Director of The North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences (NCMNS), Eric Dorfman joins Knute Berger to unveil the science, planning and the process of acquisitions for Dorfman’s former Museum’s (Carnegie Natural History Museum) upcoming exhibition, “Nature’s Rainbow,” illuminating diversity in gender and sexuality among fish, reptiles, amphibians, birds, and mammals, including primates. In this talk, Eric shares how this diversity develops from the action of genes and hormones and how people come to differ from each other in all aspects of body and behavior.

Knute “Mossback” Berger is Crosscut’s Editor-at-Large and host of the Mossback’s Northwest TV series on KCTS 9. He writes about politics and regional heritage. Previously he served as Editor-in-Chief of Seattle Weekly, Editor & Publisher of Eastsideweek, and as Managing Editor of Washington Magazine. He is Editor-at-Large for Seattle Magazine and has written two books, “Pugetopolis” and “Space Needle, Spirit of Seattle.” He is a regular commentator on KUOW-FM and a Rainier Club Fellow.

Puget Sound Mycological Society Past President Marian Maxwell was featured in our Communiversity arts and lectures series on October 26, 2020 to explain the basics of mushroom collecting, including seasons for mushroom hunting, permits required, types of mushrooms to look for, cooking, dangers, and where to hunt. Marian studied mycology under the renowned Dr. Daniel Stuntz and received a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Washington. She is a Past President of the Puget Sound Mycological Society (2010-2015), is currently the Outreach Chairperson, and has served as one of their lead identifiers, educators, and scientific display chairpersons for over 20 years. Ted Alvarez moderated the dialog with Marian and our audience as we learned how to explore the outdoors by foraging for a vast Northwest resource—mushrooms!

Ted Alvarez is an editor at Crosscut and KCTS 9 focused on science and the environment. His work has also appeared in Backpacker, Grist.org, Air Canada En Route, Outside, Alaska Beyond, Rolling Stone, Men’s Health, Skiing, Scientific American and many other outlets. He is the author of The Survival Hacker’s Handbook and National Parks Coast To Coast: 100 Best Hikes.

Richard Ross is an internationally-recognized photographer focusing on the American juvenile justice system and social equity. Recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Annie E. Casey and MacArthur Foundations, Mr. Ross was awarded both Fulbright and Guggenheim Fellowships. His most recent work, the In Justice series, turns a lens on the placement and treatment of American juveniles housed by law in facilities that treat, confine, punish, assist and, occasionally, harm them. Shaminder Dulai will join Richard, in conversation, about his life’s work, many books, and traveling exhibitions of the work that continues to see great success while Ross collaborates with juvenile justice stakeholders, using the images as a catalyst for change.

Hundreds of thousands of people around the world contribute bird observations to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology each year, providing data on a scale once unimaginable. Scientists use these data to reveal how birds are affected by habitat loss, pollution, disease, climate, and other environmental changes. NestWatch, the Lab’s citizen-science project on nesting birds, has been monitoring nesting birds’ reproductive success since the 1960s. This long-term database is the nation’s richest source of information on avian reproductive biology. Project Leader, Robyn Bailey, was joined by Ted Alvarez from Crosscut in Seattle in a discussion about current research, education, and communication initiatives for NestWatch. Learn about small things we can all do to help birds every day. This event was held on April 13, 2020, online.

The relationship between music and spirituality spans the globe. Indian ragas are an especially powerful and unique example of this tradition. Thousands of years ago, Hindus envisioned them as manifestations of the divine. While some songs are memorized, the style itself is largely a melodic framework for improvisation. Centrum gathered musicians and scholars to discuss the history and theory of this music, and to play it. Award-winning Hindustani vocalist Srivani Jade and professional tabla player Ravi Joseph Albright performed selections with local musician Saikat Ray and sat for conversation with Wes Cecil, professor of English and the Humanities at Peninsula College. The event was held on March 9, 2020, in the Wheeler Theater.

In a time of newsroom layoffs, hot takes, "fake news" and intense political polarization, it can be difficult to find in-depth journalism that takes the time to explore underrepresented communities or attempt to tackle the world's toughest questions. But Fred de Sam Lazaro is someone who's been doing just that for over three decades. Lazaro is the executive director of the Under-Told Stories Project, a journalism and teaching endeavor that documents the consequences of poverty around the world and the work being done to address them. He is an award-winning journalist who's been a correspondent with the PBS Newshour since 1985. He's reported from over 70 countries on topics such as labor, sex trafficking, public health and immigration, and directed films from India and the Democratic Republic of Congo for the acclaimed documentary series, Wide Angle. He talks with Crosscut editor-at-large Knute Berger as part of the Communiversity series hosted by Centrum, a Port Townsend-based nonprofit arts organization. The event was held February 3, 2020, at the Salish Coast Elementary School.