previously has given excellent Profs and Pints talks on the impressionist artists whose works are on display in our city.

Professor Easby will familiarize us with the checkered career of Whistler, an artist known to be witty, temperamental, and a troublemaker. You’ll learn about his connection with the Aesthetic Movement, which championed “art for art’s sake”—stressing appearance over function—and helped pave the way for modern art. We’ll discuss how this style can be seen in Whistler’s paintings, many of which now hang in the Freer and in the National Gallery of Art, and talk about the Peacock Room as the product of the vogue for Asian art in Victorian England.

You’ll learn how the Peacock Room began as a collaboration—and ended as a point of bitter contention—between Whistler and his wealthy patron Frederick Leyland, a Liverpool shipping magnet. It was intended to reflect both Leyland’s passion for collecting and the Asian-influenced aesthetic of the time, but it also came to reflect what can happen when relations between artist and patron go south.

Finally, we’ll look at how the Peacock Room made its way to the Smithsonian by way of Detroit.

It’s a talk that will be full of spicy Victorian gossip and scandal and have you eager to visit the Peacock Room on your own. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.)

Image: The Peacock Room as captured in a photo by Smithsonian's Freer and Sackler Galleries.

Profs and Pints DC presents: “Understanding Emerging Markets,” on developing economies and markets around the globe in a time of political upheaval, with Gary Kleiman and Beth Morrissey, lecturers at the Georgetown School of Foreign Service, international analysts and consultants, and co-authors of Emerging Economies and Financial Markets.

[Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/profsandpints/dc-emerging-markets .]

As the US dollar dives, interest in emerging economies has rebounded to levels last seen before the global financial crisis nearly 20 years ago. Gain a deep understanding of emerging and frontier economies and financial markets with Gary Kleiman and Beth Morrissey, founders of Kleiman International Consultants, providers of research and strategic advice on economies worldwide to public- and private-sector clients, and authors of a definitive reference for training programs for professional analysts.

Among the key questions they’ll tackle: What’s the world economic outlook? Will the current tariff war derail investment opportunities and growth in large markets like India and Brazil? What will happen in smaller but booming ones, like Kenya and Ghana?

In terms accessible to a general audience, they’ll trace the evolution of emerging economies and markets since the late 1980s and chart the financial flows to them of foreign direct investment and investments in stocks, bonds, and currencies. They’ll familiarize you with the economic and financial market indicators used to assess the development of individual countries, and they’ll talk about how commodity prices, climate change, and geopolitics affect them.

We’ll look at the 2026 outlook based on changes in the global economy, withdrawals of foreign aid, and the impact of initiatives intended to promote sustainable development. Considered as part of the mix will be the rise of new tech in the Global South.

You’ll gain an appreciation of how following global money flows is key to understanding the world. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.)

Image by Canva.

Profs and Pints DC presents: “Those Who Gave Rise to Our Navy,” on the men who set sail for the American Revolution and their fates, with Abby Mullen, assistant professor of history at the United States Naval Academy and author of To Fix a National Character: The United States in the First Barbary War, 1800-1805.

[Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/profsandpints/dc-navy .]

Their ranks were Black as well as White and included the young and the old, the offspring of incredibly wealthy merchant families as well as the all-but-destitute. The British government called them pirates and charged them with treason. Even George Washington referred to some of them as rascals. Yet all were willing to take to sea and take great risks as sailors in the fight against Great Britain.

Why did they do it?

As we approach the 250th birthday of the U.S. Navy, let’s become familiar with the kinds of people who joined it at the outset, with Professor Abby Mullen, who teaches midshipmen classes on naval history and has given excellent Profs and Pints talks on the Barbary Wars.
We’ll look at where American Revolutionary sailors came from, what motivated them to go to sea, and what happened to them during their service. We’ll examine the many ways they could serve as part of the Continental Navy, as part of state navies, or as privateers.

Finally, we’ll look at what happened to them in the long run, and how some ended up imprisoned by the British after being captured while others were discharged from their ship after the war as the Continental Navy got sold off bit by bit. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. The talk starts 30 minutes later.)

Image: A 1779 naval battle involving American and British ships as painted by Richard Paton in 1780 (Royal Academy / Public Domain).